One of a male lion’s main tasks is to secure their territory, keeping out other male lion that might want to take over the pride or the territory or both. That involves patrolling the territory’s boundaries, marking by spraying bushes and trees and fighting off other male lion if they find them in their territory. Depending on the size of the territory this can be a difficult task and mostly the task rests on one male lion. When the territory is an island in the Okavango Delta and two brothers joined forces to control it, it could give the impression that their territory was safe from intruders. The brothers split the task of patrolling the boundary between the two of them to have a presence at different parts of it, spotting intruders early. While they were young their strategy worked very well. As they got older keeping up their dominance became more difficult. Splitting up patrolling between the two of them also meant that each brother would have to face an intruder alone and with age they were not always the winners of the fight anymore. When a male lion (male in the picture) from a neighbouring island swam over to their island to mate with with one of their females, he got into a fight with one of the brothers, which left him with a wounded face and ear, but he won and ended up mating with the female. These territorial dynamics are necessary to get new genes into a pride and keep lion populations healthy. The lionesses know that they need to mate with the new strong male to keep themselves and their cubs safe, as he might take over the territory and pride. Although the territory surrounded by water appeared to be safe and easy to guard, it proofed to be just as difficult as in any other area. Lion do swim.
