Lion Naming Ceremonies

Last week we held community meetings (kgotlas) in our partner villages to name our newly collared lions. The purpose of these naming ceremonies is to engage community members in sharing information about individual lions and hopefully create a connection.

In Beetsha Village, the meeting was contentious since lions have been killing lots of unattended cattle over the last several weeks. The names they provided reflect their displeasure with one lion being named Twashwena, meaning “Disagree” and Mwakuhukopa, meaning “Don’t Return”.

The votes are coming in!

In Gunotsoga, the tone was very different. Many of the villagers were excited about tourism opportunities with lions and named a new male Mariri, meaning “Big Mane”

Mariri, meaning “Big Mane”

We thank Beetsha and Gunotsoga for being a partner in our work. We hope that these lions don’t cause trouble for the livestock farmers and live a long prosperous life.