Cecil’s Pride Alive and well – News from Wildcru

King’s Vision
Image Chris Collyer

Cecil and the Trans Kalahari Predator Project
May 13, 2016
The idiom has it that as time passes water flows under the bridge: David Macdonald observes that as we approach the anniversary of Cecil’s death that proverbial water has been a torrent, but amongst the turbulence of debate and the swell of concern for lion conservation there is good news from Hwange: Cecil’s three lionesses and seven cubs are still alive and well and, together with the surviving pride male, Jericho, still occupying what was formerly Cecil’s home range. We did have a scare when one of the females appeared ominously stationary but it turned out that she had shed her radio-collar, so all was well. The survival of all these lions is a personal delight to us, and a relief, but it’s also quite surprising. As is widely known now, when a pride male is killed that can lead to the overthrow of his coalition partners by incomers and the subsequent infanticide of the cubs, but this didn’t happen. Furthermore, Jericho is a very unusual lion, sociologically, as was Cecil before him. Both were old, and both had previously been pride males elsewhere before they teamed up for a second career – Jericho’s continuing success is remarkable. All this is good news from the field, and adds to the continuing fascination of lion sociology, but this is only a tiny part of the story that has unfolded this year: WildCRU’s Trans Kalahari Predator Project has been setting up new initiatives in Zimbabwe and in Botswana, where Andy Loveridge and I will be working with the field team next month, so there’s much more news to follow.
Read more from WildCRU:

Donations to WildCRU’s Cecil Appeal can be made at: http://www.campaign.ox.ac.uk/wildcru
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Cecil and his Lady
Image Chris Collyer