The Zambian Carnivore Project (ZCP) is an amazing organization that researches carnivorous species within Zambia – observing their social structures, interactions and abundance.
We had an amazing opportunity to go on a field trip with ZCP, specifically to conduct lion and wild dog surveys to help with their research.

The day started with us collecting camera traps which we placed a few days previously. Ruben and Kings (our ZCP experts) taught us how the camera traps operated and why they use them. These camera traps capture imagines of animals as they walk past, this gives ZCP an insight to what species occur in that area.
We then set off into South Luangwa National Park where we started our hunt for carnivores. Firstly, we came across three lions sunning themselves, we filled out the lion survey sheet where the GPS location, number of animals and type of habitat was written down. Photographs of each lion was taken for identification purposes.

Kings got out the VHF tracker, which tracks the location of animals wearing radio collars, and proceeded to hang out the truck, listing intently to the sounds given off by the machine. Much to our amazement, we found a pack of wild dogs, consisting of nine individuals. It was amazing just sitting in the truck observing the animal’s behavior and taking in the African environment.

We found a beautiful spot near the river to have lunch, we were completely surrounded by wildlife, with hippos to our left, elephants to our right and lots of antelope in between. We were half way through eating our lunch and the baboons in the trees started vocalizing a warning call, we look up and saw an old male lion was walking about 200 meters away from where we were eating. Ruben, Samson and I jump up, quickly running to the truck to follow the lion – leaving the other 6 MATZ, Kings and Philip stranded in the middle of the African bush. We observed this male lion for 10 minutes, collecting our data and taking identification photos. Suddenly the lion’s behavior changed, and he then charged straight towards a thick bush, a leopard came darting out the other side – literally running for his life. This old male lion had stolen the leopards fresh kill (an impala) and was sitting happily with his meal. It was absolutely incredible seeing this whole thing play out, it was as if I was watching a David Attenborough documentary.

To end this already amazing day off, we saw another 3 lions and a spotted hyena. We were able to see the National Parks four largest carnivores and learn heaps about conservation research along the way.

Parris
MATZ Member