Oh my gawd. It was a large felid bonanza today at the Ngorongoro crater. Let me tell you how it all went down:
We had arrived early at the Ngorongoro conservation area to descend into the crater floor and view animals at their peak activity. It was spectacular.
Imagine (I put a picture below) a large, open field of grass with mountains in the distance, birds flying overhead, and anxious little gazelles prancing around – that’s what it looked like inside the crater! There were so many different microenvironments, including marshlands, open prairies, canopied forests, and natural lakes, which housed the 21 unique species I observed throughout the day.
The Ngorongoro Crater
Most importantly, I saw my FIRST large felid: the African Lion, panthera leo leo. The lion seemed to be a relatively young male who had suffered significant injuries. He had large, deep, wounds on either of his sides; he was rolling around restlessly in the grass, likely due to his discomfort. We’ve crafted two theories to explain his wounds:
- He tried, and desperately failed, to hunt a buffalo: due to the shape and position of his wounds, it’s possible this young male tried to hunt his first buffalo and was impaled by fiesty prey.
- He was booted from his pride: just a few miles down the road, we encountered another pride of lions – roughly five adult females and one adult male. Interestingly, the male had a large gash on his side, too. We think it’s possible the younger lion tried to take over this pride and was outcompeted by the older predator.
The Injured Lion
Since we only visited the Ngorongoro crater to see large felids, we rapidly lost interest and left shortly after viewing them. Just kidding, but we did leave very soon after so we could make it to our campsite at Olduvai Gorge before dark.
We arrived and set up camp just in time for dinner with Dr. Dominguez-Rodrigo’s excavation team. Dinner was cooked over an open fire by local Maasai who worked at the station – I was quite impressed by the spread they had prepared: bone-in chicken, boiled potatoes, squash soup, and rolls. For dessert, everyone got to watch my presentation on large felids. Yippee!
We crashed around 11 pm to the soothing sound of violent winds against our tents… supposedly we got lucky and experienced a rare windstorm on our first night here. Another day, another victory.
