Second Glance
Two young impala pause in the late-afternoon bushveld near Thornybush. The light is gentle, the clearing quiet, and somewhere beyond the fallen timber a leopard is already close. Photograph by Adam Piotr Kossowski.
Two young impala turn towards a sound in the late-afternoon bush at Thornybush.
I already had my camera raised when a dry, cough-like sound came from the bush to our right.
Our tracker lifted one hand and pointed towards it. There were four of us in the open game-drive Land Rover that afternoon - my partner and me, with our guide and tracker in front - and everyone had heard the same brief sound. The guide turned slightly in his seat and whispered that it could be a leopard on the hunt. He spoke so quietly that his voice barely carried beyond the vehicle.
A short distance away, two young impala were feeding together in a patch of open ground. The adults had moved further back into the bush, where leaves, branches and deeper shade partly obscured them. The younger pair had been left slightly behind, close enough to the herd to remain connected to it, but standing in a far more exposed position.
It was after five, yet the December heat was still intense. There was no wind and, with the engine switched off, the hot metal of the Land Rover gave an occasional crack as it cooled. Late sunlight filtered between the trees and fell across the reddish-brown coats of the two young animals, warming their backs and shoulders while their faces remained partly shaded.
I had been watching them for several minutes before we heard the sound. Their hides shivered occasionally, and their front legs made small, restless movements. On another afternoon, I might have put that down to flies, but there was enough tension in their behaviour to catch our attention. They would lower their heads to feed, pause after only a few mouthfuls and look towards the denser cover to one side. That nervousness was why I had kept the camera at my eye.
One of the impala lifted its head and looked back towards the place the tracker had indicated. Its neck lengthened, its ears twitched forward and the muscles along its shoulders tightened. We searched the same area but saw nothing - no branch moving, no shape between the leaves and certainly no sign of a leopard.
After several seconds, the impala lowered its head and began feeding again. Then it suddenly looked back for a second time, and the animal beside it turned as well.
I noticed the symmetry immediately. Their bodies stood at almost the same angle, while both heads faced the same patch of bush. Their slender legs, the gentle line of their backs and the pale markings beneath their tails briefly aligned. Behind them, the smooth, sun-bleached branches of a fallen tree curved across the darker vegetation.
The pose appeared graceful, but the behaviour was entirely practical. Their necks were stretched, their ears were moving independently and their weight had shifted slightly forward. They had not yet committed to flight, although both seemed prepared to move at the first sign of danger.
Impala are among the most familiar animals in Greater Kruger and can easily be passed over while everyone searches for lion, leopard or elephant. Their abundance, however, does not make their lives any less demanding. Each time they lower their heads to feed, they surrender part of their view and must divide their attention between food and the possibility of a predator approaching. Research has found that impala standing towards the outside of a herd show greater overall and anti-predator vigilance than animals protected nearer its centre. These two were young, partly separated from the adults and standing on the exposed edge of the group.
Thornybush Private Nature Reserve forms part of the Greater Kruger conservation area and shares a fenceless border with Kruger National Park, allowing wildlife to move through a much larger connected wilderness. December falls within the hot, rainy summer, when the grass and foliage become thicker and animals are often more difficult to see. That afternoon, the summer growth offered the impala shade and food, but it also gave the leopard the cover it needed.
For the next minute or two, nothing appeared. The adults began lowering their heads again, and the two younger animals gradually followed. Their ears continued turning towards the trees, but the nervous movements began to ease. From our position in the Land Rover, it seemed that whatever had disturbed them might have stopped or moved away.
Then, just as the small herd began to settle, the leopard leapt from cover.
It came from the very direction the impala had been watching. What was remarkable was how close it had managed to get without any of us seeing it. Four people had been studying that narrow patch of vegetation, including an experienced guide and tracker, yet the leopard’s low approach and rosetted coat had concealed it among the leaves, branches and broken afternoon light.
There was surprisingly little sound as it closed the final distance. The leopard was almost upon the impala before the alarm snorts erupted and the herd scattered in every direction. Animals cut across one another, turned sharply and sprinted for the thicker bush. The two young impala disappeared among them, with the leopard following so quickly that the entire encounter was over within seconds.
We could not follow. Predator and prey had gone deeper into an area with no track and no way through for the vehicle. We stayed where we were for another minute, watching the bush and listening for further alarm calls or some indication of how the chase had ended.
Nothing came.
Our guide eventually restarted the Land Rover and eased it back onto the rough reserve track. And so we continued with the afternoon drive, still not knowing what had happened beyond the trees.
