‘There’s a carcass in the thicket, you just can’t see it.” Our safari guide Farai Chuma has way of seeing things the regular eye misses. He somehow spotted the lions from more than a kilometre away across the golden savannah, driving us to within metres of four females and four cubs. A short distance away stands the pride’s dominant male, guarding whatever is in the thicket. We soon find out. He dives in and drags out the gory remains of a buffalo, a project he’s clearly been working on for some time. The females and cubs raise their heads, but don’t approach. “The male is full,” says Farai, “but he won’t let the females eat.”
My wife is equal parts astonished and affronted. “This pride needs a feminist revolution,” she quips. I worry for a second she might jump out of the 4WD and start marching towards the lionesses distributing copies of Betty Friedan books. But before she has a chance, Farai makes the case for the patriarchy, explaining that having a strong, dominant male is in the females’ best interest. If a new male enters the territory and succeeds in an overthrow, he will kill their cubs, clearing the decks to establish his own bloodline. With a dinner invitation not forthcoming, the lionesses turn their attention to a herd of buffalo arriving at a waterhole across the plains. An evening hunt looks on the cards, the aftermath of which we’ll discover soon enough.
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