A few days ago Lion Guardian Pilenanka came across a zebra that had been killed by lions not far from camp. We went down to see the carcass, and found that not very much had been eaten, and realised the lions would probably come back to the kill that night. We decided this was the perfect opportunity to put up the camera trap, and see whether the lions came back to their kill!
We carefully set up the trap by a nearby tree, and left it overnight to see who arrived at the scene of the kill. When we came back to the site the next day we found the trap had been opened up and was hanging off the tree, and covered in hairs, bite marks, blood and saliva!
The camera was switched off, and we feared that it had been completely destroyed, by what looked from the tracks to be a huge male lion!
We rushed back to camp to see whether the camera had been able to take any photos before it was attacked. It was then that we found out who the culprit was – our collared male lion Kesayou!
Unfortunately he was on the wrong side of the zebra to get a very good photo, but we have got 2, which we can recognise him from. Kesayou is extremely camera shy, and obviously did not want to be photographed while eating the zebra!
Luckily the camera still works, and once it is cleaned up it should be perfectly fine again. Next time we will have to put the trap out of his reach!!
Kesayou was not a happy chappy when it comes to modern media!
maybe he just does not like the smell of people and their things?
Agree, the smell and what it represents (even if in this case it was placed there from friends) would have been enough for him to make his point !
Wow, impressive paw. But one thing bothers me. Recenly I read report of Amboseli Lion project. They had two females of about 109 and 112 kg, and two young males of ~150 and 160 kg. They suggested that Amboseli lions were smaller than in other parts of Kenya. Can you confirm this? Can you post some weights of your adult lions (Sangale, Ndelie, Lentim etc)?
Oh, my goodness!!!! That’s all I can say!!
We aren’t able to weigh all the lions we capture but we do have Lentim’s & Ndelie’s weights recorded as 180kg and 200kg respectively. We also have weights of three adult females recorded ranging from 130 to 150kgs. These weights are a bit larger than the weights recorded from the Amboseli lions though quite a bit smaller than the few weights we have recorded from our northern Laikipia lion project. In Laikipia, we have two female lions on record weighing in at 148kg & 180kg! So there may be some truth to the lions in southern Kenya Amboseli area being smaller than in other areas of Kenya. Unfortunately, we don’t have enough data to be certain.