A mother-son leopard duo made a meal of a six-and-a-half feet (2 metres) long African rock python in the MalaMala game reserve in South Africa in front of horrified tourists, reports Daily Mail, London.The rock python was first captured by the female leopard in the long grass, but as she dragged it, still wriggling, along behind her, her over-zealous son came in.
The young male snatched the end of the enormous snake in his powerful jaws, and tried to tug it away from his mother.The two big cats fought ferociously over their prey for half an hour, in front of stunned guests at the MalaMala game reserve, South Africa.The brutal battle was only ended when the female leopard gave up, retreating to a tree while her son tucked in to his prize.
But he only ate a morsel before deciding it was not to his taste, and discarding the snake's body in the long grass.The unusual scene was caught on camera by American photographer Josh Scheinert, who was staying at the MalaMala reserve.Antony Mulligan, 31, manager of the reserve, said: 'It was a really incredible sight - it's very, very rare.
'I've never seen anything like it before. Just to see two adult leopards together is rare, so to get them in a tug of war situation like this is amazing.'We first saw the female leopard walking up the road, when she spotted this python trying to cross.'She stalked it and caught it, but her son was following her.
'He's almost four and much larger than her. He should have set out on his own to be independent already, but he's a bit of a mummy's boy and keeps hanging around.
'In this case, he let mum do all the hard work then came in to take the snake for himself.'He grabbed one end of it, and they got into a tug-of-war with the snake between them.
'They were probably at it for a good half hour before the female gave up and her son started feeding on it.'After all that effort, he actually left most of it and discarded the snake in the long grass.'It really was an amazing sighting.'
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