Within four hundred metres from the most easterly wing of Bush Camp, Dickson slows his cruiser. There appears to be most of East Africa’s zebra grazing on the nutritious pastures North of camp. However, he has singled out one, there is something different about this animal many hundreds of metres away, a difference not noticeable to most human eyes.
From a respectful distance his guests watch as, over the next fifteen minutes or so, a foal appears. Above on Lion rock two tawny Moniko females and four subs are alert but horizontal …. this is an incredibly vulnerable time for both zebra mother and infant.
19 minutes later the calf is standing, albeit like Bambi on ice. The lions are up now but not advancing towards this easy meal. ‘ It’s their stripes’ the Maasai maestro explains ‘ they confuse the lions’.
Zebras are perhaps the easiest animals to spot in Africa so the irony of their markings misleading the lions is not lost on the small group out with Dickson, James and Charles that afternoon.
29 minutes after delivery the single-parent family were lost in the vast herds and the lions would eat elsewhere that evening.
