Dead Lion Walking - Saving Sirga - Journey Into the Heart of a Lion - The Secrets of Nature

[Music] a childhood dream brought valbruna to africa and the remote Kalahari Desert of Botswana [Music] his work at grassland game farm running a volunteer project and caring for captive rogue lions and wild dogs is fraught with conflict and danger [Music] but rescuing a dying language changed Sega is a handmade captive born of wild parents by rats she should be dead or in a cage but valleys determined to give her a chance at a free life and a hunting ground of her home any safe server for life in captivity can ii hope ur rediscover a wild predator with inner [Music] Bell greener Von D's dream on grasslands for a two-hour Trek of a rugged death to the nearest town he also found a very special friend court saga together here in the vast sands of the Kalahari Desert fell and sir the lioness are living an extraordinary story it's a story of friendship which blurs the boundaries between species it's a story of an emotional connection which challenges accepted wisdom it's the story of a man's humanity and his willingness to sacrifice of a severe to keep his promises and the lionesses unconditional trust in that man right now this story's ending remains unsettled because grasslands the remote ten thousand hectare gain farm where it all begins lies on the front line of a century-old war between man and editor when friendship between a lion and a man is unthinkable [Music] because here the life of a lion is worth little more in the price of a bullet as far back as well can remember he wanted to become a wildlife veterinarian in Africa there was no money for that the young German was undaunted he left his homeland to work for a year in the frozen oil fields of northern Canada the money and there enabled him to travel to Africa to qualify as a wildlife guide and gain a tracker and to spend time as a volunteer at the wildlife rehabilitation center in the middle Olivia gave his first taste of the great Kalahari Desert but it was here in Botswana Ravel's dreams of Africa his passion for predators and his guiding and tracking skills finally managed [Music] because grasslands gain farm is you luckily positioned and with the exception of serger all the Predators valve cares for our wild rogues destined to return to the wild we're basically bordering central Kalahari Game Reserve which is a massive pockets it's bigger than Denmark so it's unimaginable how how large it is and nobody really knows about it it's very empty that's not much happening so it's me it's probably the favorite place in Africa and it's it's so amazing just living right right next to it and all the Predators that that cause these problems walk from from the park right into the farming areas be behind me which are even bigger than this National Park but but they don't know these fences don't keep them back so these walk in because they're looking for a new home in this as well we have these lines sitting in a cage [Music] grasslands is surrounded on three sides by cattle farms beyond its fourth border lies the 52,000 square kilometres central Kalahari Game Reserve [Music] the second largest contiguous terrestrial game reserve in the world it's one of the last client strongholds in Africa and home to the Kalahari lion the subspecies adapted to desert conditions around 600 Kalahari Lions still survive in this vast wilderness [Music] there is no immediate danger of extinction but like all lions in Africa they finding it increasingly difficult to connect to new bloodlines and in time the all-important gene pool will be eroded ninety percent of Africa's lions are disappeared over the past 40 years the mercial line hunting is banned in Botswana but in the dark of night lions can stray into cattle files more than 10% of lions from the northern part of the central kalari Game Reserve are killed by farmers every year [Music] because when water and prey are scarce predators cross the fences into the cattle farms a Kalahari cattle farm is an oasis in a sea of sand borehole step into underground aquifers and waters piped to people and livestock at outlying cattle posts that's where lions wild dogs and leopards find easy prey a young farmer can lose his livelihood to predators within weeks but SWANA law allows him to protect it will attack RAF was born and bred into the frontier lifestyle and hunting culture of the Kalahari Desert we're shooting a lion is the stuff of legends then he realized that lion hunting would silence the roar of the Kalahari lion forever I'm one of those farmers that shot quite a number of lines and it's not an achievement it's a sad thing to shoot a lion there was a killing instinct in me because of you know the stories that I heard all the hunting stories from the Bushmen and you know I think maybe that was one of the reasons why I also showed some lines [Applause] [Music] many of the stories of the Bushmen was about our dangerous aligned [Applause] with regret came a burning desire to make amends and to help save predators in Mallory in 2007 Willie changed grasslands his damn farm into a conservation and cultural venue and a sanctuary for captive road predators nowadays visitors come to interact with a some people be safe in his childhood they also follow the work done here with captive rogue lions and African Wild Dogs he's alive because the Botswana government gave Willie permission to capture him and care for him until he can be moved back into a wildlife area in Botswana [Music] these liens at the garland is actually supposed to be dead line they are not supposed to be alive because they were problem line that was actually supposed to be short by by me or other farmers but instead of shooting them I saved them from a bullet when a rogue line enters a farm there is no time to call a vet as a farmer are not allowed to use a dart gun so I actually arrest my life by capturing those lines I took at NIT and we followed this lines problem lines with some of the Bushmen trackers which is the best trackers in the world and when we approach the line you know line when you when you corner a line he gets aggressor and he trots to achievement and me and one person was standing in the back of the vehicle with an 8 left up and when the lion jumped towards us we throw the net over the line and that's how we captured these lines and when you throw the net over the line the line gets tangled in the net because the head of the line can go through the the whole of the net but the rest of the body cannot go through it really any team of San Bushmen know the dangers that done it perform every capture is a life-threatening operation because the Lions cannot be sedated the first priority is to secure the Lions feet they can't go near it so they use hooking sticks and ropes [Music] once the feet are bound and it's down the men get off the vehicles to put it into the waiting traffic it's still high-risk but the chance of Italia Co injury is greatly reduced once the gate is dropped the captain secured it takes less than 30 minutes but it requires a team of 14 million and two vehicles and once the line is inside the cage we drop the gate and that's how we capture those lines not only males arose sometimes pregnant females give birth to Cubs I never tried to raise my lion cubs by hand because when you relocate them back into the world I should be as well as possible in nature we all know that when a female line is about to give birth she goes away from the pride give birth to her cubs and after six weeks she brings the cups to the to the pride and the pride accept this Cubs but with in captivity it was impossible and when one of the female lions here gave birth to of the small cups were killed by older Cubs and the one cup was still day so this Valentin then called me on the radio and asked me whether they can take this Cup because she's also going to be killed and I gave him permission to take this cup away safer from being killed and he took her to the volunteer camp many people will look at it in a different way maybe but I just thought this young man would love to raise a cup I would also love to do that when I was young but if you do that you have to spend a lot of time with this cups and I couldn't do it so I gave Valentin a chance to adapt a cup and look after it and rise it which he has done very successful so when I got suger she was just this this tiny weak little line 1.5 kilogram and and barely able to move and we stir I started feeding her so much and six feedings a day for feedings and night and because she was only one line I took about one hour on every feeding because there's no competition nobody was was there normally lines will go crazy and they they they drink as quick as possible and she took her time and had had no no problems and now so 10 hours a day you busy just feeding a line and then I had to run the volunteer program at the same time and every night for the first eight months I was sleeping outside with her because it was also very cold it's in winter here it's almost at zero degrees or minus degrees at night and the the little line was sleeping outside I never wanted her to get used to two tents and things where we are so I stayed outside with every night and got up four times a night to feed again and again well became mother father and protector to the traumatized young cub [Music] so it went slowly but she she started trusting me and we developed a bond and she would follow me around I didn't have to look after she'd always be with me and I just got more and more and more that I started taking her for walks and she would never leave me alone he's just following and and I didn't even have to call the line though but the moment the line couldn't see me anymore it's just a tiny thing and she's tired laying in the bush but then the moment I'm gone that's that's screaming and calling for you even when there are tiny little things that they want to hunt everything anything that moves she would run when she was about three months old she would run up to any giraffe that she sees and then go over it and it's amazing to to just see how how that instinct is and then the name sugar is from my childhood when I was a kid my parents used to show me this movie's called circa a lioness which is about a little child Julie there's a local kid that grows up in the in the bush in the village and the same time in lioness is born in that area and now the mother brings that little lion cub into his tent at night and so they develop a bond and and flock together and then if they get separated and the the kid becomes a slave and and in the end-of-line saves and it's it's it's a lovely movie for for children and you know when I got so you gotta decide it's a good it's names to name a little - since since I've raised the circus she she's just become my my best friend idea and there's nobody else that stays here the whole time it's just me and she's an amazing little catty on the walks you can watch hee when I play with her she she gives you so much love and and she really gives me another very good reason to to stay if ever and I believe again raising surger in addition to caring for rogue predators is a 24-hour job well has no regrets at 16 months old she weighs a hefty 90 kilogram he's a highly social net and she craves attention and physical contact in the wild a cub her age could be up to the fried tagging along in the hunt just lean and bonding with siblings strengthening bonds before the hunters instinct or more important its immense the pride and Foster's cohesion those responsibilities make it impossible for them to be together all the time so that makes us from last time [Music] he doesn't know what the embrace means to serve her she has imprinted on him from a young age and he doesn't know if she sees herself as a lion or a human she's at no contact with other lines since she was 10 days old she looks and acts like a lion but would she recognize lions if she saw them in the wild imprinting on well could affect her future young lions learn the landmarks and resources of their territory from their mothers ballast water their hands and grasslands 10,000 hectares is their territory after 16 months sailors familiar with the physical features of their territory now she has to learn the look and scent of the antelope that live here what is the lifeblood of this great first land rain is rapidly filtered through vast expanses sand leaving little on the surface and what's left quickly evaporates in the Kalahari Lions lanty whose water is built was without it nothing survives Valon Sega don't understand the power predators command our water yet they still forging and strengthening their unlikely alliance everything else has to wait Wells guiding and trekking skills are vital he knows the animals and the plant species and he's learnt to read and follow spoor said his knowledge of tracking and following animals is instinctive the holo is freshly dug by an Oryx and such of roots and tubers the Oryx is long gone but the plants here are a treasure trove Bell wants to explore the relationship between the animals and they have been [Music] in addition to his work with predators and with serger Bell runs the Medusa volunteer project client identification is part of the program The Devil's thorns roots have proven medicinal properties he wants to take a sample back to shop [Music] [Music] don't care no no this this dream that I have and the life I'm living here I want to to share with people which is why we started the volunteer program especially to bring young people into Africa and not just as a church that's there for two nights really - for a few weeks or months even and given I experienced that in the bush about the voice they're helping at the same time and along the way I've learned a lot of things which which I never thought I'd think about that way before and and it's very important to me to be able to share this passion until we try to to save lives because if if the future generation generations will not know about it with the Lions will be lost now and his friend and business partner Michael Agathe co-founded the medusa wildlife project to make young people aware of the realities facing wildlife in africa but he says this eternal word for guardian fowl runs the day-to-day activities Michael manages the business side of things from Denmark and get the wild ostrich visits the camp from time to time for water and for company grasslands is the perfect backdrop for an awareness project [Music] Wells decision to rescue serger has long-term consequences in Botswana hand-reared lines can never be returned to national reserves but was determined that she won't be just another captive pepper the only way she will have a fighting chance at living a relatively free life as if she can hunt but both felons server are novices at the game of hunting they know little about survival in the Kalahari and things wild game is extremely dangerous Oryx carry lethal weapons no man has ever hunted on foot and unarmed with a lion in the wild before thou cannot teach server to hunt all he can give her are opportunities to develop the predatory instinct she was born with but both novice hunters have much to learn right now neither would be able to survive on their own in the wild and they have no experienced wild hunters to learn from [Music] [Music] sabira and she's inexperienced but she's alive hunting isn't a flood but it's not easy Oryx are fast and strong she laughs to up again if she's to be successful sarah has never been part of a hunting pride she's never watched the pride moving to ambush or take down prey [Music] they'll simply do the out in the wild to provide stimulus and exercise he never expected a tunt but Sega shifted the goal posts she changed their lives forever she made a first kill there was a hartebeest and probably one of the most and overwhelming moments I've ever had lines are very very crazy about their food and very protective so normally you you know when a line has meat you can't get neared now she's killing the hartebeest but she's young so it took her a bit of time and you start feeling sorry for the antelope but you're so happy that your line has has caught something because it's what they're supposed to do and after while sand came back from the kill she came up to me gave me a little hug rub the head on my head and then she walked back to to antelope so I just decided I'll try a walk back with and she had absolutely no problem and actually helped her to kill it and then cut it open for it because she was very very exhausted and it's probably the most amazing thing I have experienced this first kill was pivotal because service showed no signs of aggression towards Val until this moment he'd considered hunting with her impossible there's lions and notorious for their aggressive behavior around food the serger turns on a manicure it would be disastrous he cannot survive a food fight [Music] but the behavior gives him a unique opportunity if he can hunt with her she can rediscover and hold a hunting instance and if she can hunt on her own he can create a large fenced hunting ground for her where she can live a relatively normal life he trusts service genetic heritage it's quite amazing to see her in stings and all the things she just does without me ever showing it was probably more that I can learn than I could have a teacher hunting with a large predator will always be a calculated risk there are no guarantees there is no one to ask for advice but val is her family is all she knows she's young and easily frightened by the unknown but she's willing to learn and overcome her fears for val being here with Saiga is a dream come true no it's really been my dream since I'm a small side three or four years old that I wanted to live in the bush in Africa with with lines and and just being this this environment here and yeah it's just amazing now I'm I actually made it Olivia I have raised a lioness I can go hunting with with that line together and and I spend every day of my life out here and there's no way to describe how it feels like you just simply living the dream you've always had and it's worked out the dream is drawing him ever deeper into the complex world of a lion she has an insatiable need for closeness and touch but sometimes what instinct takes over she withdraws from him the body language changes there's an inner and from the push up ahead then she looks back at Val she's checking his position he's part of her hand [Music] the Elan pool escena taking it on shows courage confidence and inexperience only learn her limitations [Music] but the chase is too long for a short distance printer [Music] and then work now cannot keep up it's enough just to be part of that [Music] Zed is tired but restless she knows the alert is still out there but there will be other animals other chances she's learning the chasing prey in the scorching sand is hard physical work she will need strength and stamina as well as speed if she's to survive as a lone hunters she will need knowledge and cunning to outwit prey animals and she will have to come to terms with thirst thirst is part of being a lion in the Kalahari come on Jada it's gone Kalahari lions often survive on the fluids and they pray if they cannot kill they die of thirst two vowel these three to four hours alone with serger are precious it is only private time the care of the captives and the activities of the medusa wildlife project take up every other waking moment sega uses the time without a bond and practice a takedown skills not on the sand grass they to snore well is just the right size [Music] is the ultimate lion surfer and this giant surfer belongs to her she refuses to share it with anyone else I chose Botswana because not many people here and the wild love that's left is amazing and not just inside national parks also outside protected areas and the calories this huge empty wilderness which is beautiful it's a it's a freedom that you have Aarti that I've never seen anywhere else in the world and it it just really moved me and made me want to come in and help saving it co-founders MIDI Sir Michael Agartha sacrifice his own African dreams to manage the business side of things from day now but visits Botswana as often as you can the idea for a project started in Namibia where Val and I was working and we quickly became good friends and and one night were just talking about what would we actually like to do in the future and we've both been dreaming about working with wildlife and animals since we were kids so that was the first thing that came up to our mind and not a few days we were still talking about it and how can we actually do this and and then we decided okay let's try it and go for it like we only get this one shot so we might as well just try and go we're without dreams and they were both went back to Europe so we could try and actually put this idea into a bit more planning and we started to look into different African countries and after bit of research we found out that the SWANA didn't have a similar programme to what we would like to start and then after bit more research we also discovered that the Kalahari lion was in a big decline due to the conflict between the lines and the pharmacy in the area so just try they just wanted to go to purse wanna basically and after some time we we met with little half who share our passion for for the big cats he's been he's been capturing lions because he didn't want them to get shot and then the idea was to get them relocated into some safe areas here in Botswana and at the time where we approached him and talked to him he was looking for someone to manage his lines and and we saw a great possibility that both of us could benefit from this idea and we agreed on that we could start rebuilding our camp here and slowly start our volunteer program and in the meanwhile he's been teaching us about how the situation is really here because as many other people outside of Africa we have some sort of idea that we know there are problem between farmers and lions and just you know while that they define but he was really teaching us like how is working just here in this area he has a great understanding of the whole situation here in the Kalahari region and so he's been a great mentor to to for us and for the program we run now we all know that the shooting of lions is a very sensitive thing because the numbers and the population of lions is is dropping you know but in Botswana it works like this that if a lion comes from outside he'll do a phone you are allowed to protect your livestock so you are allowed to shoot the lion when it kills one of your animals and I'm one of those farmers that that did should quite a number of lions trying to protect my animals no one understands the challenges faced by commercial and subsistence farmers in tribal areas in Botswana better than Philly does cattle farming is deeply ingrained in Botswana culture it represents status in the secure income predators are a major threat to farmers livelihoods you can imagine if this beautiful animal is killed by a lion then you realize the Predators like a lion is still being killed and shot by the farmers because you can't afford to lose a bull like this but you must understand the conflict between a predator and a farmer because you know you don't want to kill a lion or shoot the lion you also don't want to lose it animal that cost you forty five thousand rand there are no easy answers here hungry lions don't distinguish between wild game and livestock and angry farmers don't ask questions before shooting but lions are not the only hit egg farmers have when lions are killed their most successful competitors take the gap fewer than 200 African wild dogs still survive in the central Kalahari Game Reserve they're part of the most important interconnected population that remains of the species they too were killed by farmers and tribesmen wherever they found the captive wild dogs the grasslands are part of the unfolding tragedy of a species on the brink of extinction well if you look at the wild dogs it's such a sad story there's such amazing animals and and not the danger to us as people at all and it's very touching to you to think about the fact that they're almost disappearing and we were not really doing anything against at the moment they're still becoming less and less and less and farmers shootin well I want to save the the wild dogs simply because there's not many around when in captivity we have the chance to keep some of them and keep them healthy vex vaccinated for rabies and breed in a way that they're healthy that we can make sure they're not inbreeding the calorie is a very big ecosystem which is still functioning they come from here and the only way that why they have to sit behind the fence right now is because they were walking to some of the neighboring cattle farms and get shot if I let them out but I really want to make a difference for these animals and try to to save as many of them as possible and whether we can just do this in a small area and cages for now and maybe release them into bigger areas at some stage if we can get funding to fence in and make sure they cannot escape into the cattle farms but I'm really hoping it for the future we can make a difference and bring these animals the numbers up again instead of just watching and drop and disappear from from Africa saving wild dogs and farms is hard because most farmers want them exterminated there are no telephone service fast while frontier believe this is the families living at isolated cattle pastes in person it's a mutually beneficial relationship he provides them with basic provisions such as you may unique to you and Nixon as well as the latest news from the outside world and they will give him fresh updates and predatory aliens injuries and up trip citizens in the areas around one of my guys just told me that cow was killed by some wall dogs yeah you know it's not easy to track Waldo down because you know once you the water kills a account by the time that you reach they they are going to the next pet often another cow is killed so so it is a it's a serious problem and you know it will always stay a problem by the time we we see the vultures you know it means that the war dogs already left the carcass because once the wall the vultures comes their home the dogs are gone the wild dogs killed a heifer in a remote or Froude area the men have to track them and chase them back across the border fence into the buffer zone the sun's ability to find and follow tracks on foot and foremost back is legendary and well deserved Phyllis over distracting the pants of eight dogs with Yonkers [Music] it will be another hard day in the Sun [Music] every two weeks villi drives the 60 kilometers from his cattle farm to grasslands to discuss the care of the cattle predators ensuring that they fed regularly as a priority those first months in the Kalahari with a steep learning curve maintaining equipment and infrastructure in such a remote area is a huge challenge he also never expected that you'll be hunting and slaughtering gammy but the strict realist and the idealistic young dreamer with the bare feet work well together we want to feed the lines tomorrow or you should feed them so what do you do there shooting tomorrow for me okay so I want you to shoot for volley beast okay I can do that okay [Music] when we first arrived well dreamed only of saving the lines of Africa and helping captive predators but captive lions and wild dogs cannot hunt they have to be fed someone has to provide the food [Music] shooting wild animals was the hardest of all lessons and still goes against the grain now I really don't like the hunting me but and we have to we have to feed the lines and well I mean we try to do it as as good as possible there was a shooting that we don't wound anybody and at the end of the day we have too many wildebeest in the park because the lines are locked in the cage at the moment and content on them on their own so we we just have to to do the hunting for them until we can get them back outside so they can do it themselves you see that they had a fight that's gonna slip is Scott the captive predators are fed twice a week getting the portions right is important slaughtering was a foreign concept about when he first arrived the San Bushmen had to show him how to divide the meat into portions for the different captives nowadays it's just one of many tasks that have to be performed and he any staff handle it as a matter of course but he remembers what it's like to be from the first world country where meat comes neatly packaged for most volunteers their first slaughter is a life-changing experience that forces them to confront the realities of life in rural Africa once they understand that the captives would starve without their help most are happy to get their hands dirty nano captives they care for our tale all grateful now these four boys they kept jumping out of the big enclosure where their moms were they even jumped into another lion cage and killed one of our females so I had to to catch them like once a week they used to be out even more and we'd use a net to throw on them and bring them back into the cage or trap them or just chase them so they they don't like me anymore at the moment and but since their big threat to the people that are here when they jump out of the big cage we had to lock them up and in the small one which is a set situation at the moment but we we cannot change it right now we're busy fixing the big cages with electric wires so we can bring them back into the big camps in the wild these young males would be nomads they'd be sneaking between territories living in small mammals and scavenging for anything they can find here they are fed twice a week they quickly learned that the sound of the tractor engine means food is on his way tempers and stress levels are higher around but once the tractor arrives at the enclosure and the smell of the meters and their noses most captives come down and wait their turn but liens are individualized this lioness hates being captain she wants to hunt her own food she's escaped so often that she had to be confined here until the enclosure is electrified they'll feel sorry for her but he has to be careful she's clawed him twice before nothing pacifiers her not even food right now val is responsible for twenty lines and six African Wild Dogs as well as two shy female leopards Willie's efforts to capture rogue predators have paid off ten lines and five wild dogs have been moved back into the wild by the Wildlife Department as part of various research projects the six males are settled in their large 10 hectare enclosure but they haven't lost their competitive edge they were captured because they killed cattle on farms they still as wild as ever and like all wild lions they fight and compete for food even the thin males recovering from a serious injury to jaw back in the wild only the biggest and the strongest - Willa pride in the territory these males come into the farmers as no matters now they arose warn outsiders as far as 8 kilometres away this is our territory keep out - who died [Music] what I noticed since I started with their lines here that the lines from outside is not entering the form as they did before and I think the reason is that they are afraid of the price in captivity here so the young males and the females from outside they've got respect for the lines when they hear them here on the forum but I remember once to pick miles came I think because they are they were able to challenge this lines here but the younger males and the females don't come police observations resonate with new research indicating that the sound of a lion's roar might be used to keep other lions away from fenced farms surveys shows no memory of the brutal territorial battles that drove of parents from the central gallery game reserve she doesn't respond to the laws of the captive Lions perhaps she staying silent because she's an outsider in another prides territory [Music] perhaps a bond with fellows taken heir to an existence outside line society that she doesn't recognize the cause because he's communicating it differently now Sega release is a lioness that's that's offspring from lines that are from the wild sushi he's not a captive bred line that has been a population that has been cages for for a long time who parents with problem animals on on cattle farms had walked walked in here from the central Kalahari Game Reserve she basically really is the first generation in captivity and she still has all her senses in what she what she needs in in nature to to be able to survive and and to handle and I guess the only the only problem she has today is that she's she's just very used to people um but maybe not as friendly with everybody as she is with me Sega also gets her piece of all to beast meat she's still a captive after all risking service given bone your insight into the complex problems surrounding lions in Africa she was born because Villa de Graaff captured her parents but they were wild they could be returned to nature sega can never rejoin her wild fried they would kill her no she's different she rinses a meat in their water before feeding she's used to clean fresh food in the water she shows no aggression towards Val even though the meat is too small to share because she trusts him [Music] [Music] the idealistic young man took pity on a dying Carles come to terms with the fact that rescuing sir there's long-term consequences only he can help her become the hunter she was meant to be only he cares enough to create a hunting ground for her when she can live an independent life if he succeeds he would have saved her from a life of boredom and captivity [Music] if he fails sir the young lioness with a hunter's heart will never run free [Music] but saving soda will require a dangerous and unprecedented leap into the unknown [Music]

Channel: The Secrets of Nature

Views: 5,133

Rating: 4.949367 out of 5

Keywords: orf universum, documentary, blue chip, natural history, secrets of nature, planet earth, natura, naturaleza, documentales, wildlife, grandes documentales, lion, africa, nautre, big animals

Id: cIwgkuI_w3k

Length: 51min 57sec (3117 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 21 2019