Report by: Leon Lamprecht
Location: Selous Game Reserve
Date: 15 August 2006
Lion Survey
We are already into August and we keep on getting more and more surprises. We arrived in our Rungwa Ikili hunting block a couple of days ago and on the previous hunt a hunting client, Jeff Sevor, hunting with PH Hilary Daffi, shot a magnificent lion. Our policy for this first year was to not sell any lion hunts but should clients see mature males away from prides they would be allowed to shoot them. The main criteria being that the lions should be at least six years of age and not be part of a pride.
Research has shown that although lions are active in breeding until a lot later age, the best time to harvest them is at six years. There is a lot of fighting among male lions to establish territories and by leaving the lions longer you might loose some of your huntable population. By the age of six the male lions have also done most of their breeding and the genes have been carried along.
In Madaba, in the Selous Game Reserve where we have been hunting for the past 10 days, we have seen numerous lions. Being our first year operating in these areas one of our main priorities apart from learning more about the population is to find out about the distribution of the game. Jack and I have spent a lot of time walking riversides and hills in areas where we do not have roads to do this. One morning while walking the Matanga River we heard lions roar in the distance ahead of us. About an hour later reaching the downwind side of some springs in the river, we saw nine lions laying in the sand. The pride consisted of two old females, four cubs (including some young males about 18 months old and three cubs about nine months old). A pride like this will be made up of sisters and their offspring. After the sighting and some video we proceeded along the river and heard more roaring ahead of us. It was about another hour when we spotted a large female laying to the side in the shade of some trees. Closer investigation showed that she was accompanied by a younger animal, probably a young female. On two different occasions we spotted four young males together. These were more than 30 kilometers apart and would have been two different groups.
One morning after leaving camp (about 30 minutes after first light) we spotted a big, old male lion on the side of the road. This lion was walking when we saw him. He turned towards us and laid down at about 40 yards. He was not spooked by our presence at all which was very encouraging. We were not hunting lion in this area but this was definitely a shootable lion being old and solitary. It would not have taken too much effort to drive away with the hunting vehicle and return on foot to do a stalk on him. We were also not too far from a riverine area with dense vegetation and lots of game where we could have baited this lion.
Although these were the only lions that we actually saw while hunting in Madaba we encountered signs of lion on most of the roads that we drove in the mornings and most of the rivers that we walked.
Upon our arrival in Rungwa we decide that we should climb Ikili Mountain on our first day of the hunt to get a better idea of the area. Ikili Mountain, at 6200 feet, has a lot of springs that attract game, especially buffalo in the dry season. We saw a lot of buffalo activity in the valleys we walked but did not get to see any buffalo. It was decided to return the following morning and investigate a valley that we did not have time to walk the first day. Unfortunately the wind was not in our favor and we decided to leap frog ahead and glassed the valley from the high ground along the sides. Jack spotted some bush pig that we successfully stalked. We only managed to get up to 40 yards of a big boar with a female and young one at about 20 yards. Jack shot the boar with his bow and as is customary we waited awhile before following the bush pig. When we started following the bush pig we heard a lot of growling and a stampede following the growling. The noise could have been a leopard catching our bush pig but it sounded more like buffalo. Upon investigation we found a herd of buffalo about 100 yards from where we were. After getting on some tall boulders to get a better view of the valley we spotted the buffalo in a swampy area at some springs below us in the valley. The buffalo were very restless and we thought it might be because of our scent. For no reason the buffalo took off up the opposite side of the valley and it was only at this stage that we saw two lionesses stalking the buffalo. The lionesses made several attempts at killing a buffalo but were unsuccessful. These lions were more than likely inexperienced at killing buffalo or too young. At one stage an old buffalo bull turned around and charged the approaching lions, a second bull followed and then the whole herd. We had ringside seats and the view from this vantage point was quite spectacular.
Three days later while driving in an area called Buffalo Basin in the early morning, we spotted a male lion off the side of the road. This lion was probably a four year old and already had a very nice ginger mane. We have been seeing a lot of female activity in this area and he will definitely be doing some breeding here. On the same morning, Craig Middleton, the camp manager, saw a very nice black mane lion lying in the road along the Isawa River. The lion was still missing some mane along the ears but was more than likely at least four years of age.
PH Hilary Daffi and his clients saw a second lion with the lion that they shot. This lion was the same size and age but the color of the mane was slightly lighter than the black mane lion they shot. Also while on this safari in the Buffalo Basin area, they saw a three year old male with some females. This lion had a blonde mane.
My conclusion so far is that we will have some very good lion hunting to come. We will not make the mistake of selling lion hunts when we do not have the goods. You the client can rest assured that when we do start selling lion hunts we will have sufficient old males to give you a sporting chance.
We have just short of two weeks to go in Rungwa before Jack returns home and with a bit of luck we will shoot some animals and get baits out for the lion. With the excellent photographs we have been getting from our trail cameras so far on leopard it will be nice to see what we can get on lions.
I have said before that this year will be a learning curve for us but we are willing to learn. We did not expect to see too much the first couple of years due to some mismanagement by the previous managers but I am very happy and encouraged with what we have seen so far. Hopefully in the next few weeks I can report some more on what we are learning as the season progresses.
Happy hunting,
Leon Lamprecht
Managing Director
Tanzania Wildlife Company