Ngorongoro Conservation Area

• But when one of the most tracked male lions in Kenya’s famous Masaai Mara was killed on 24 July 2023 the world took notice.
• Known as Jesse, he was killed during a fight with a coalition of three male lions from a rival pride, drawing attention to the brutally risky and dangerous lives of male lions.
• In the public imagination, male lions are better known by their popularised image as kings of the jungle.
• One in two male lions die in the first year of life.
• From the moment a male lion is born it faces a gauntlet of challenges – from snakebite and hungry hyenas to infanticide at the hands of other male lions.

The trials of a young lion

• A young male lion’s biggest threat is his exposure to other male lions that aren’t their father or uncle.
• This involves incoming males seeking out and killing the cubs of other males or driving young males away, and attempting to take over prides.
• Killing cubs accelerates the onset of oestrus in pride females and so is likely to increase the reproductive success of incoming males.
• Most lions that get pushed out of their pride when very young don’t survive.

Three laws of the wild

• These are the three tenets most male animals live and die by in the animal kingdom and this could not be truer for male lions.
• When male lions are in the prime of their lives somewhere between 5 and 9 years of age they will attempt to have as many cubs as they can.
• And they will do their best to protect and guard over as many prides as possible.

For conservation: look to the lionesses

• When it comes to the conservation of the lion species it is important to look to the lionesses.
• They are the sentinels of a populations health, specifically the number of animals in a group, and more importantly the ratio of lionesses to lions.
• The story of Jesse highlights how, in spite of their status as king of the beasts, lions are vulnerable.