A wildlife photographer got an unlikely assist in spotting a leopard in a tree in Kruger National Park in South Africa.
Henri Olckers captured an image of the hard-to-spot leopard—he called it a “master of camouflage”—and posted it on Facebook, where viewers had difficulty finding it.
“Where?” one commenter wrote. “Driving me crazy.”
Another wrote, “Not sure there is a leopard in that tree.”
Well, there is, but it is definitely not easy to spot.
In fact, Olckers would have missed it had it not been for a nearby lion.
“A lioness gave him away,” he wrote in his post last summer. “She was lying in the grass close to the tree. After a while, she got up, walked up to the tree, sniffed the air and looked up. Then walked off. I thought it was a bit suspicious, so we scanned the tree and saw the tail.”
The tail is all you can see of the leopard, its telltale spots showing if you look closely.
To help, Olckers posted another image that shows the tail a bit more clearer.
Next, he posted an image taken a little later that clearly displayed the leopard’s head as it came into view.
“We would have driven straight past if it wasn’t for the lion,” Olckers wrote.
Also on FTW Outdoors: Can you spot the leopard? Photographer barely spotted it in time
Incidentally, the Henri Olckers Wildlife Photography Facebook page has plenty of other images of wildlife that are far easier to spot.