Back with the Manyari!
I picked up Manyari shortly before sunset in the Chekwa area. And oh my! she was not a pretty looking girl. She looked like she’d eaten an elephant. Every seam in her body was ready to burst.
Of course in that state she wasn’t going anywhere.
As I drove closer 2 adult male lions left her moving into the Mopanie woodland to hide from the vehicle. These are the 2 nervous male lions that are being seen more and more regularly in the Banyini area.
But why was Manyari here on her own? Is she in oestrus?
The 3 moved east after dark and the males relaxed down a little, the one being more nervous of us than the other.
They shadowed Manyari’s every move competing to be at her side, sometimes rushing ahead to be the one. And Manyari seemed to be enjoying the attention.
The lions drank at Banyini pan, the males away from us and Manyari right next to the vehicle.
All the passed out with their over-sized bellies.
This whole situation is perfect for us to habituate the males. They’re so keen to be with Manyari and with us sticking close to her they too have to follow suit or else the other guy gets lucky.
And it did work amazingly well. So much so that even at dawn in daylight the one male was happy to lie about 20m away.
In the middle of the night the lions moved north, the males still vying to be next to Manyari. On reaching the airstrip we lost them as they took off north. Why were they suddenly running at such pace.
We lost them moving into the first row of hills. Moving around and waiting for them to hopefully come past us, I heard hyaenas squabbling and hassling another lion to the north.
We took off in the direction and arrived at the rotten giraffe carcass at the same time as Manyari and her escorts. They’d chased off the other lion and the hyaenas were nowhere to be seen.
Having taken over the giraffe carcass the 3 roared staking their claim to the rotting meat.
Being already so well fed the lions didn’t feed and lay around.
I drove up close to Manyari but the males weren’t that brave to stay by her side and lay off about 5m from her.
While she slept something suddenly triggered in the males as they charged towards her. The clashed before getting to her in an aggressive attack on each other running off with Manyari as she took fright.
As quickly as it started it was all over and the rest of the night was quiet with only Manyari feeding at dawn while her escorts watched.
So what is going on with the males and Manyari? Is she coming into season, was she in season?
Whatever it is is good news. She seems to be setting up her own pride with these males and her cubs will probably join her. I wonder who else will join her pride?
Interesting times ahead as Manyari breaks away from the Nduna pride and these 2 new males form a new pride with her.
It looks like the giraffe bull died of natural causes and has been dead for several days. Vultures were waiting patiently in the scattered trees all around when I left.
Recent Comments