Stealing A Leopard's Food

[topper]

Seemingly unaware of the beast towering over it, the tiny rodent grabbed at scraps of meat
thrown into the African Leopard's enclosure. But instead of pouncing on the tiny intruder,
the 12-year-old leopard Sheena kept her distance. After a few minutes she tried to nudge
the mouse away with her nose, but the determined little guy kept chewing away until he was full.




The extraordinary scene was captured by photography student Casey Gutteridge at the Santago Rare Leopard Project in Hertfordshire , England . The 19-year-old, photographing the leopard for a course project, was astounded by the mouse's behavior. He said had no idea where the mouse came from. He just appeared after the keeper had dropped in the meat for the leopard. Taking no notice of the leopard, the mouse went straight over to the meat and started eating.




Even when the leopard bent down and sniffed him, the mouse just carried on eating like
nothing had happened. Even the keeper said he'd never seen anything like it before.



Project owner Jackie James added: “It was so funny to see - Sheena batted the mouse a couple of times to try to get it away from her food. But the determined little thing took no notice and just carried on."
The mouse continued to eat the leopard's lunch and showed the leopard who was boss.
We can only assume that Casey received a grade of A on his photography project.

[rolf]

That's amazing Neil.

[Chocky]

That really is wonderful.

[Catherine]

Fantastic photos to find and a lovely story too, Neil!

Just can't work out what species of Mouse it is though - def. not Wood Mouse, and ears still seem too small for a House Mouse. It looks like a young (therefore 'innocent') animal too, but is already quite large in size...

[ladylouise62]

That IS a fantastic story - even if the cat didn't go for the mouse, how can the mouse just sit there? Nature is full of surprises!
Thanks for bringing this to us, Neil, it's amazing