How a lonely lioness found love with a little help from her friends

As he began filming animals from his open-topped truck, he noticed a single lioness in the distance, watching his every move. Local rangers told Herbert that her entire pride had been slaughtered by poachers. Lady had somehow managed to survive, and was now the last lion left in the National Park.

From then on, the lioness appeared to be waiting for him as went about his work. She began to tentatively follow the filming truck, sitting at a distance and watching as they focused their cameras on the wildlife. Then, one day, she made an extraordinary move. Bounding up towards the truck, she suddenly dropped down onto her back and rolled over, purring deeply. ‘I was so shocked,’ says Herbert, ‘that it took me a couple of seconds to realise what I was seeing. Here was a wild animal who was greeting us with an unheralded display of friendship.’

But Herbert quickly realised that there was more to this behaviour than a simple show of affection. Lady was lonely – and the film crew were her only company. ‘She began to follow us each day,’ he says, ‘and would sit happily nearby watching us complete our filming. You could sense her contentment that she had found company at last.

‘It’s the most unnatural thing in the world for a lion to be relaxed with humans around. Her only experience of humans had most certainly been a violent and destructive one – with memories of the poachers who had killed her pride. But, despite this, she was willing to trust us, and accept us.’

Then one night, as Herbert and his crew relaxed outside the tents in their camp, they heard a noise in the bushes. Slowly, but surely, Lady walked towards them. To a man, everyone froze. But Lady appeared oblivious to the tension. She simply stopped ten yards away from Herbert, dropped down on her vast stomach, and purred deeply.

‘As soon as I saw her, I was strangely unafraid,’ he says. ‘I somehow sensed that Lady had come into camp just to find me. When she dropped down and relaxed, we all realised that she just wanted to be near us.’

And so an extraordinary ritual began. By day, Lady would roam the wilds, always on the lookout for the film crew. At night, once they had returned to camp, she would creep in and settle down to sleep just yards from their tent. Humans had become her only comfort – and, despite every wild instinct in her body, loneliness was driving her closer and closer to the only friends she knew.

In 2007, another fresh face arrived at camp – Craig Reid, the newly appointed Project Coordinator for Liuwa National Park. Craig, 37, recalls, ‘As soon as I arrived, Herbert – who had returned to the Park to monitor Lady’s progress – and the other rangers told me about Lady, who had become a local legend.

They said that she would come into camp at night to say hello, but nothing could have prepared me for our first meeting. As I stood outside my tent, a huge lioness appeared and strolled up casually to within ten metres of where I stood – I was frozen to the spot. All my years of experience taught me to be extremely wary of lions, but it was clear that she was totally relaxed and happy. She looked me up and down, and then settled

nearby, rolling and purring. I had never seen anything like it in my life. It was clear that she viewed humans as her friends.’

Our story might have ended there – as a quaint tale of a lion who enjoyed human company. But one night, Craig and the rest of the camp heard Lady give a distinctive call. Craig says, ‘She was calling out to us in a low roar, a special sound which lions produce when they want to make contact with other lions. It was clear that she was calling us – a cry of friendship. But it sounded so lost and so mournful, and that’s when we all realised that this lion was desperately lonely.’