The week started off with a great sighting of with the Basile female leopard on an impala kill which she had hoisted in a tree and as expected the ever present hyenas waiting at the bottom hoping for some scraps to fall.
We had wonderful sightings of herds of elephants along the river, in the dry winter months the elephants frequent the river looking for the greener vegetation to feed on. We are very fortunate that here at Ulusaba the animals are well habituated to the vehicle and that it allows us to literally become 'one of the herd.' Sipho had a great close encounter on one of the sightings we had.
Sipho's close elephant encounter
The highlight of the week was most definitely seeing the Othawa pride with a Kudu kill in the river, one of the females on the second day dragged the whole carcass out so the cubs could start to feed. The guests enjoyed seeing the whole pride crossing the river.
Members of the Othawa pride with the Kudu kill in the river
The Mhangeni pride were also seen this week, Tom and Sipho had a great sighting of one of the lionesses hunting impala. For guests are guides its always very exciting to watch the build up to a potential hunt. Watching a lioness stalk and literally disappear in ambush and then suddenly the burst of speed is exhilarating. In this case she missed but the build up and chase was incredible.
Lion tracks
On one our drives we were lucky enough to see a male cheetah on a termite mound. This male cheetah is seen on occasions down in the south where the vegetation is a lot more open. This male covers a massive area, we estimate his range is over fifteen thousand hectares.
The male cheetah on the termite mound
Don't forget that you can catch us every Monday on #sofasafari, we're live on Instagram at 3pm BST/ 4pm SAST. Follow us here to get the reminders.
The latest #sofasafari episode from 5th July 2021.