The Leopards Baby

The Leopard’s Baby
by
Raman Jalota

   The big female weighed almost a hundred and twenty pounds. At five feet, she was at her full length. Lying next to her was the new baby, just a pound and barely six inches long. It whimpered and crept towards the warmth of her mother. She licked it affectionately and pulld it to her belly. It found a teat and began to feed.
   She was exhausted but knew how to rear cubs, having done so in the past. She stayed lying with her cub for a while then picked her up in her mouth and walked slowly, looking for a good place to hide. Perhaps she already knew of the spot, or maybe she just found it. She liked the little cave and dropped her cub in it. She made sure to cover the opening, watched for any predators and then started looking for food.
   She walked around her territory listening for any sound and soon spotted the herd of impalas. Her mouth watered at the sight of them. But she kept reminding herself to think of the work ahead and the necessity to choose one that she could catch. She lay on her belly in the grass and scanned the herd. She saw a young impala not quite mature but not a kid either - just the right amount for a good fill-up and maybe a little more.
   The impala was grazing just a little bit and running around more and more, full of joy of life itself. Little did it know that it would be a nice lunch for a leopardess soon. He had been running back and forth, straying a little away from the herd at times but sure of its own strength and agility. It was a little too late by the time it heard the leopardess. She had crept on her belly till she had it isolated in her mind. She slowly walked forward, crouching down to be hidden for as long as possible. She knew when it was time to take off at full speed. She came towards the herd with speed, her muscles flexing, her breath steady and her target at the center of her focus.
   The herd scattered and started running away from her. She kept coming straight at her target, who had joined four others that were running in the same direction. Two of them turned left but the Leopardess kept on her focus. They ran and at a spot the last one made a split move and ran towards one portion of the herd. Her target was alone and was now making a noise as well as running and jumping and at times seemed to be flying. The leopardess was always at its back, turning, running, jumping; matching its prey and gaining ground. She jumped and hit the impala with her right front paw. It staggered and fell. Before it could rise, she had its neck in her mouth, squeezing hard, cutting out the oxygen.
   The impala shrieked a few times, tried to stand, whimpered and lay still. The leopardess scanned the surrounding quickly, lifted the impala in her jaws, still squeezing its neck and moved towards some trees. She found a shady spot and started eating.
   She yawned contentedly, her belly was full and the starvation that she had gone through at her baby’s birth was now finally over. She was annoyed at the baboons on the tree screaming and yelling and decided to take the remaining carcass and move on. She took it back to the cave and hid it at the back. Her baby was overjoyed to see her and scrambled to her feeding post. Her feeding done, both mother and daughter relaxed in the sun, content and happy. The mother preened her cub and yawned repeatedly.

.....

   At six weeks the baby started eating some of the meat that her mother regurgitated for her. She would also let her eat some of the raw meat at times. The baby liked it and ran around her mom each time she arrived back, full of excitement and life.
   The mother started teaching her hunting by hitting her hind legs with her paw, knocking her over and getting it implanted in her mind. The way to get your prey down was finally demonstrated to her with a small gazelle that had strayed from its herd and the mother let the baby play with the gazelle, knocking it down several times.
   But the baby leopard didn’t know what to do next. She would put her mouth on its neck but didn’t know how to bite or clamp on it. The mother let her play with it for a while then showed her how to bite its neck, drawing blood and holding on till it was dead.
   The baby learned to chase squirrels on the ground and up the trees and occasionally chase after baboons.

.....

   She was about 6 months old and had captured a few small prey and was spending her days observing her mother’s every move very carefully, when she learned her lesson about the baboons. She knew how annoying they tended to be, always howling and barking when she and her mother were feeding. Her mother often growled at them to get them to leave her alone.
   This day was a little different. She had just downed a small gazelle and had signaled to her to join her. Having watched her mother chase the gazelle and make it fall with one slap and then kill it and call to her for feeding was very exciting. She approached her running. Her mother cautioned her and moved a few paces to a slight shelter between trees and they started to feed. The baboons in the tree were screaming and being a nuisance as usual but one of them with white and brown markings came down the tree and baring his teeth, crept closer to them as they tore large chunks of meat and chewed and swallowed. The baboon was large, obviously a group leader or second in command, he walked close to the gazelle and touched it with his hands. The mother leopard jumped at him and bared her teeth. He bared his teeth in return as he backed away towards the tree.
   Other baboons had stopped playing and were watching with interest. Suddenly they all understood and started climbing down the trees and gathered near the other baboons. Soon they had their game going - they will come close, touch the carcass or even grab it and try to drag it and then run away. It was very annoying and they were getting too aggressive. Before she realized it, they had grabbed the carcass and had run away with it. Her mother bared her teeth and hissed but decided not to waste any more of her energy.
   The baby leopardess grew to hate the baboons more than even hyenas. Though the hyenas probably stole more carcasses than the baboons, they seemed to let the leopards eat for a while before they gathered around and eventually took their share. Hyenas were ugly and cunning but the baboons were the bottom of the pit.

.....

   On one of their excursions, as she was nearing her first birthday, she saw her mother encounter the baboons once again. They had gone on a long walk and found no prey. At one of the spots that they ventured to, they saw trees full of baboons.
   Her mother studied the baboons and she knew that her mother was going to go after one of them. Puzzled more than hungry, she watched in fascination as the mother scanned the baboons and decided on one of them. She seemed to have judged the distances, the trees connectivity and had figured out that she could trap one of them by cutting off all his routes to the ground. Once she was certain she moved in on him. Like a blur, they went flying up and down the tree branches, the baboon jumping from tree to tree and the leopard running back to the ground and up the other tree to cut off his route. But the baboon was more comfortable up in the trees than she had calculated. He out-flew her among the trees and eventually made his escape without as much exhaustion as she had.

.....

   At just over two years of age, she knew she had to leave her mother and find her own territory. She hung out with her mother that day, no hunting, just walking around, lying next to each other and nuzzling in affection. Before nightfall, she rubbed her neck on her mother’s head and walked out.
   It took her many days and countless encounters with other leopards before she found her own territory. At last she was home and keeping track of the water holes and grazing areas. Occasionally she would see her mother come across her territory. She could recognize her from afar. Those unique markings that she had grown with were imprinted in her mind. She would run to her and they would rub their faces in greetings, sometimes they would share a walk and then she would be on her way. She seemed to know her daughter’s territory and used it for her own forays in the jungle.
   The baby had almost grown to a full adult and matched her mother’s size, speed and abilities. She would find a herd of gazelles and pick a candidate almost uncannily similar to how her mother used to do it. Her speed and maneuvers were lightning fast and her kill rate was better than her mother’s. She was content in her territory, till the baboons came.

.....

   The hate that had lain dormant in her, rose up as she tried to get used to their screams and attempts to disturb her while she ate. They would get bold at times and try to touch her food but she would jump like lightning and bare her teeth at them. She would chase one of them every now and then to keep them in check.
   It had been three days without a successful hunt and she was getting frustrated with not finding suitable prey and failing when she tried. She went to the water hole and drank some water. She came back and laid down under a shady tree. Her nap was interrupted by a score of baboons as they gathered around the trees near her and screamed warnings to each other.
   She studied them as she lay down conserving her energy. Her gaze shifted to the trees, shrubs and paths of escape for the baboons - there were too many paths they had to escape. She started closing them one by one as she conceived of a plan that incorporated each of them. Her mind was as alert as if she was on the actual hunt and then she realized the flaw in her plan. It was the same flaw that her mother had when she had attacked the baboons so long ago. She had closed all their paths of escape in the air by calculating her speed and agility against the baboons light weight that let them fly from branches of one tree to another - she had to use that same time to scamper down a tree and up the other tree to which the baboon may have flown and so on and so on. During these calculations something went “Click”. She had accounted for and calculated using all the escapes in the air but had left out some of the escape routes on the ground. A basic flaw that had mother had in her plan also - the baboon could easily jump on the ground and run to another tree as well as run up a branch and fly to another tree. The baboons’ ability to scamper to a tree away from the bunch he was already in, was what she must take into account. Back to the drawing board.
   Like an intellectual involved in solving a complex chess game, she started incorporating all the permutations and combinations available to the baboons and then she had her algorithm. Her eyes were fully open now as she crouched and scanned the trees for her target. He stood out from the rest because of the light tufts of hair on his forehead and his movements among the rest of the baboons. He was the dominant male of the group and all the males avoided looking at his eyes as he approached them. The females would rub against him to show affection and to get his attention. He would play with the babies that were sticking to their mothers or occasionally playing among themselves. He was it.
   She watched him, logging his position on the grid of the extremely large, three dimensional chess board. At last he was nearing a lone female on the ground and at a point where she could close out his escape to the left side of the field by charging and driving him forward and to the right keeping him in front of her at all times. She stood up and moved towards him, her muscles flexing as she anticipated a run to the left to cut him off. He was petting the baby in the female baboons arms when he heard the rustle and saw the leopardess. His hair standing on end and his teeth bared he stepped to the leopardess’s left and then to the right and scampered up the nearest tree. The leopardess was in hot pursuit as the baboon went left, went right, went up the tree and to a thin branch and flew off to another tree. The leopardess relished the chase, flying up and down trees and cutting off the baboon’s moves to push him to the tree that she knew he would be left with just one final escape route.
   The baboon was getting a little tired, what with the ups and downs and the flying through the air and the constant chase by the leopardess. He finally flew to the tree she wanted him to go to. He hesitated a second before running down the tree and running towards another nearby tree. She jumped off the tree that she had chased him up on and went after him at an angle that cut off his access to the tree. He saw her and turned right to escape her and ran, she jumped up and hit his rear leg and right side sending him flying and tumbling. Something separated from him and fell on the ground as she jumped on his throat and squeezed hard with her teeth, killing him.
   With the baboon in her mouth she looked back. A baby baboon was lying dazed on the ground. He had attached himself to the other baboon as his flight began and he had fallen on the ground as the flight ended. He was shook up and crying fearfully. The leopardess dropped the alpha baboon and walked slowly to the baby. She opened her mouth and carefully closed it around the baby’s head. Her mother had often carried her in her mouth when she was a baby and she did the same with this baby.
   The baby baboon, shivering with fright knew only the warmth of the leopardess and clung to her desperately when she finally released him. She preened him a little with her tongue and nudged him on to her head. He grabbed her neck and clung to her as she picked up her prey and looked for a spot to eat it.

.....

   The leopardess and the baby baboon bonded like mother and daughter. The baboon was used to playing with other babies and being cared for by other adults in the troupe along with her mother. The other females liked to hold him and preen him and would often take turns among themselves. The baby took to the leopardess easily and clung to her whenever a noise frightened him. He would venture away from her and try to eat some grass or berries but would come running back to her if she moved or he heard an unfamiliar noise.
   Despite his very bad diet, he managed to survive. He would try to eat the regurgitated meat that the leopardess nudged him to eat at times but it was too rich for him. He learned to run up the fruit trees and eat fruits and young leaves. The leopardess liked to preen him and would play with him as he would run around and over her. They were perfectly content in each other’s company. But the leopardess was worried that he wasn’t eating any meat and would need other nourishment.
   It took a few weeks when they finally found themselves surrounded by a family of baboons. It wasn’t his troupe but they were very excited to see a baby baboon playing with a leopardess and shrieked aloud. The baboon first clung to the leopardess but slowly walked away from her and towards some baby baboons playing in the middle of the troupe. They were frightened by his smell but soon came up to him and started playing with him. The leopardess was watching them carefully from a little distance and seemed to be happy to let him go. She stood up slowly and started walking away from the baboons. The baby came running up to her and climbed on her head, ready to go with her. She lay back down, brought him down from her head with her paw and preened him. She then slowly pushed him away with her paw towards the other baboons. He seemed confused and climbed back on her head. She brought him down and licked him tenderly. She let him relax a little and then pushed him away once again. He looked at the baboons and then at the leopardess. He seemed very confused. After looking at the baboons and her some more he seemed to understand and walked to the troupe.
   The leopardess started walking away from the troupe. Her ears erect, listening for any noise of the baby coming back. She walked a little and when she was out of the grove of the trees, she looked back at the trees, seeing no one she quickly walked away.

The End        3056 words

Copyright © 2004 Raman Jalota. All rights reserved. No part of this electronic publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without the written permission of the author.

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