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How unusual
Thanks for the pics

No ist not that unusual that Lions sit in a tree. As already told some African prides specialise themselves in climbing at trees. Even in Kruger does reports exist where Lions sit in trees. Why i can only speculate.

We saw lions in trees in Queen Elizabeth Park Uganda where they regularly sleep up in the trees. Seems they pick a nice branch or fork in the trees to stretch out on. They were pretty relaxed as we were only a few feet away from them in our jeep; with the pop up top we were at eye level for taking pictures. Will try to see if the posted picture will show up. Am not quite sure if I have the process right.
Link

With a bit of coaching I am trying another picture post using tinypic....here goes...another couple of shots of the Tree Lions in Uganda......

if I'm not mistaken so far nobody has until now uploaded any pics of kruger lions in a tree, so here we go, taken about three weeks ago near Croc Bridge





this guy seems to be the leader of that croc bridge pride. I've heard other travellers saying they once saw 16 different in that pride (I personally counted 10 at one time). Given the size of that pride I'm surprised you can see the rips of this particular fellow...also, to me he seems quite young to lead such a big pride

Thanks for all the input and great pics guys!

During Jan and Feb it can be extremely hot and humid in northern KZN, so would guess that they climb into the trees to catch any breath of wind in order to keep them cool.

Hi AWB,

this is the same explanation they give us two weeks ago when we visited Uganda.

This makes LIT seem a bit vague now

Lion(s) in tree. The second one is obscured by branhes. Taken in KZN.

I presume the behaviour is passed on from adult to cubs ... if mom climbs up a tree, the young ones will surely pick up the habit.







I agree Glen. LIT ? We'll have to specify in future

We found this young lion with three others on the H13-1 near Punda Maria trying out his climbing skills. He looked good in the the tree, but not so good when he was getting down.

Larger view

It was shown on a wildlife film where a lioness climbed into a tree to steal a leopard's kill. She lost her footing and fell down. I the process, one of her hind legs got caught up in a fork of the tree. She was unable to free herself and starved to death. Not a nice story, but such is life in the bush.

I think the documentary was filmed in Mala Mala.

Very interesting, I remember the doccie.It was either Mala Mala or Londolozi.

I have seen it on You-tube. Heartbreaking

It was mala mala- sad but thats the way of the wild!