We sit quietly on our game truck and watch in awe as the lion duo commandeer the road, owning their space calming and purposefully. It is early in the morning and we are on drive tracking white lions. We caught them at that time of the morning when you really couldn’t be bothered with visitors and yet there the knock goes anyway. Everyone on the struck stares intently, amazed at this opportunity to see these great white lions in the wild.
Global White Lion Protection Trust
We were visiting the Global White Lion Protection Trust (GWLPT) on a small private reserve in Timbavati, Limpopo and had been tracking the pride all morning hoping to catch a glimpse of them. Alas, my spotting skills have not improved much but I’m pleased to share that my ‘seeing and identifying what others have spotted’ skills have largely improved.
Our trip incorporated many different elements from lions and science, to traditional medicines and ceremonies, to the community’s youth creatively engaging in conservation and leadership. There were stories of poachers killing lionesses in the night; leopards eating cattle; spirits speaking through people, to people and to the animals; people communicating with animals; and one lone woman with a baby on back calming walking through an angry pride of lions to protect a broken down vehicle with terrified travellers. It was a lot. Borrowing from the last line from a youth performance we attended (yeah, there was that too), the whole trip experience was “Cool. [Insane]. Awesome”.
The GWLPT advocates for the protection of the critically endangered white lions. They aim to re-establish the white lion in the Greater Timbavati and the southern Kruger Park regions where they once occurred naturally. Over the years, white lions have been removed from the area by captive breeding operations, wild hunting and trophy hunting; thus depleting the gene pool in the area.
Linda Tucker and Jason Turner spearhead this programme and monitor the reintroduction of the white lions in their protected area. Linda is a conservationist and founder GWLPT, she has studied ancient cultural symbols and spent time learning from the medicine women in the area. Jason is a specialist lion ecologist and scientific advisor.
While they share a common goal, they come from different outlooks and this made each encounter with them rather fascinating. We did two game drives, one with each of them and it was fascinating learn about lions from a scientific and cultural perspective, and brought to light the impact that indigenous knowledge played in nature.
Community Conservation
The trust is also involved in community based conservation and combines indigenous knowledge and modern scientific methods. This peaked my interest because there are many initiatives that don’t actually involve the community or do so rather superficially and I was particularly interested in how this involvement manifested itself.
After our morning drive, we were invited to lunch with community members, and the local chief and induna. A local club called StarLion Clubs performed fir us. The clubs range from nursery to high school level. They are programmes that foster principles such as leadership, identity, conservation and environmental sustainability. They equip the members to participate in conservation issues surrounding them. Further mote, it allows them to have their voices heard in what concerns them.
The performance was staged in a dry riverbed where a lionesses had been killed by poachers. It was part of the One United Roar campaign, which aims to celebrate and create awareness to protect lions as a global heritage. The groups took up the challenge and developed great creative pieces from both the perspective of a lion and the community. They recited poetry and monologues, sang songs and performed dances about the place of lions in the community and the world.
In Timbavati, the local medicine women say that the great white lion is a sacred animal that should be revered. With this in mind, before any of the performances start, a traditional ceremony by the local medicine women is done. They burned incense and requested permission to be in this sacred space, this is followed by a response from the spirits and ancestors. This is an important element of the proceedings, not just on the day but in general.
The medicine women hold a lot of indigenous information about the environment and historical life in the area. I won’t delve into all the explanations shared with us because there is a lot of information and I certainly won’t do it any justice. Partly because my scepticism would cloud certain aspects but also because I believe people should tell their own stories in their own voices. Not an account of what someone saw one day, but really the essence of a life, an experience, the heartbeat of a space.
While watching the youth groups perform, a lady sitting next to me remarked on how fortunate the white lion trust was, in finding a community open to joining forces and working together in the manner that they did, not all would. Some might not find Linda’s desire to learn about the indigenous culture and history to be genuine. They would question the motives harshly. It was an interesting conversation, and I’m sure not all community members agree on the projects and programmes, there was a genuine spirit of participation there. There was support of one another and they came together for lions and for youth. Which, I think, is pretty cool.
After looking through my photos and reflecting on this trip. I was worried that this post would end up being “the story of “what?” There were so many things I didn’t get but still wanted to learn more. In the end, it came down to just opening my mind and allowing an alternative thought to permeate there a while before judge too harshly. I’m just happy to see the youth roaring about things affecting their community.
You can learn more about the plight of the great white lions here.
I was a guest of Global White Lion Protection Trust. The opinions expressed are my own.