Posted on 08/09/2007 11:21:19 AM PDT by fishhound
Animal battle video becomes hit A clip from the YouTube video The footage has already been watched by nearly 9.5m people An amateur video of an amazing animal confrontation on the African savannah is fast becoming one of the biggest hits on video-sharing website YouTube.
The footage first shows how several lions attack a group of buffalo, snatching a buffalo calf.
As the lions wrestle with a calf by a watering hole, a crocodile joins in the battle, pouncing on the buffalo.
The lions win the tug-of-war, but then the buffalo herd returns, chasing away the lions and freeing the calf.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.bbc.co.uk ...
I know what you mean. Even though we see what appears to be the top of the cab of a truck in parts of the video, the cameraman (tourist!) doesn't seem to be that far away, that far up, or that well protected at all.
If those lions had decided to turn left towards the truck instead of right towards the buffalo, I suspect they could have closed the distance and jumped up into that vehicle before the driver could get it started and get them out of there. (I didn't hear any background engine noise in video, so I'm assuming the truck was turned off so as not to scare the animals.)
Ouch! Talk about seeing Nature in Action.
In that part of the world, humans are not at the top of the food chain. ;-)
I know. I kept telling them to follow the baby. That was one tough little water buffalo.
No, I heard a truck starting when the lions started approaching the buffalo.
Here's the play by play that I wrote back then for some people who didn't have broadband.
===CUT===
Buffalo herd inadvertantly walks up on a group of about 5-6 lions, who are lounging at the river’s edge. Lions startle buffalo and catch buffalo calf. The herd runs away. As the lions subdue the calf at the river’s edge crocodiles pop up and scare the crap out of the lions. Lions argue with (HUGE) crocs over calf. They have a tug-of-war with the calf. Lions win and pull calf out of water and up riverbank. Lo and behold, the herd of buffalo is coming back, and they’ve come to open a can of whup ars. Calf sees buffalo coming back and struggles/bellows mightily. Big big BIG buffalo introduces lion to laws of aerodynamics! One by one lions skeedattle, but are largely cornered now by a huge herd of really ticked off buffalo on one side and a river full of crocs on the other. Buffalo calf runs back into the herd. Lions exit stage right one by one, each with a buffalo horn eager to enema.
===CUT===
I was waiting and hoping to see the buffalo push at least one lion into the crocodile/alligator. Just one...!
No kidding. I was surprised to see the water buffaloes come back. What I'd like to know is whether the herd was headed in this direction all along and the two buffaloes with the calf were just out in front, or if the two original buffaloes went somewhere (off-camera) and somehow “told” the rest of the herd to come and help.
No, I heard a truck starting when the lions started approaching the buffalo.
Hmm, maybe I ought to be paying attention when my wife tells me I'm going deaf. (I guess if I could hear her, I wouldn't be going deaf. ;-)
LOL. That would have been just great. Pay-back big time!
I could be wrong but that’s what it sounded like to me, because I figured when the lions didn’t even flinch that they were further away than I thought.
Then we will finally be rid of the rampant, mindless idiocy that is PETA.
Is there money in it?
If so, we could sell of our pit bulls and invest, for our pension fund!
Yours truly,
National Football League Players’ Union
I like this one even more. Don’t know how to post the short link but it shows a lion attacking lion hunters as they shoot at it.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=h1FivamFXms
LMAO!
Depending on how you look at that, that could be skating on thin ice!
Living in the wild is a hard life.
I think it is beautiful that the whole heard came together and moved as one deliberate force to save the little calf. They were more collected together and in a bigger mass than they had been before. Like they spoke to each other.
People could learn something from it.
BUMP!
bump
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