Saturday, January 21, 2012

Another day spent at the leopard gorge

I spent the day again today at the gorge, staring into a small bush for 8hrs! This is the small bush on a ridge at theleopard gorge where i spent about the same time again waiting for zawadi to come out and pose for us. Teh wait today was longer but of course having warmed up yesterady, i was all set for teh wait.
I arrived at the leopard gorge some minutes to 7am and found nobody there, so i had to look around to find zawadi. I was able to locate her within minutes and what a gift! She came out and sat on teh rock in teh nice morning light. However, the cub did not join her ruining what would have been a nice mother/cub potrait on the rock in nice golden morning light. After taking some shots she went back to the bush again. this seemed to have been teh end of the show for the day, we did not have another great pose.
It was around 10.30am whne a Hyaena came to where zawadi was with her cub. the hyaena went round and at some point was close to teh cub, causing zawadi to engage in some confrontation. She did not manage to ward the hyanean off completely. Bith animals went to sepnd the day ont eh opposite side of the same bush. This led us to worry for the cub, but without our knowledge, the cub had gone up a very thin tree trunk. I then waited and waited, untill the hyaena left the scene around 4pm. I also gave up at 6.30pm after waiting for hours.
Today i and my guest were the only “die hards” to brave the baking sun, staring into the small bush across the gorge hoping for zawadi to come out and pose once more. But well.............. this is ‘my office’ where nothing sticks to a partern/routine and no rule has been set for our subjects! Things just unfold and you find out as you go! Welcome to my office cum bush school, there is a lot to learn here!
Zawadi on her favourite lookout rock, this morning

Playing with her cub

A beautiful view of the northern entrance into the gorge

Zawadi warding off an intruding Hyaena

2 comments:

dotcombs said...

It is so wonderful to see Zawadi after so many years still active and with a cub. We see the Big Cat Diary here and so see her as a baby herself.

bernie bee said...

Hi Paul thanks for your patients of these beautiful photos I do appreciate them. So scary the hyena sniffing about!!! You take care... Who knows
we all may meet up in March on our safari. B.

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