Lion Update - October

Gobbolina and Meatball

After a very chilly winter, summer has finally arrived in Namibia. However, as the temperature heats up, the insects have come out to play, causing problems for our lovely lions - Meatball, Gobbolina, Clarence, Winnie and Nancy. 
  



The biggest pest for large carnivores during the hot summer season is horse flies which plague the cats by burrowing deep into their fur and biting into their skin. It seems ironic that such small insects can cause our strong lions such discomfort!

Winnie

Gobbolina

Meatball and Gobbolina

The only way to rid them of the flies and insects is to spray flea repellant onto the big cats. We use Frontline which not only kills the flies on the animals but prevents re-infestation. Now spraying flea repellant on huge lions through a fence is no easy task! 

Using a standard sized spray bottle, it's necessary to lure the lions close enough to the fence to spray through the fence, onto their bodies. Usually in the males' case, their manes are so large most of the spray ends up there! We carry this out during feeding time as it's the easiest time to get the lions to come close to the fence and then if they get a bit too close we can throw meat to keep them happy.

Meatball

We've been keeping a close eye on Clarence, Winnie and Nancy recently as last month we noticed their fenceline had been damaged. It seems the lions have been getting a little feisty and were crashing against the electric wire on the fence to their enclosure. With their weight, which is somewhere between 180 - 250kg each animal, this can cause some extensive damage! In fact, it caused a huge hole in the fence! 

Nancy

Nancy

Farm Manager Hardus quickly found some large boulders to block up the hole until he and his workers were able to fix the fence properly. Any work to the lion enclosure requires caution and precision with everyone on high alert at all time. Volunteers were stationed all around the entire enclosure to keep an eye on the lions and their movements, so the men could focus their attention on fixing the fence wires without worrying whether a lion was heading their way! 

Fortunately, Clarence, Winnie and Nancy were more interested with the horse heads they were fed to keep them distracted, and the men could complete the work safely.

Clarence

Clarence

Similarly, we needed to enter Meatball and Gobbolina's enclosure to give it a bit of a clean out - whilst the lions are still in there. We always aim to avoid sedating the animals where possible as it causes them distress and is a risk to the animal's health. Instead, we use distraction to keep the lions busy whilst work is done on the other side of the enclosure. 

Meatball

So the time came for their camp to be cleaned - daily feeding of red meat leaves behind an awful lot of bones, not to mention excrement which needs cleaning up. With volunteers and staff stationed all around the camp, with radios for constant communication, we were able to keep a close eye on the lions, whilst another group of staff and volunteers entered the camp cautiously with buckets and quickly gathered up as many carcasses as they could. The amount they found was astonishing - these lions certainly like their food! We even found the remains of 3 bat eared foxes, who had clearly snuck in through the fence by mistake, only to meet their inevitable fate of walking into the lion's den...