2011-09-20 – Masai Mara G.R.

Back in 2007 and 2008 there was a young female Leopard living on a particular river in the central Mara. Lorian, this is her name, has always very confident and was almost a guaranteed daily sighting in those days. At the end of 2008 she disappeared from the area she had been using so extensively and since then sightings of her have been sporadic and occasional. In the meantime she grew to be an adult female. In December 2010 she was seen with her first litter of two cubs, but unfortunately she lost both. I haven’t seen her for almost three years so when news spread that she had been seen and that she seems to be suckling, we decided to head there and look for her. We missed her in the morning but our spotter found her. We were waiting for the Wildebeests to cross so we decided to go to her in the afternoon. The area was so dense of bushes that when we found her we could only get glimpses of her, just enough to positively identify her with my Leopards’ ID pictures. It was fantastic to see her, now we can only hope that she actually has cubs and to see them soon! In the evening, for the last African sunset for my guests, we had the male Lion Notch walking beautifully on the horizon after sundown.