Exciting sightings whilst at Linyanti Discoverer Camp
On a recent trip at Linyanti Discoverer, we were treated to some great elephant sightings for this time of year. Elephants in the Linyanti tend to move in to the Mopane woodlands during the rainy season and start to come back along the Linyanti River towards May, though for the past two years elephants seem to have not shown much movement into the woodland, preferring to stay closer to the permanent Linyanti River.
The three nights at Linyanti produced some great wild dog and lions sightings. Our first night in camp we were treated to a male lions’ roar - it continued reverberating through the air until dawn. From the night calls, we could ascertain that the male was coming from Chobe national park walking along the river towards the South East. I found his tracks just before the sun rise and we continued to track him for a few hours with no luck. In the afternoon we did not see any fresh tracks, and eventually we decided to stop for our sundowners not far from where we last saw the tracks. As my guest were having their first sip of Chardonnay we heard the male lion call… we immediately packed up and went on the chase. We finally caught up with the Chobe male, walking along the road - we followed him for a while till he moved off into some thick mopane shrubs.
The next day we decided to go out for most of the day – we were lucky enough to find the lionesses of the Linyanti pride – we were very lucky to see their cubs, small and very fragile, the mother picked them up in her mouth and carried them into a more protected patch of dense bush before moving off on the hunt. This pride (consisting of two lionesses, one juvenile male and one adult male) has struggled to raise cubs for the past years, as some cubs are known to have been killed by intruding male lions, male leopards and hyenas. We are certainly hoping they will be more successful with the latest batch of new born lion cubs.
On our last morning, we also tracked some wild dogs, which we were sure were not the resident Linyanti pack, (As they have been seen further south). The tracks and calls were from six dogs - which I think broke away from the Zibadiaja pack…These dogs were on the hunt and we could not keep up with them, as they headed to the far east of our camp. Hopefully they will settle in this area and provide us with some excellent viewing opportunities in future.
What a fantastic 3 days indeed!
