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The dogs sensed them first. Three skinny lions lurking at the edge of the farm, hungrily sizing up the roving feast of goats, poultry – and small children. As the hounds began barking furiously, the kids ran, shrieking, to the safety of the farmhouse.
“They were shouting: ‘Guys: go inside! Go into the house! Lions! Lions! Lions!” recalls Benjamin Kordom. “They’d never seen lions in the wild, only in pictures at school. This was the first time lions had ever come to the farm.”
It was a first for Kordom, too. His family farm lies 80km (50 miles) south of Khorixas, a gateway town to the untamed, arid landscapes of north-west Namibia’s Kunene region. That night, the lions helped themselves to a duck and chicken dinner. Chased off by local rangers, they slunk away to a neighbouring farm and killed a dozen dogs.
The incident, in 2018, is a snapshot of an ongoing challenge playing out across Kunene, where shifting rainfall patterns are bringing lions into unfamiliar territory – and into closer contact with humans.
