Posturing makes up a huge part of life in the wild, because it’s the most effective way for many animals to keep themselves safe. As a healthy adult, this elephant would make an unlikely target, but her young calf would have been at risk of an attack from these two lions.
Rosa Swart spotted this pair of pairs near the Shingwedzi camp at the Kruger National Park, and sent her footage of their encounter in to Latest Sightings.
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Vacate The Area
Adult elephants are large and strong enough that few predators will risk attacking them unless there are extenuating circumstances like age or injury. Their close knit social groups make them likely to defend each other in the event of an attack which makes it even harder.
Lions, and others, will predate on elephant calves however, especially if they are in a vulnerable situation. It’s unclear if that’s what these two lions were trying to do, or if the elephant mother just wasn’t going to take the chance.
Either way, the lions realized quickly that their best course of action would be to keep a safe distance from the angry elephant hurrying their way.
Elephants Coming Through
The way the elephants themselves also seemed to be in a hurry to vacate the area would suggest that they were just passing through from one place to another when they happened to come across the lions.
In this case, the lions were likely relaxing in the shade after a long day, when the elephants trampled onto the scene and immediately demanded that the big cats get up and out of the their way.
With such a tiny baby, this was still likely still the right choice for the mother. If she hadn’t scared the lions from the area then they might have returned to hunt the calf due to its vulnerability.
Trying To Keep Up
The elephant calf itself was so tiny that it could barely keep up with its mother as she charged at the lions. With her trunk and ears out, the elephant was making herself appear as big and intimidating as possible to make sure those lions stayed away.
But her calf barely came up to her knees, and only had tiny legs of its own that were working overtime to try and keep up with its mother’s much longer stride. Luckily there were only the two lions, otherwise the mother might have left her calf vulnerable.
If there had been any more members of the pride lurking, they would have had a good opportunity to attack the calf while the mother was focused on the pair she was charging, but once she’d spooked the big cats, the elephant gave her calf time to catch up.
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Mother Knows Best
With only a short time to make a decision, this mother elephant managed to guarantee her and her calf’s safety, and make it across the open plain into the cover of the trees.
For anyone watching the moment, it was a display of the respect which elephants demand, as one of the largest land animals on the planet, as even these lions didn’t want to get involved.