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Panthera pardus kotiya
Golden Yellow coat with black rosettes. Large male. About 2 meters in length. Light golden eyes, white whiskers.
Yala National Park, Sri Lanka. A dry day at 5.55pm Yala combines a strict nature reserve with a national park. Divided into 5 blocks, the park has a protected area of nearly 130,000 hectares of land consisting of light forests, scrubs, grasslands, tanks and lagoons. One block is currently opened to the public. Situated in Sri Lanka’s south-east hugging the panoramic Indian Ocean, Yala was designated a wildlife sanctuary in 1900 and was designated a national park in 1938. Ironically, the park was initially used as a hunting ground for the elite under British rule. Yala is home to 44 varieties of mammal and 215 bird species.
We were so lucky to see this Leopard while it tried to cross the road. Unfortunately (and in my excitement I did not really realise ) we were in his way to cross the road and while he was trying to find a gap in between the Jeeps he peeked through the leaves to see if he could cross at this point. He decided against it and moved on. About three meters further he did decide to cross and with two big bounces he crossed the road. It was amazing to see that such a big creature could just disappear into the bush while still being very close by. You could just easily stand there and just miss him if your eye does not just pick up on his pattern in between the branches. See the last pictures. He IS there!
Spotted on Dec 31, 2014
Submitted on Jan 5, 2015
14 Comments
Beautiful, well spotted and thank you for sharing!
Thank you AntónioGinjaGinja and your more than welcome!
Awesome capture Muckpuk,great series,congrats and thanks for sharing
Thank you venusflytrap2000 and Sergio! I now put the second image on the front, is that better?
Wonderful series, Muckpuk, congrats.
wow, love the second image!
Hi csetzer. Yala national park has the highest leopard densities in the world. We were hoping to see a leopard ( although we were very excited about the peacocks and other things too) but did not expect it. It was not " the season" Yala NP is divided into 4 blocks and only 1 block is open to people. The animals can go anywhere in those blocks. YNP covers 979 square KM. They say there are about 25 leopards in that space, so I consider myself VERY lucky. I did use a zoom but I swear he was not more then maybe 3 or 4 meters away from us! Many other jeeps did not see any leopards and the driver had never seen them so close. :-) He was impressive and very very beautiful.
Did you go to the park expecting or trying to see leopards? Your photos are so close that at first I thought it must have been in captivity!
Thanks Leuba, and yes it was very, very exciting. He was really close (3meters)
Thank you Bhagya.
Nice captures....
Your notes makes this spotting all the more interesting. Thanks Muckpuk - must have been an exciting experience !
Thank you cseltzer and KathleenMcEachern! I know #2 is a great shot but his head gets cut off when I put him on #1! Don't want that ;-).
Thank you cseltzer. I know, I am surprised too. :-/
Great spotting! My favourite photo is #2.
How exciting! I'm surprised this hasn't gotten more attention. Nice spot! (And spots- a beauty!)