Synopsis

In the year 2000 all the lions in a place called Selinda had been hunted virtually to extinction. The pride of lions we had been studying was dead. One lioness walked around, calling into a void. It is an open system connecting to national parks but the land was over hunted and abused. One herd of buffalo came through one year. A single leopard called into the darkness. Our small filming camp was the meeting point of the old pride but now it stayed quiet of tracks and the nightly attacks on our solar panels and other targets of young male lion mischief. We moved camp. In 2005 the hunters called me. They offered to sell the company and the lease to me. We raised the money and moved back. The first weeks were shocking. Not a single lion call. One day we found the single female hunting warthogs. She had a cub, a sub-adult female hunting with her. It was like the clouds on this place had opened and a ray of sun shone on these two females. That year we declared the area a Reserve, the Selinda Reserve, stopped all hunting and let the area rest. Two males lions swam across the river from Namibia and we filmed them the day they came in, skittish but looking for the young female who was leaving scent. They found her. There were probably the first male lions she had ever seen. Tension turned to fighting. They wanted to mate, she and her mother wanted to be left alone. But biology won the day and 110 days later we found a single cub. In 2002 Botswana banned lion hunting. So the numbers elsewhere started to recover. But in When the older female died, she gave up life reluctantly but ultimately her time was up. Her daughter and granddaughter now had the reins. This time it was a young nomadic male. What we were witnessing was the birth of a pride, and five cubs were born, four of them were females. We had a hunting pride with numbers that could actually make a difference at last. At the same time because not a single gun shot had been fired in 6 years, wildlife was starting to filter back in, to breed and settle down. Buffalo started to come in. Almost as if the area knew it was safe again, the flood returned and even more wildlife came in. And with it, a second young male. These two young males would normally compete, but they formed a bond probably to help in hunting. But by 2010 the pride had two males and 6 hunting females, and at least 3 young males had been expelled into the system. Wildlife numbers were back up. In 2011 Botswana banned all leopard hunting. The writing was on the wall. 2014 all hunting was banned. In the same year, the pride had 6 cubs. But these new cubs had to contend with the flood, crocodiles, hippos and buffalo. One day, the pride had to move. A major scene in the film is about this epic crossing of a river. Two females and six cubs. The females swam across with four cubs. 2 remained. They went back and forth and the two refused to move. It was a two day brain teaser for the females and finally, they saved all cubs. Once they had them, they weren't letting them go, even into the next buffalo hunt. Tiny cubs scattered and ran under the feet of the buffalo. All of those cubs made it to adulthood, the males left, the females stayed. Last week I filmed the Selinda Pride of 13 lions on the hunt. This is a story of success and victory over bad land use, and how wildlife can recover if left alone. The film will cover all of these and other more regularly known behavior. The social media around this has a large range. ? We have BCI projects about lions and we will develop a campaign that pulls all of those in behind this film. ? We have massive twitter, instragram and Fb media followings that we will marshal into this. This film needs to the story of hope for big cats going forward.

Crédits

A film by: Dereck Joubert

Produced by: Dereck Joubert and Beverly Joubert

Duration: 44 min

Year completed: 2018

Pays:  Botswana

Catégorie: Professionnel