A place to discuss photos taken in the Sabi Sands.

[Graham Wallington]

OK, I realise that there are so many good image services like Flickr, Tinypic, Photobucket, Picasa, etc. and this group really doesn't need to try and become another one. I thought it might be cool to have a place to post pics taken in the Sabi Sands and to discuss them. For example, the picture above was taken by Pieter Pretorius on western Gowrie, but there is some debate about who this leopard is. WE think that it might be a cub of the Beacon Female, but we don't know what her name is or even if she is that cub. If anybody has any ideas I'd love to know.

[Lisa]

I have no clue! But I went searching for pics of cubs and mothers on Flickr, google etc. seeing if I could find one whose spot patterns matched those in the pic. The spot pattern above and between the eyes is very distinct. She also has a tiny nick out of her left ear at the top.
One problem in searching on Flickr for example is the lack of tags for pics, i.e. leopard. Tags generally indicate the date of the photo rather than subject matter.

elle

[Anne Rogers]

Day,date and time could be very helpful to search our databases.

[Lisa]

yes the date and time are good but the name of the subject matter is also important when searching so I can search leopard July 10 for example. In terms of pictures especially because there are so many of them.
Like
Leopard
Djuma
July 10, 2007
anyway wasnt shooting down how people tag just pointing out it was difficult to search picture databases as it is relative to this particular search.

[Anne Rogers]

I took the image into photoshop, lightened the shadows and enlarged by 50 pixels to allow for more detail.
[IMG]http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i34/CORA_ANNE/MISCFUN/leopard_005...[/IMG]

[Blaze]

Hi Graham - I remember this sighting & I have a lot of pics from it. But at the time I did not notice the ear notch. What is interesting is that the leopard sighted on the May 4 AM drive, ID'ed as one of Karula's cubs - the one now called Saseka - seems to have the same notch?

Instead of stills, I'm providing video links to 2 of Banditt's videos, as I never have uploaded my clips of those two sightings. Just quickly comparing markings, they seem to be the same cat. But I have not spent more than a couple minutes comparing them.

This is Banditt's video of the sighting when Pieter took his photo, it was the Feb 12 AM drive:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hhjmkFgbqqU

This is Banditt's video of the cub ID'ed as Saseka on the May 4 AM drive:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GVPGqIG-CA

[LadyHawk]

I too have a few pics of the cub, but I have them labeled as Karula Cub. I'm pretty sure that was the label given to her on the drive for that day. When I photographed her, I had just found the site a few days earlier so was very much a newbie!

[Blaze]

The cub from the May 4 sighting does not appear to be Saseka or Tingana(Rex ID's it as Saseka on the video clip) . I think both of the above videos in my post are of the same cub, tentatively ID'ed as the Beacon Female's cub.

If you view these videos by Banditt, of both of Karula's cubs, from the May 18 PM drive, neither cub seems to have a notch/tear in the left ear. One cub appears to have a notch out of her right ear. The facial spots also do not appear to match the cub from May 4.

Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsL9xFtazTE
Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTsVSOEjPMA

[Kerri]

We had a big discussion on this cat today and based on the pictures I saw I think this is definitely not Saseka as there is another picture Pieter took when she was a baby with Karula and she has a very distint vertical "T" shaped mark above her left eye.

So I am thinking it is either Tingana or like Graham says the cub of the Beacon female. There are definitely at least 3 cubs in the running for being identified as Karulas! This cub has very distinct markings with not too many right above her eyes. The cub identified as Tingana has more markings in that area and also has a more narrow looking face.

Whoever this cub is she is gorgeous and I know for a fact we can all agree on that!!