Living with Leopards (2024)

[bunniefuu]

Leopards are

the most supreme predator.

Their skill to hide...

their skill to climb,

their skill to hunt...

it's very calculating.

It's very smart.

I've lived with and filmed

multiple leopards over the years,

and each one has a unique personality.

The first time I met Mochima,

she easily jumped up

into the top of these branches,

10 or 12 meters high,

and positioned herself

very deliberately.

I had no idea what she was doing.

Then something

extraordinary happened.

I'd never seen a

leopard take such a risk

to get prey.

But pretty soon after,

she revealed the reason why.

Getting a glimpse into the den

and seeing these tiny cubs,

I really began to understand

how vulnerable they are.

The first two years are

incredibly dangerous

and why less than half of

all cubs make it to maturity.

I had no idea

where this story was going to go.

But I knew, by following this family,

I would open a window into a

leopard's world nobody's ever seen.

I, I cry like crocodile

Then drink opinions out

I've always got an answer

The sun shines out my mouth

- There ain't a rule I'd wanna break

- There ain't a rule I'd wanna break

I'd rather k*ll than show my face

Man, I guess I was scared

Feet, don't fail me now

I got to stand my ground, my ground

And though I'm down for trying

My feet don't fail me now

Filming leopard cubs

is always challenging

as a good mother will keep them

completely concealed

and unknown to the world.

As the cubs get older,

they are relatively alert to the world.

But they won't venture

beyond the boundaries of the den.

It is only after about three months

that the cubs start to explore

outside of the den.

This is the time

where their real characters are revealed.

And it's a good time to name them.

Kutjira means "the shy one."

And she was the image of her mother.

Not only by looks but by personality.

You could see her watching

and puzzling out the world around her.

There was a real sense of intelligence

behind her eyes.

I called her son Dakunga,

which means "the one who wants power."

He was the complete opposite

of his sister.

He was a lot more cavalier.

A lot more clumsy.

If you're gonna survive

in the wild,

you can't throw caution to the wind.

It's a dangerous place to grow up.

Free to believe

In words I didn't mean

Used to get by

I'd rather die than to cry...

It's a hard life

It's a hard life

It's a hard life

You make me happy...

Filming leopards requires

a large amount of dedication and passion.

And I knew that if I was going to be able

to keep up with this family,

there's no way that I could do it alone.

It's a...

Straw that broke the camel's back

Don't think I can live with that

Always seem to fall

Harder than before...

I had to build a team

that were incredibly driven

and were prepared to commit

several years of their lives

to following these leopards.

I grew up in the city,

and, coming here,

I didn't really know

how to cope in the bush.

My mom especially was not happy.

She thought that one of the wild animals,

the predators, is going to get me.

Straw that broke the camel's back

Don't think I can live with that

Always seem to fall

Harder than before...

I had no idea

I was gonna end up here.

And I had minimum experience

of the camera and the bush.

So I was thrown in the deep end,

and I had to prove myself.

Yeah, so Mochima stashed her cubs

in Leopard Central

and she's heading east

towards Mongoose Tree Line.

It looks like she's hunting.

So you can see her concentration.

There's one thing on her mind.

She's here to get food on the table.

Because, if you fail,

you might have to go three days

without feeding your kids,

which starts to get dangerous.

Every move that they make

is very deliberate,

and you can see

the thought process playing out.

As a hunt unfolds...

that intelligence,

combined with its ability

to remain concealed,

is what really defines a leopard.

It's extraordinary

how close a leopard can get,

and how completely oblivious the prey is.

I've seen Mochima stalk

within a few feet of prey

and spend up to an hour

in that position before actually pouncing.

An experienced hunter

might suffocate its prey

by biting over its mouth and nose

to prevent any noise

that may alert other predators.

The quieter a leopard can k*ll,

the more successful they are.

Leopards can pull a carcass

up into a tree

to keep it away from scavengers,

but a mother with very young cubs

will often hide it on the ground.

When Mochima called for the cubs,

Kutjira, as per character,

responded immediately.

But there was no sign of Dakunga.

He had obviously been playing

well away from where he should've been.

And pushing your boundaries

in these environments could be fatal.

Mochima had to call several times

before she got an answer.

He didn't really care.

He feels like he's in charge already.

The carcass provides an opportunity

for the cubs to learn.

And there's this very comical

sort of ritual that plays out...

where they almost relive the hunt

in their heads.

This is vital

because it ignites their bloodlust

and is an important step

to them becoming independent hunters.

Now that the cubs are well-fed

and fat and happy,

Mochima has to go

and maintain her territory

that is about

20 square kilometers in size.

To do this,

she has to patrol her boundaries,

scent-marking as she goes.

When you're following her,

it's a huge challenge.

She could walk

for seven, eight hours straight.

Your body is in a stressed state

trying to keep up.

During that time,

sometimes we forget to eat

because you don't want to lose her.

This scent-marking

lets other female leopards know

that this is her land

and to keep out.

But this doesn't deter nomadic males

venturing into her territory.

The biggest k*ller of leopard cubs

is other leopards.

And this nomadic male was

a threat to Kutjira and Dakunga.

They will deliberately k*ll the cubs

to bring a female back into estrus

so they can mate with her.

The only thing

that could stand in his way...

is Mokhanyo...

...the area's dominant male,

and the cubs' father.

As soon as Mokhanyo picked up

the scent of the intruder,

he immediately started to track him down.

It wasn't long before

Mokhanyo caught up

with the slightly pale male.

So we had this situation

where these two males,

they were sizing each other up.

The tension was building,

and building, and building.

Eventually, a point broke

where these two males had to fight.

It happened

in a thick scrubby area, out of sight.

The stakes were high.

This was a fight

that would ultimately determine

the life or death of Kutjira and Dakunga.

The young intruder

was the first to emerge.

But there was no sign of Mokhanyo.

The uncertainty was horrible.

He finally emerged,

properly beaten up.

But, because the nomadic male

started to leave,

he was clearly the victor.

We all breathed

a huge sigh of relief,

knowing that Mochima's family was safe

and that we could continue their story.

I woke up to the morning sky, first

Baby blue, just like we rehearsed

When I get up off this ground

I shake leaves back down

To the brown, brown, brown, brown

Till I'm clean...

There's been days and weeks

where you don't interact

with a single person.

So it's important to be comfortable

with your own mind space.

Then I walk

Where I'd be shaded by the trees

By a meadow of green

For about a mile

I'm headed to town, town, town

In style...

I've always been

a bit of an introvert,

and I guess that being out here

in the peace and the quiet

aligned with my character.

Little bitty blues bird flies

And gray clouds

Or white walls, or blue skies

We gon' fly, feel all right...

Sleeping out at night,

you have to keep your wits about you.

There's always a chance of snakes

and scorpions and lions walking past.

But also,

you're underneath a blanket of stars,

uh, which nowadays

people don't really get to experience.

All my favorite colors

Right on

My sisters and my brothers

They see 'em like no other

All my favorite colors

When you wake up,

you immerse yourself in the environment.

When you're looking out,

you're not just looking for leopards,

say on trees or walking.

You're also looking at other game

in the area

to see if they are relaxed

or if they are alert.

And that will also give you signs

if there's, uh, a leopard nearby or not.

Uh, gents,

I have some female leopard tracks

on the link road

heading towards Pangolin Forest.

Uh, looking quite fresh. I'll follow them.

You have to become a leopard

and think like one, act like one.

That's the key to finding them.

That comes with time

and putting in the miles every day.

Yeah, so I've managed to pin down Mochima.

She's with Kutjira, and they're heading

towards Mangosteen Crossing.

When a leopard cub

gets to about a year of age,

their hunting instincts

really begin to kick in.

And at this stage,

Mochima was taking Kutjira out

on a number of hunts

so that she could watch and learn.

There's this one time

when Kutjira is watching Mom hunting.

And Mom is in full stalk mode.

Fully elusive, doesn't want to be seen.

And then, all of a sudden,

Kutjira pulls in

'cause she wants a little snuggle

with her mom.

I mean,

you gotta give your kids attention,

but not at work.

Kutjira has the best intention,

but she hasn't got the skill yet,

the experience.

But at least she's willing to learn.

Dakunga was completely different

to his sister.

He didn't have the focus

to want to learn from anybody.

He was kind of on his own mission.

He was always

getting himself into trouble.

Out of Mochima's two cubs,

there was always a concern

that Dakunga might not make it.

There was one particular period

when he was gone for a number of days.

It was unusual. We couldn't find him.

We didn't know where he was.

It's very, very easy for a

leopard at that stage of their lives

to be k*lled by predators.

Yeah, so I'm up

by Velvet Tree Line now,

and, um, there's no sign of Dakunga.

There's a cheetah family nearby,

so I'll probably spend my time with them.

It was a mother

with two big subadult boys.

And they managed to k*ll an impala.

I checked them eating a bit.

And then, who do I see?

Dakunga.

His direction is the impala carcass

with the cheetah family.

And he's getting closer,

getting closer, getting closer.

Only him will try to claim this impala,

as a little boy, from three big cheetahs.

This describes

Dakunga's personality to a T.

I never heard a leopard

getting chased by a cheetah.

And I never heard a leopard

being up in a palm tree.

We sit and watch these leopards

for hours, and days, and weeks

not doing anything.

But that one day,

you need to make sure you are on point.

Dakunga must have thought

his luck was in

when he caught the scent of another k*ll.

So he followed his nose, only to find

that this was Mokhanyo's, his father.

You don't push in

on a dominant male's k*ll.

But Dakunga was led by his stomach.

It made little difference

that it was his father.

He was playing with fire.

Each time Dakunga failed,

I thought that he would

come to his senses and give up.

But he has no sense of danger,

and he just persisted.

Incredibly, his boldness paid off.

I would never have expected

this situation to end like this,

and I'm not sure why Mokhanyo conceded.

Maybe there was an acknowledgement

from his father, which'd be astounding.

It's a real testament

to Dakunga's character.

And moments like these really

show a different side to leopards

that we've never really seen before.

At the end of the day,

the family reunited.

The bonding over that moment

is incredible.

There's a lot of playfulness,

a lot of jumping.

And in Dakunga's case,

arsing about, really.

Those moments of joy

were getting fewer and fewer.

They're definitely approaching

a time where...

...they're gonna be more independent...

which is inevitable as a leopard.

Noah, Noah?

Yeah, Greg, go.

Quiet on my side.

Um, I haven't found any signs,

so I'm thinking

I'm gonna go into camp to refresh.

Uh, copy that, Greg.

It's very quiet my side as well,

so I'll be shortly after you.

I'll see you in camp.

Sitting in a car for almost a week,

without moving, is not ideal.

And so getting into camp,

playing a bit of sport,

having a shave, you know,

just looking after yourself

as well is important.

The crew have become

like an extended family.

Without that level of team dynamic,

the whole operation

just wouldn't be possible.

A lot of us have this disease

of coming back to camp,

you feel like you're missing out

on all the action out in the bush.

So you do as much as you can in camp,

but try as much as possible

to get back out there.

When the Okavango

is at its hottest,

winds blow across the land...

...and thunderstorms start to build.

But when it finally breaks,

it pours down.

Everything seems to celebrate its arrival.

It's a relief from the relentless heat

and a promise of easier times...

when life is breathed

into the environment.

Almost everything gives birth

in this season.

There's no better time

for 18-month-old leopard cubs...

to get familiar with what their prey

will be in the future.

I've been tracking Kutjira.

We are near Mongoose Tree Line

at the moment.

Um, she's bedding down for a rest.

She'd been in this bush

for a couple of hours...

...and that's when a big troop of baboons

started coming into the area.

And Kutjira might have thought,

"Maybe I could grab a youngster."

And she'd stuck around

too long in that bush.

She was surrounded

by big male baboons

that have massive, formidable teeth

that are made for causing damage.

She was in big trouble.

I don't think

she's ever ran so fast in her whole life.

But she realized that things can change

very quickly out here.

We spent more time

with the leopards

during the period of this project

than with any other being on this planet.

It was amazing to be let into

this super elusive and secretive family,

into their deepest secrets.

You really get, uh,

emotionally attached to these cats

because every week and day,

you are with them,

and there's a point

where you start rooting for them.

You laugh and you cry with themk

and you know, there's times

where you think to yourself,

"I really love this cat."

But you need to be able

to draw a line in the sand.

And it comes down to letting them

live their lives as leopards

and being an observer.

It was inevitable

that Mochima would look to mate again.

And when the cubs were two years old...

she came into season.

She wanted to get

the attention of Mokhanyo,

and began to leave her scent

all around her territory.

When two leopards come together,

it's an intense affair.

They will mate hundreds of times

over four or five days.

Typically, the female is gonna be the one

who's gonna push the mating behavior.

She'll flirt with him...

and smother him in love and attention.

Cut to three days of mating,

and the male is tired.

He's exhausted. He's drained.

And she still wants to make sure

that this mating behavior

is gonna be successful.

She's really just trying to make sure

that he knows these

are gonna be his cubs.

Having mated,

Mochima is expected to have a new family.

And both Kutjira and Dakunga pose

a... a real danger to her unborn cubs.

Mochima now only has three months

to get them both out of the door

before the new family arrives.

It's a real ticking clock.

Kutjira was showing

great signs of progress,

but still hasn't managed

to nail her own first k*ll.

Dakunga, on the other hand,

was still making big mistakes.

And a considerable worry.

Mochima knew he needed help.

And, as a good mother,

she deliberately showed him

where to find his prey.

Mochima obviously knew

that there were warthog piglets

inside this hole

and was bringing her son

to a perfect opportunity.

That's a thought-out process.

That's nothing instinctual.

It was an incredible piece of behavior

to witness.

What she didn't expect

was the mother to be home.

Confronting an adult warthog in a hole

is almost impossible.

Their razor-sharp tusks

would rip them apart.

Kutjira has been observing

Dakunga and Mochima,

learning from their mistakes.

Fighting a battle they never can win.

And then a week or so later,

Kutjira is just sitting 25 meters away

from a warthog burrow.

And she waits.

An hour later,

I look at the warthog mother

walking out the burrow.

It all made sense to me afterwards

that she's been calculating this

from the moment

we stopped next to this warthog burrow.

That's incredible!

Oh, gracious

How sweet to find

The loved ones

The meeting of minds

I will be finding out

Just where to find you

Over mountains

Just where to find you...

Kutjira was not only growing

in skill but growing in size

and becoming sexually mature.

She began to scent-mark

all around her mother's territory.

That will attract nomadic males in,

and they pose a real threat

to Mochima's unborn cubs.

Oh, icicles will melt

When I have found you

And we will melt the snow

Mochima had very little choice

but to push Kutjira out.

She picked up Kutjira's scent very quickly

and got on her trail.

Kutjira recognized her mother.

But her body language was different.

Her approach was more serious and focused.

When the fight broke up,

you could see confusion in Kutjira's face.

She couldn't understand the aggression.

Mochima kept pushing her

further and further

towards the edge of her territory.

When Kutjira felt that

there was no further to go

and needed to push back

and try and hold her ground,

it was seen as a challenge.

That was the end

of that relationship.

Mother and daughter

had to go their different ways.

It's hard to understand

in human terms.

The separation we have with our offspring

are never so abrupt.

To see it in a leopard's life

is brutal.

But that's the way

the natural world works.

And Kutjira was pushed out

into the unknown,

and she was not welcome back.

For Mochima to safely have a new litter,

she needed both her cubs to leave home,

but Dakunga was still hanging around.

Instead of thinking

and using the skills that his

mother had passed onto him,

he would charge into situations,

which is not how a leopard should hunt.

He was failing dismally,

time and time again.

Dakunga was not ready,

and if he was pushed out now,

he wouldn't survive.

So there's this one day,

when Dakunga climbs this warthog burrow.

I've seen all of the leopards

checking warthog burrows before...

but I've never seen one attempting

the biggest warthog in the area.

Sabretooth.

He's not gonna take fail for an answer,

so he follows this warthog,

and he tries again.

To k*ll a fully adult male warthog.

He proved us all wrong.

Yeah, it was a proud moment.

The warthog k*ll

really changed Dakunga's mindset,

and this was now impacting on his mother.

Physically, he was dominating her

and becoming a threat,

not just to her but to her unborn cubs.

You could see the relationship

beginning to break apart.

Every time they met,

the aggression was growing.

Finally, Mochima snapped.

The familiarity

and the kindness was gone.

He turned his back

on his mother's territory

and decided to take his own path.

Mochima had done everything

that she could for Dakunga.

And he went out into the world

with the best chance.

We had to just watch him leave,

and we never knew

whether we would see him again.

It is a bittersweet moment.

Regardless of what you may be feeling,

he has to leave to get his own territory

and one day start his own family.

There's this sense of pride

that he's made it this far.

He's done the hardest part of his journey.

You know that he's gonna

go out there and be successful.

He's a big, strong boy,

and you take comfort in that.

With Dakunga departing,

this unique window

into a family life of leopards was over.

I don't think anybody

could be part of this

and not be changed

by the experiences that we shared.

Spending two and a half years

filming with these leopards

has given me

a different view on our lives.

There's something pure

about the life they live.

It's very uncluttered and uncomplicated,

and I think if I could be

more like that in my life...

it'd be a good thing.

A couple of months

after we stopped following Mochima,

Noah called me

and said that he had found her...

lying in the forest line, dead.

The irony of only being able

to touch her once she was dead...

was... terrible.

You know, it was

one of the hardest moments

I've had to deal with...

is seeing a cat that I got to know

and loved so much...

gone.

I can never be certain

as to what happened to her.

But these animals have

very sharp, short lives.

And hers was exceptional.

We were just lucky enough

to witness a part of it.

After Mochima's death,

it was as though

our world had completely emptied out.

There were no leopards around us.

That was until Greg called in

that he had found Kutjira.

She was on the edge

of her mother's territory.

There was clear excitement

right through the crew

that she was back.

Keep looking through the window pane

Just trying to see

Through the pouring rain

It's hearing your name

Hearing your name

I really never felt quite the same

Since I lost what I had...

She perched high up

in the branches of a tree.

No one to blame

Seems to me

Can't turn back the hands of time...

I did notice

some impala fairly close by.

And in the back of my mind,

I had an inkling

that if the impala get under the tree,

she might actually try to hunt.

Eventually, some of the rams

get underneath the tree.

My goodness,

you... you just see this head pop out.

She nailed it.

Absolutely nailed it.

It gave us a lot of comfort,

knowing that Mochima's legacy

was continuing.

It made the end of the story

more of a beginning.

A new chapter in Kutjira's life,

where she was evolving

into an exceptional cat in her own right.

Whoa, it seems to me

Can't turn back the hands of time

Seems to me

Can't turn back the hands of time

Seems to me

History was left behind