We set out this afternoon needing two of the big five to call it a done deal; the rhino and the famous Leopard.

I knew of a leopard that was seen earlier on during the day on a kill so I thought we should go out a little sooner than usual. As we got to the area where this leopard was seen, we saw the kill underneath a bush but no leopard in site so we sat there for a few minutes talking about the kill when all of a sudden here came the male leopard strolling in and started to feed.

This was truly a sighting of a life time but as we get ready to leave my tracker spots another leopard heading our way; a female this time. We could not believe our eyes; to have two leopards in one sighting is extremely rare. The female started making sounds as if she was calling a cub so we went to investigate. As we followed her we saw what she was looking for – a poor baby leopard that had been killed by the male. This is called infantiside when males of the same species kill a cub of the same species, most of the time in order to mate with the female. It was extremely sad to witness this reality.

However, it was an amazing sighting and my guests enjoyed it despite the loss of the baby leopard.

JT – Kapama River Lodge
07/02/2013