2011-06-29 – Masai Mara N.R.

Another wonderful day, mostly with Shingo and her cubs. Shingo hunted a Thompson’s gazelle fawn in the morning, and quite unusually she decided not to call her cubs after catching it, and to eat it most by herself. The cubs waited besides a bush a couple of hundred meters away and were called only when the scraps were left. They squabbled among themselves and played chasing each other. In the afternoon nothing much happened until a herd of Impalas came running down the hill straight towards them, at around 6.00pm. Shingo was up fast, followed by the cubs, and they all chased a fawn and caught it. The cubs started playing with it, practicing their hunting skills, tripping it and chasing it repeatedly, until a Spotted Hyena came to the scene, attracted by the commotion. The cubs left the fawn on its own, and the fawn went to the ground, hiding completely in a patch of bushes. The Hyena searched for it but couldn’t find it. The Cheetahs laid scattered and the Hyena did the same, it laid flat to the ground nearby, completely still. After about ten minutes, the cubs thought that the Hyena had gone and they went back for the fawn and flushed it, but at that point the Hyena ran to them, snatched the fawn and tore it into pieces in a matter of few seconds. Very interesting interaction, rather low light for photography though.