This must be one of the most text-book hunts ever seen!
Mario Paul had this incredible sighting and told Latest Sightings the story:
“Earlier in the day, I received some info of a male leopard that was sleeping on the rocks at Biyamiti Weir, in the Kruger National Park.
Since it was still cool, I decided to go there when it warms up, because the leopard was lying in the shade thus the sun won’t bother it.
That leopard wasn’t just sleeping there, it was waiting for an opportunity to present itself for a successful hunt when the animals come in for a drink. Animals often frequent the water during the warmer parts of the day.
On my arrival, I noticed the leopard wasn’t on the rock where it was sleeping, however, I noticed the giraffes were all staring at something, but I was too low down to see what they were staring at.
I drove to higher ground where I could see what was going on, and that’s when I saw the leopard on the edge of the riverbank watching a herd of impala grazing on the bank.
I noticed the wind was blowing quite strongly in the leopard’s direction and that the leopard had quite a lot of cover to launch an attack from, and I knew that the probability was good for some action.
I positioned my vehicle on a spot where I could see everything happening and I waited. The leopard cleverly used the riverbank and bushes to conceal himself and approached to within a few meters of the impala where he launched and caught the Impala in a miraculous fashion.
—WATCH—
After the kill, he proceeded to drag the kill more than 300 meters to a big tree where he lay down to recover. It was an amazing experience to witness how the hunt progressed from start to finish and to have been able to capture it on film was just incredible.”
