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Morgan’s Diary – November 28, 2016
Morgan’s Diary – November 28, 2016
This morning I said goodbye to Zoi who is part of an organzation TIA (This is Africa) as she is headed to Namibia. She had been here for a few days to learn about the volunteer experience here. She did a small interview with Line, Tale, Martin and I last night asking about our experience here so far.
Then we all headed up the mountain for work. As we were driving up I could see Sasha, Moya and Natasha laying all together on a big rock in their enclosure. They really are the best of friends. It’s so nice to watch them all interact with each other. They rub heads, lay and play together. You rarely see them alone, as they are always together!
Once we got to the top of the mountain I started work on helping Martin measure posts for the outside deck of Andi’s house. Then I spent the rest of the day sanding the planks that we had painted last week with creosote. Tale would plane the sides and I would put the finishing touches on by sanding. It was a tough job today as it was around 31 degrees outside and not a single cloud in the sky. It was so hot today, but I was glad I was working under a tree that provided some shade.
Line and Mandeeli went to get a cow for the lions that had passed away from a tick bite. Once they came back, we finished up with work and then Tale and I fed Carl and the babies Odin and Mulan. Mulan took her meat right away and started eating as she is the more fiesty one and has been eating meat a little longer than Odin has. It was odd when Tale gave Odin his meat as he wasn’t interested. I suggested cutting up the meat into smaller pieces. When I fed him the meat he ate it straight away. We figured out that he didnt take it in the beginning because Tale had the smell of liver on her hands and Odin does not like liver.
Tale continued to pass me meat to feed to Odin. It was very interesting to see Odin take the meat out of my hand, as usually the cubs are quite possessive over their food. If someone gets too close to them while they are eating they make this grunting noise, which I find to be quite a cute sound. It was a little scary however when Odin looked like he was having trouble to swallow a piece of meat. Both Tale and I tried to take it out of his mouth as he was close to choking. We were both releived when we got it out and he continued to eat normally.
I sat and watched Carl eat in his enclosure. While I was sitting there the two cubs would almost waddle over to me as they had such big full bellies! They would bow down their head which shows they wanted to run heads with me, so I lowered my head to rub with theirs, however they tricked me. Instead they just wiped their faces on my legs and arms, which was still cute, but I was definitely dirty after that. I watched the cubs play and wrestle with one another for awhile. It is so good to see these two growing up together.
When Tale and I went to wash off our hands at the tap, Odin came over and started to play with the water out of the hose. It was so cute to see, as he reminded me of a house cat playing with a toy. Tale and I headed down to put the rest of the meat into the freezer, and as we drove down the mountain we had the most beautiful view of the sun setting. There is something so unique and different about a South African sunset than anywhere else I’ve seen in the world.
Now I am headed to bed as I have another long day in the heat tomorrow as it’s supposed to be hot all week! Thanks for today!
Morgan Young
Lööf Foundation representative
