Recce to the border and Serval kittens!!!

On the morning of the 8th we took a drive around the Mugoro pride territory to look for the mugoro females and to hopefully find out which males were holding tenure of this pride, we had heard stories that the 4km boys had returned but at the same time news that the Olooloolo males were in situ here. So slightly confusing! However, despite looking in all of their favourite haunts we were unsuccessful, not so suprising as these females often go AWOL for a number of days at a time. So after ceasing this mission we decided to trundle toward the Tanzanian border where the game was more prolific and in the hope of maybe finding cheetah.

Very few game vehicles seem to travel to this area so we had the place to ourselves as we cruised along the border posts with a clear view into Tanzania. There was plenty of prey species for cheetah but little sign of them. Many of the wildebeest herds that we had seen the day prior had moved further south with just a few small herds remaining. We continued on our journey toward the area held by the 'border/[Oldonya Nasipa?]pride. A pride held by three males, two of which we photographed last year. It was then that we met along the road one of our good friends, ranger Alfred Betts, who works on the anti harrasment/anti poaching team. After having a general catch up we then got onto the serious business of lions!, mentioning that we were on the look out to see if the three males were in the area still. Alfred happened to mention that morning he had seen a male in the direction we were headed and very kindly showed us where.

Soon enough we came across the male, although the sun was gaining in intensity he was still in the open and with enough of an opportunity to check against our ID files and get some nice shots. Sure enough it was one of the border males we had photographed the year prior and given he was in a similar area we could only assume he and his pride mates still held this territory. He did however look a little lean in weight and had perhaps been on his territorial rounds for a few days as he certainly had not fed on anything substantial in the last 3/4 days. He now had the most impressive mane, not particularly dark but with huge coverage, he certainly was the most majestic and beautiful male. Soon the sun was just too hot for him to bare so sensibly he took shade under the tree and this signalled time for us to leave.

The afternoon of the 8th was very cloudy, terrible for photography but on the upside providing better potential for increased animal behaviour. However, despite this it was a quiet afternoon, that frustratingly culminated in finding the same three Cheetah we had seen the day prior. We say frustrating as it was literally after sunset and almost dark. However, although on the verge of darkness it was enough to make out that it was 3 young males, speaking to the rangers at the sighting they had mentioned one of the males had been car hopping which was interesting as very rarely have cheetahs on the MT side been seen to do this. We suspected these males could perhaps been Shingo's boys or maybe even Amani's, but without fully checking there were a number of suspects who these could have been but it seemed they may well have originated from the Narok side. They were highly mobile but sadly it was just too late to follow as the time was fast approaching 7pm, when we needed to be back in camp.

This brings us to the morning of the 9th, and what was a great morning it was. Firstly we finally found who we believed to be an Olooloolo male (TBC!!) not too far from the gate, interestingly he was with another male, who could not have been much more than 3-4 years old. The younger of the males, yet huge in bulk was highly mobile, scent marking and roaring frequently, while the other male followed him. However, struggling a little to keep up given he had quite some limp. It was a little confusing exactly who this younger male was. He was indeed behaving like a territorial male but quite a difference in age to the other male. Given the Olooloolo males (sons of Romeo and Claude) only took over in Early 2011 the maths did not add up to even suggest they were the offspring of the males (by now he would have technically have been ousted from the pride also) It did all seem rather odd, but perhaps this male was sired from the previous males and gained acceptance by the new males. Unusual but not impossible to consider. Speaking to the rangers later on at the gate they said this male was very often with the other male and now two of the other Olooloolo males were rarely with the pride these days and instead spending most of the time with the Owino/Sausage pride. Talking to several different people there were mixed stories regarding the relationship of the males.

With a bizarre but very lucky twist of fate we had a lovely signting of a serval mum and two kittens after seeing the two males. I had asked Andy to stop the vehicle as I wanted to check what initially looked like a lion under a tree in the far distance, it turned out I was totally wrong and it was a 'log lion'! However, as we had stopped something much nearer suddenly caught my eye close to a large bush and in the long grass, immediately I could see it was a serval kitten bounding around, then mum appeared and then another kitten! Awesome!!! They were so unbelievably cute!! They pounced and played in the grass, it was amazing to watch and the first time we had seen serval babies. Then fortunately they both bounded toward a dead tree and sprang up it with amazing agility. It was again one of those moments when lens caps and tele converters were flying around inside the car! We knew we had limited time to get some shots before they would descend again, it was some way off but we still captured a couple of nice images. The cutest little cats ever! Sure enough they stayed up the tree only a short time before mum brought them to order and back onto the ground. They moved into another area of dense coverage and as mum went off hunting nearby they frolicked about, occasionally seeing tails flying and bodies flying into the air. Not that long after we saw the mother serval trotting back with a catch, with what looked like a large rodent. She called them across and they bounded after her and then we lost sight of them, no doubt enjoying some of the feast mum had procured. At this point we this left them to their meal as supper would not doubt be followed by a rest!

Just a km or so further up the track we then came across more lions, more members of the Olooloolo pride, flat out under the protection of an acacia and nearby an adult female who was lactacting, she moved across the plains after looking as if she was trying hunt. She moved into a culvert and here we assumed there must be cubs. Later that afternoon we returned and indeed found the female again having been joined by another with 7 x gorgeous 3 month old cubs. Sadly there were quite a few vehicles all vying for a photographic opportunity yet they were in such long grass that gaining any images was going to be nigh on impossible. So we decided to leave the cubs to it and hopefully we would find them again before we left the Mara triangle. The next day we planned to move to the central part of the Mara Triangle and here we hoped to spend a little more time looking for the Mugoro pride as well as continuing to recce more of the area and of course looking for more cats!

Border male

Oloololo male

Male companion to above

Cute serval kittens

 

 

 

 

 

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