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Los cielos nocturnos una vez que se llena de estrellas.
Hoy nuestras propias luces eclipsar la oscuridad
y difundir de manera constante cada día.
Poco a poco, los lugares oscuros en África se convierta en el último refugio
para uno de nuestro planeta los animales más emblemáticos.
Hace cincuenta años 450.000 leones vivieron aquí.
Y hoy puede haber tan pocos como 20.000.
Y, sin embargo, en estos lugares remotos,
algunos de los más dramáticos historias de la Tierra se juegan.
Ellos son muy duras, a veces violentas,
Nunca malicioso, y siempre es real.
Esta es una historia
de algunos de los últimos leones salvajes en la Tierra.
Aquí, en un pequeño bolsillo de esta oscuridad,
comienza nuestra historia.
Es una antigua saga de la vida vivido por los dientes y garras.
Una leona en perfecto estado.
Es raro que una leona que sin orgullo,
pero ella no está sola.
Ella tiene un compañero
su compaero y protector,
y el padre de sus cachorros.
Los inicios de un nuevo orgullo
por esta tierra virgen profundamente en Botswana.
Esta noche, el arbusto es incómodo.
Las llamadas distantes que han estado escuchando
durante algún tiempo están cada vez más cerca.
Los pone en el borde.
Invasores Y de repente se materializan.
Leones del norte,
forzada aquí por el implacable invasión del hombre.
Están dispuestos a arriesgar todo para ganar nuevos territorios.
Su macho tiene no tiene más remedio que luchar.
Es una batalla que podría cambiar las líneas de sangre para siempre.
Los invasores con una clara determinación
para ganar y para quedarse.
Cuando por fin emerge de su escondite,
su hombro casi sano,
ella está lista para recoger a su vida.
Ella comienza por intentar para encontrar a su compañero.
Cada sonido tiene se congela
Cada aire respirado trae olores desconocidos.
Hasta que lo encuentra,
ella es una fugitiva en su propia tierra.
Por ahora su compañero ha tenido semanas para recuperarse.
Él debe contestar sus llamadas.
Su espiritu ha salido de el
Sus heridas son muy graves.
Se ha convertido en viejo, insevible y esta ya roto.
Su reinado ha terminado.
Hay nuevos reinan ahora.
Para sobrevivir aqui
ella tendrá que rendirse a estos nuevos amos.
Pero hasta que los recién llegados detecten su presencia,
ella todavía tiene una opción.
El remolino de aire lleva un toque de su olor no familiar.
comienza la caceria
Ella decide irse
irse imediatamente
Porque ella tiene un secreto
todo lo que queda de su antigua vida ...
Un secreto que debe proteger
Esta sera su vida ahora...
Proteger la sobrevivencia de sus cachorros
Con los hombres detrás de ella, retrocederse es imposible.
Las hembras huye de los machos desconocidos
Ellos bloquean su escape en el Oeste
El líder se acordará la noche violenta su última reunión
tan vívidamente como ella lo hace.
La noche en que se quedó maltratadas y mordida,
Desangrandose hasta la muerte
Pero, a su vez, abandonado el más grande de ellos
con un ojo ciego de por vida.
Es una herida de plata de ojos del líder de la manada
Nunca olvidara
Ellos huelen sus huellas
La tormenta se enciende el monte y ella está atrapada.
Ahora ella debe elegir
norte hacia los pueblos y las personas,
o hacia el sur a lo largo de la línea de fuego
aún un más grande obstáculo para ella ...
El rio crecido
En esta parte de África, una madre es llamada
después de que su primogénito como su protector.
Siempre fue un poco más pequeño que los otros dos,
lento, propenso a perderse.
Hoy, Ma di Tau, Madre de los leones,
gana su nombre como protector de sus crías.
Como el mas pequeño
Tiene que acostumbrarse a ser acosado constantemente
Una de dos lo pondra mas fuerte o mas debil.
Ma di Tau sabe el orgullo de leones vendrán después por ella,
pero lo que está por venir es aterrador.
Leones detestan profundamente, agua abierta.
Esconde las cosas que parece poco natural a ellos.
Sin embargo, las opciones de detrás son peores.
Si se queda a pelear, Los leones matará a sus cachorros.
Es su instinto para limpiar la superficie de la Tierra
limpieza de genes del viejo macho
Ella debe tomar su decisión ahora.
El cachorro macho no duda en esta ocasión.
Él sabe estar cerca.
Sus hermana se lanza con más cautela.
Pero el tercer cachorro se detiene, y tiene miedo del agua.
En el momento el tercera cachorro encuentra el valor suficiente,
Se convertido en un blanco fácil ...
tanto en la tierra, como en el agua.
Los leones dan la espalda en su territorio recién conquistado,
satisfecho de que ella y sus cachorros han sido expulsados para siempre.
El silencio es una condena.
Ma di Tau, the protector,
Ha fallado por primera vez como madre.
A medida que se aleja, ella es dando la espalda a su pasado,
en el orgullo que era tan desesperado por librarse de ella.
Y se da un paso adelante hacia un futuro incierto
con sus dos cachorros que sobrevivieron: el pequeño macho y su hermana.
La batalla por el territorio se ha decidido.
Ma di Tau y sus cachorros han escapado
a una casi desierta isla en el pantano,
los únicos leones en este vasto, desierto aislada llamada Duba,
en el centro del delta del Okavango.
y los ríos que tejen a través de él.
Si se trata de un refugio para ellos, será uno mojado.
Pocas semanas han pasado.
La comida ha sido escasa,
pero todavía hay senas de otros leones,
y ellos están empezando sentirse seguro en el último.
El cachorro más pequeño ha ganado una confianza renovada
por ser uno de sólo dos cachorros ahora.
En su corazón es un cazador,
siempre dispuesto a explorar las infinitas posibilidades
que se encuentran a la espera de un cachorro con un espíritu inquieto.
Para los jóvenes varones, fue una decisión difícil ...
Él pudo haber pensado que tan cerca ha conseguido su primer asesinato,
pero el corazón de ese pequeño cazador hizo saltar un pequeño golpe en la actualidad.
La retirada cobarde por el elefante
confirma que habra otra oportunidad,
tal vez cuando sea un poco mayor.
Hoy debe dedicarse a escapar y sobrevivir
pero ahora ella debe encontrar una manera de conseguir sus cachorros
de forma segura a través de su primer año crítico,
hasta que puedan valerse por sí mismos.
Y como madre soltera,
esto llevará hasta la última gota de su energía e inteligencia.
El fuego y marcha de los asentamientos humanos
hacia el norte han llevado otros refugiados animales
hacia la isla.
Duba está a punto de cambiar.
Estos son algunos de África animales más agresivos.
Sus cuernos afilados y cuerpos aplastante
son las armas perfectas,
y la gran cantidad del groupos para darles confianza.
A la cabeza de la manada es una del más temible de ellos:
un toro cicatriz en la cara pesa casi una tonelada.
En las últimas semanas esto ha sido su isla.
La llegada de los búfalos trae esperanza posible presa ...
pero también el miedo.
Estos serán a su nuevos enemigos de la isla.
Buffalo no son presa fácil.
No les gusta el olor de los leones,
y no lo hacen dudan en atacar.
Por los Cachorros,
vida hasta ahora ha sido una letanía de escapes estrechos,
una larga línea de los enemigos a por ellos -
una extraña manera de empezar una nueva vida como el rey de las bestias.
Con más y más de los recién llegados
que fluye en su isla,
Ma di Tau y sus cachorros son destinado a ejecutar en ellos de nuevo.
Pionero de la manada Ahora es consciente ahora es conciente
y de ahora en adelante él siempre estará en estado de alerta.
Será una conflicto casi todos los días,
inevitable en este abierta, sin embargo, el espacio confinado.
Si ella no va estar a su merced,
ella tendrá que aprender más sobre esta nueva presencia.
Ella tendrá que ponerlos a prueba las debilidades
and she must look beyond
the strong outer wall of their heavy armaments.
In time she must become expert at finding those weak points...
small, hidden chinks in the armor
that will stumble out into view
and excite her instincts as a huntress.
Night is an advantage for her.
She can hide in the shadows of a crescent moon
and let her eyes brighten to take in her quarry.
Now she has to become invisible.
It is what a solitary hunter does best.
The damp grass helps her perform like a silent ghost,
flitting in and out of reality.
Two mothers now battle for the survival of their young:
buffalo desperate to deflect an attack;
lioness eager to double back and strike quick, fatal blows
to earn a meal for her cubs.
It's the eternal dance of Africa.
The young lions will go hungry a little longer.
When the buffalo calf escapes, it carries a chilling message
of a near-miss written in blood back to the scar-faced bull.
It's a race against time.
The cubs are demanding more from Ma di Tau
as they grow and her milk dries up.
The small male doesn't seem to want to compete.
But while he bonds with his mother,
his sister grows stronger all the time.
Her cubs survival is a hard taskmaster for her,
and despite the searing heat and humidity,
she forces herself up again,
back onto the path of the buffalo.
She seems to understand that the herd will provide,
if she can just crack that code.
She has a fresh tactic in mind.
Having taken up her position,
she tries something very sophisticated...
a full on, out in the open, rather desperate charge.
It panics the herd.
A lion hunt is as much a mind game
as it is a physical explosion of violence.
What she doesn't know is that the commotion of the hunt
has drawn interest from across the river...
Silver Eye.
Only a thin strip of water divides them
at this point in the river.
The intensity keeps Ma di Tau focused -
perhaps too focused.
The night hides many a bold and sinister thing.
Signs of change often come
in the slight shift of grass in the breeze,
or a hint of a scent that brings disturbing news to Ma di Tau.
She and her cubs once again stand directly in the path
of an aggressive, half-blind lioness and her followers.
Ma di Tau's hostile warning
buys her time against these huge lions,
who present a united force
though lack the confidence of her local knowledge.
The cubs understand her body language;
they know what to do.
This territory is her last option.
There is nowhere else for her to go.
If she flees from the island,
she'll immediately have to face
the males patrolling the far bank.
And if she were to avoid them,
at the horizon there are people, villages, guns.
The river is her defense and her confinement...
Her last stand.
This island lives and breathes
by a different set of rules to the rest of Africa.
The pride has some lessons to learn
before they can call it their own.
The first is that it's a mistake
to sleep too deeply on Duba island,
especially when a scar-faced bull
has smelled the spilled blood of his young.
Ma di Tau hears the buffalo attack.
She pictures the chaos from bitter experience.
One sound -
the crash of water as the buffalo retreat -
takes on a new significance to her.
Water!
Each crystal clear splash clarifies an idea:
buffalo flee to water to escape.
They use it as a protective barrier
between themselves and the lions.
And yet, they still panic,
bunch together and make mistakes.
If she can make water her strength,
it will be their weakness.
Silver Eye has noticed the silent hunter on the move...
and what she has left behind in the grass.
The casual awakening is deceptive.
She is giving the huntress time to leave,
enough time to get involved in the hunt.
Something bothers Ma di Tau for a moment, some instinct.
But there seems nothing amiss.
Beaten, or just deterred for the time being?
It's a question that would haunt
any mother with vulnerable young,
driven by conflicting imperatives -
to hunt and feed her young,
or to stay and protect them?
With the pride safely in retreat,
the young male cub turns his attention
to a much greater challenge...
like being king of the hill.
Even just for a moment.
For a young lion, being lord of all you survey
is almost your birthright.
If only one's sister would accept it.
Winning the high ground is something to fight hard for,
but then when one's opponent unexpectedly gives up,
then the triumph of victory feels a little hollow.
With each day she hesitates or fails,
her cubs get closer to starving.
The disturbance is another indication
of the sheer power of the scar-faced bull
and the aggression of all buffalo.
And then she seems to see the solution to her problem.
This violent fighting will keep the pride away.
If she can move her cubs
up close to the herd but keep them hidden,
they will be safe from Silver Eye,
and Ma di Tau will be able to leave them to hunt again.
As the herd moves, she tracks them silently.
Keeping close, the cubs follow her every move.
It's a risk.
If the buffalo hear them, they could turn back and attack.
They're surrounded by demons.
It takes nerves of steel.
But any thoughts of a single-handed defense
are short-lived.
By dawn she's in a position to attempt the unknown...
a water hunt.
With the cubs nearby but safe,
it's time to concentrate on her new tactic.
Now she has the advantage.
She has already overcome most of her fear of water,
but the buffalo won't know that.
And they have hit the deep channel
where they bunch together.
The angry bull pathfinders
horn each other out of the way in the confusion.
Confusion is exactly what she is looking for.
They don't expect her to come out of the water;
they don't understand that shape, that wet smell,
that calculated approach
designed to cause stragglers to panic.
This is a chance she can't let go -
a lone cow isolated without help.
The distress calls enrage the herd.
They rally to the cow's defense.
The one thing she will not confront is a large crocodile.
But she still has the advantage of almost total concealment.
Her first attempt has given her hope.
The confused herd is just too enticing,
and the deep water is now her speciality.
Now is her time.
Her success is celebrated...
by anyone else who can take advantage.
Africa is as dispassionate about great victory
as it is about loss.
It drives all to learn and accept fate
and step forward towards the next day.
At least Ma di Tau has eaten,
and in a few hours she will produce milk.
And later she will go boldly into the water
and hunt the herd again.
But that is for tomorrow; now she is exhausted.
But that old lesson of never sleeping soundly
is not to be ignored.
There are risks attached to leaving the cubs
in the path of the buffalo, stirred to panic.
There are a thousand reasons to enjoy the dawn,
especially after a successful hunt.
There is only one reason that she quickens her pace.
Her calls are not being answered.
Every time she leaves them alone they wander off.
The little male has been going farther and farther,
but both always return to the same spot.
But not today.
Although there is a strong scent of buffalo,
there is no sign of the pride,
so she carefully follows the cubs' trail
away from the hiding place and out into the open.
A call!
It's the female cub,
way across the open terrain in the distance,
clearly upset, but alive!
Ma di Tau the protector has not failed completely;
she has found one of the cubs.
Her kill has brought a loyal following of scavengers,
and they can sense some weakness about her.
With no sign of the little male,
she'll defend her last cub
against the mob of hyenas at all costs.
In this final hopeless moment
she seems to understand the risks of following the buffalo,
and what happened here last night.
She hesitates just long enough to give hope...
But she can't mend a broken back.
No amount of care, licking, defending, will fix this.
When she steps away, finally,
Ma di Tau leaves behind her legacy -
the last of her male's bloodline,
and her name.
She is Ma di Tau,
mother and protector of lions, no more.
We don't know about animal grief,
or even the effect of any broken heart.
But something happens to the lone lioness
when the storm of emotion brews up in her eyes
and she leaves her cub behind for the last time.
When she roars, she calls to no one.
Her voice just adds to the turbulent day.
On this day when she has lost everything,
she seems to draw on a deeply held instinct
and transforms herself once again into a lone huntress.
For a single lioness to run directly
into the buffalo is virtually unheard of.
To take on the largest male in that herd -
a fit, fighting bull - is almost suicide.
Too much for her.
Too much hardship for one day.
Is it a lament to the gods?
A cry for help?
Or a last battlecry of frustration?
The pride again...
Their arrival is always sparked by any disturbance.
But this time she will not retreat.
And now the past strengthens her.
The submission extracted from Silver Eye
is enough for the lone lioness.
She has something left to do.
And in this moment of strength something fundamental changes -
something the pride recognizes.
They sense it in the determination in her step
and the look in her eye...
Something unseen...
She is transformed into a leader.
It's more than Silver Eye can do to follow her old enemy,
especially across water,
especially as a lower ranking huntress.
Lions hunt with coordination,
and when the stakes are high
they depend on being well rehearsed.
Now, hunting together for the first time,
every instinct drives them to find that rhythm.
All they can rely on is the leadership of a lioness
who has never led before.
When she makes her move, it is clinical and precise.
But the bull has led this herd for ten years or longer.
He has won the herd's allegiance with blood.
They won't abandon him now.
She is used to standing alone.
Suddenly the scales tip in the bull's favor.
The loyal horde fights back,
winning the advantage and forcing the lions into disarray,
destroying their confidence and scattering them to the wind.
With her pride divided and weak, she can't push forward again.
They're exhausted.
But something beyond the buffalo catches her eye,
a disturbance in the herd.
A lion cub...
Her lion cub.
Her reaction is a violent explosion of motherhood
that drives the buffalo back, away from her defenseless cub.
At last, she has hope.
She might still be able to fulfill that ambition
to raise at least one cub.
A mother who has lost and then found her offspring
must be overwhelmed with emotions.
The lone lioness has her name again...
Ma di Tau, the huntress, has purpose once more.
The transition from fierce tormentor
to compassionate mother attracts the buffalos' interest.
A slow, determined march of aggression.
And then, out of nowhere, a lioness arrives.
The light in this lioness' one eye
should still stir terror in Ma di Tau.
But it doesn't.
The two lionesses share a look that in an instant
sends a message in some silent language.
With a wall of buffalo ahead and a vulnerable cub behind,
somehow Silver Eye conveys
that she is not here to take advantage;
she is here to help.
There are moments before every conflict
when the fighters have a choice:
to back away and let the moment pass,
or to unite and step forward behind their leader into battle.
Silver Eye knows what she must do.
She must follow Ma di Tau's lead.
And in this moment a pride of lions is born.
And now they seem to understand
that their future will be determined right here,
as a pride.
With just one less of them,
the scales would tip in favor of the big bulls
and shatter their hopes...
And the future of this new pride's one remaining cub.
It is now or never.
Ma di Tau splits the herd and routes the front rank.
She seems to understand
that behind her Silver Eye will lead the attack.
It's a moment of trust...
The trust is well placed.
And it is over.
It is his first experience
of seeing lions do what they do best.
It's his introduction into a world of hunting and killing,
a necessary part of his legacy.
With the bull destroyed,
Ma di Tau has created a safer world for her cub.
She has unified a hunting coalition.
But one last thing remains to be done.
To raise her cub successfully,
she needs to accept this pride as her own.
When she and Silver Eye finally make peace,
they mend themselves and bind their pride,
their future, together.
And will this unlikely survivor,
a straggler with the heart of a lion,
be one of the last?
Will he get to grow a mane
and strengthen through adolescence?
Will he have a chance
to wear the battle scars of a mature male,
each one a badge of honor that started here today.
Will he be one of the last wild lions on Earth?
Will he wander alone in the last of these wild places,
as our world fills up with lights, clutter,
noise and people?
In 15 years there will be 8 billion human beings on Earth.
How long these last 20,000 lions survive
will depend entirely on us.
We are losing cats at an alarming rate.
It's time for an emergency effort by all of us.
At this rate, these beautiful animals
are heading for extinction.
Can you imagine our world
without any of these iconic animals?
It's not too late.
We can take action now.
We all have the power to turn it around.
To find out more go to CauseAnUproar. org