Jess is an amazing spotter. She has spotted two snakes in trees, one snake I had missed on the ground and once in Shingwedzi campsite she said, Dad, a snake just fell out of that tree! If it had been anyone else I’d have laughed and said, ‘Pull The Other One,’ but being Jess, I knew a snake had just dropped out of a tree.
Now she said, Dad, there’s a warthog in that tree! I turned to her to explain about how cloven hoof animals can’t climb … but luckily before I opened my mouth I lifted my Zeiss binnies and of course there was a warthog in a distant tree, and now she was trying to get me to spot the leopard that had put it up there.
There, Dad! His ear flicked! I stared and stared through my Zeiss binocs. I double- and triple-checked I was looking in the right place. We carefully tracked the rock, the branch and the twig where she was looking, but each ear twitch and each I can see his spots through a gap in the branches had me thinking, the wind has stirred a leaf, or she’s seeing dappled sunlight.
After thirty minutes of focused peering and Jessie’s exasperation at Dof Dad: ‘Omigoodness Jess, a leopard just sat up! Right there where you said!’
Told you; she said matter-of-factly.
~o0o~