The Kurhula female isn’t seen often on Londolozi. A handful of sightings, total. She spends almost all her time south of our boundary, on our neighbour’s property, and the few records we have of her here are of a leopard passing through rather than a leopard staying. Until very recently, I had never laid eyes on her.
It feels like we have only just said goodbye to the Ndzanzeni Female. After reading Megan’s farewell blog, there was a line that has been sitting with me:
“And, as nature always does, the landscape is already beginning its next chapter.
Over recent months we have become increasingly accustomed to seeing both the Tinxiya Female and the Ximungwe Female moving comfortably through areas that, for so many years, belonged almost exclusively to the Ndzanzeni Female.”
But perhaps there is a third individual that we haven’t yet considered…
Twin daughter of the Ntsumi Female and Nweti Male, born August 2023. Now navigating independence along Londolozi's southern boundary.
A Morning in the Deep Southeast
It had been one of those mornings where leopards were few and far between. We spent most of it searching for the Nkoveni Female, following her tracks into bush that gave us less and less, and as the sun rose, the tracks grew cold. I dropped Bennett to continue on foot.
Then came some news on the radio. The Kurhula Female had been spotted in the southeastern pocket of the reserve. Fellow ranger Megan Wade had managed a brief view before losing her.
Every direction she could take was a bad one. North lay the Dudley camps. East was the Sand River. South, and she was over our boundary and gone. There was no good way for her to move, only different ways for us to lose her. All signs led to one conclusive thought: “Not good!”
But a morning without a leopard makes you gamble, and we had been searching for a while now. We abandoned the tracks of the Nkoveni Female and pointed the defender south. The Kurhula Female was far, and if we had even a chance of catching just a glimpse, we would have to ‘go a little quicker than normal’.
Twenty minutes of driving with one ear cocked for the transmission I was dreading, and five minutes out, it came. She was up and moving. Heading into a thicket that Megan was unable to follow her through.
We carried on anyway. Three vehicles now, combing the bush in hopes of a brief moment with her, all of us finding nothing. The morning transformed into the heat of the day, that flat dead hour when the light is harsh and anything with sense finds some shade. One by one we gave up and turned north for camp.
And then… A track.
I’ll allow myself a small moment here, because I had no tracker on the vehicle and I am one of the less experienced rangers on this team. A single set of paw prints, crossing west over the road. West was the one direction we wanted. West meant she was leaving that tangle of boundaries behind and walking into an area we could actually try and track her.
I called for some experienced backup and a second opinion. Andrea Sithole, who was amongst the search party, was still close by. He confirmed it. Fresh, across the road, and a worthwhile endeavour.
Even then I wasn’t hopeful. She had gone into awkward thickets that were riddled with dry riverbeds and few roads to scan from, and I didn’t have Bennett’s eyes with me to scan, and felt like I had already used up my tracking quota for the day. We worked road after road and found nothing more.
Nothing, until a single impala gave off an alarm call. A sharp, nasal bark that always brings hope to a search, even when lunchtime is fast approaching.
To our delight, and somewhat my relief, there she was. Beautifully slinking through the dappled light of a Tamboti grove. The midday heat seemed little bother to her – the excitement of being in the presence of a leopard that I had never seen before was kicking in, and so it was little bother to us as well.
Kurhula is a Shangaan word meaning ‘peace’
She had put herself in somewhat of an awkward spot, pinched between a dry riverbed and a herd of elephants that wanted nothing to do with her. It didn’t trouble her in the slightest. She was out of their way and moving through before the herd had even started to make a fuss.
So who is she?
She was born in July 2023 to the Ntsumi Female, just to the south of Londolozi, one of a litter of two alongside her sister, the Mgiba Female. Both sisters made it to independence, which, given what happens to most leopard cubs, is worth pausing on.
The Ntsumi Female herself was born in the Sabi Sabi camps to the Little Bush Female, placing the Kurhula Female within the Little Bush Lineage, one of the six dynasties we follow on Londolozi, whose founder operated largely south of our boundary but whose descendants have gradually made their presence felt closer to home.
The Kurhula Female’s mother, the Ntsumi Female, is a rare visitor to our southern boundary.
Young females usually establish themselves on the edges of their mother’s range, inheriting a slice of it rather than striking out. But nobody hands out territory, and a female of three years old looking for a patch of her own has to find her own way. As of quite recently, the southeast corner of Londolozi is a good opportunity for her to take something of her own.
A few sightings of the Kurhula female do not imply territorial intent. She may simply have been on a wide loop, the way young leopards tend to move. Whether she could hold anything against the Tinxiya and Ximungwe females, both of whom have somewhat of a head start, is another question altogether.
But she has reason to try. Our southern neighbours have reported her with two young cubs, and I could see the truth of it by the milk pouch and suckle marks on her belly. She was hungry. A female with dependent cubs needs ground she can hunt reliably and hoist in safely, and she needs it more urgently than a female without them.
There was a small herd of impala not far off, and a couple of warthogs closer still. So we stayed with her into the late morning and watched her approach them. We didn’t see her hunt. She lay down in the shade instead, and we eventually left her to it and drove the long way home.
It didn’t feel like a loss. The deep southeast is about as far from camp as you can get on this reserve, and it is seldom driven. So to be able to spend time with a leopard I had never seen before is not something I’ll forget in a hurry.
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