2010-06-13 – Masai Mara N.R

Another fantastic day with Olive and the cubs. But the most amazing thing is that it all happened within our camp. In the morning we left for our game drive as usual to find the Leopards. At around nine am we were called back from the camp, with news that Olive and the cubs were having an Impala kill not more than twenty meters behind the camp’s tents, in the bushes. We rushed back and after some waiting, all three of them returned, Olive, Ngayoni and Paja. They were a bit more wary than usual because of human movement in the camp. Despite this, Ngayoni joined his mother to feed immediately and took a big fill. Olive fed after him but Paja tentatively came to the scene but didn’t eat. In the late morning they all left. At around five thirty Ngayoni returned on his own and ate extensively. Olive wasn’t seen at all in the afternoon. As darkness started falling Paja showed up from the bush and hissed repeatedly against his brother. Ngayoni hissed back and tried to drag the kill away, but Paja finally jumped on the kill and chased the brother. We were extremely happy that he finally had the kill all to himself and as he was about to start eating, a Spotted Hyena came out of nowhere and stole the kill. Paja showed enormous courage as he hissed, hit the Hyena with his paws, and remained attached to the kill as the Hyena took it away into the thick bush. We enjoyed all this interaction from our vehicle in order not to disturb them, and we had all people to stay away from the area to enable the Leopards to behave naturally. And we were just by ourselves. I only wished that Hyena didn’t come and that Paja, the shyest of the two cubs, could also take some bites our of it.