The big cats of bale

In Ethiopia’s Harenna Forest, tracking down big cats frequently involves a bit of improvisation. As the late afternoon sun throws shadows across the forest floor, Demiss Mamo lifts a length of plastic pipe to his mouth and blows. The sound that echoes through the dense vegetation is a cross between an incipient roar and a deep-throated woof, and it sets a family of squealing giant forest hogs dashing for the nearest bushes, while birds and monkeys begin a chorus of squawks, howls and indignant chattering.

Mamo’s surprisingly life-like calls may be fabricated, but the effect they generate is all too real. Because nothing raises the adrenaline levels of the Harenna Forest’s animal community like the sound of an itinerant black-maned lion.

“We often hear lions calling far away, and we sometimes see their tracks in the mud, but we hardly ever see them,” Mamo, who works as a guide in the nearby Bale Mountain Lodge, tells me. “There’s only one road and a few paths running through the forest, so it’s really difficult to reach the places where the lions usually stay.”

Despite Mamo’s persistent feline fakery, it seems as though Harenna’s lions are either uninterested or simply out of range. With darkness falling, we return to our 4x4 and drive back to the lodge. Mamo, a devout Muslim, breaks his fast, handing around a bag of succulent dates.

“You never know when lions are going to appear,” he says philosophically. “Last year they took a donkey that was tethered next to the lodge and sat there eating it in plain view. They come and go as they please.”

The fact that Harenna’s lions generally shy away from humans is hardly surprising. Today, they have disappeared from much of Ethiopia, mirroring a retreat across much of Africa. Over the course of the last century Africa’s lion population has declined by as much as 85 per cent, and these majestic animals have now vanished from 26 countries altogether.

The 4,000-square-kilometre (1,544-square-mile) Harenna Forest is one of the largest in Ethiopia, with much of it falling within the boundaries of the Bale Mountains National Park. It is currently thought to support around 50 lions, but Guy Levene, British owner of the popular Bale Mountain Lodge, tells me over dinner that he believes the population may be significantly larger.

“This is a huge expanse of forest that has hardly been explored at all,” explains the keen conservationist. “From the numbers of lions that we and our guests have encountered in the past, I would say there are probably more. But that doesn’t mean they aren’t under pressure and don’t need better protection.”

Conservationists estimate that t