Thomas Vijayan Photography

A cat dog fight…

This one is from last year monsoon season, it was a Saturday morning at Kabini, the cold weather was dampening everyone’s spirits and the rains that followed signaled the start of every photographer’s worst nightmare- rain during safari time, where the constant pouring and low light conditions prove to be an extremely competent obstacle.

As we went deeper into the forest we per chanced upon a pack of wild dogs on the road. This sighting lifted everyone’s mood and we started clicking away with our cameras. Their agitation however didn’t go out of notice. The leader of the pack seemed unusually disturbed than his usual relaxed self. His gaze upwards drew everyone’s attention to a nearby tree which was situated right beside the road and to our huge surprise we saw a huge male leopard on the tree growling viciously at the pack. It soon dawned on us that this leopard was probably chased up the tree by the very same pack that we first noticed. They were waiting for the leopard to climb down.

While we patiently waited the leopard sensing the disorganized state of the pack seized the opportunity to leap from the tree from a staggering height of at least 15 feet and flying like a bird avoiding the pack but landing awkwardly on the ground and for a second looked like a rug on the ground, but managed to get up quickly. Time stood still for a moment as the confused wild dogs registered what happened, this was followed by an extreme burst of speed from the running leopard and the chasing pack. The leopard realizing its disadvantage on the ground climbed another tree at lightning speed. Soon thereafter the leopard stealthily crept down the tree and avoiding the pack’s gaze made a quick escape.

This was an amazing sighting and I’m glad we got to witness it!




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