No two safaris are ever the same. Sometimes you encounter the Big 5 in one game drive, other times the animals hide from the prying eyes of the public.
Rare safari encounters happen often, as Kurt Schultz from Kurt Safari recently witnessed when he encountered a baboon steal a lion cub.
Schultz was on his way back from a meeting in the Kruger National Park when he witnessed the unusual sighting. He told Kruger Sightings that he had a meeting at Skukuza and decided to enter the park to get some pictures.
As he drove into the S21, one of the roads near Skukuza, he witnessed a troop of baboons. The baboons were restless. Schultz watched on.
He watched as the other baboons focused their attention on a baboon who carried something close to him.
That particular something turned out to be a lion cub.
“Knowing the area, I know there are cubs present in the area lately. Being early in the morning, and close to a granite rock face, I suppose the baboon troop rested during the evening on the rocks,” he told Kruger Sightings.
Schultz initially thought it was a female baboon, but later realised it was a young male baboon.
“The young baboon crossed the road and climbed up a marula tree. I waited for about 30 minutes before it came into view. He was moving from tree to tree. The rest of the troop then moved away and the baboon was grooming and caring for the lion cub as if this was a young baboon.
“I spent about an hour at the sighting and decided to leave as I had a meeting at 9am. It is normal for a troop of baboons to kill young leopard and even lion, however after 20 years of guiding this is the first time I have seen a baboon nurturing and caring for a young predator cub,” he said.