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Encounter with a wild Jaguar in the
Brazilian Pantanal
 One evening, just as we come around another bend in the river in our motorized canoe, he just sits there among the bushes on the bank, with his elegant spotted coat, a shining orange-yellow-brown in the last warm rays of the setting sun.
A live jaguar! A wild, live jaguar! Absolutely gorgeous...
The mythical Emperor of the South American Rainforest.
The third largest cat in the world, and definitely among the least observed ones.
When we approach, we are followed by his long, meditative stare. Then he slowly gets up, stretches with his back in an arch and walks calmly and with full dignity into the bushes. He is gone.
Already the following day, we have the incredible luck to meet yet another jaguar, a couple of kilometers up river. This one is a real old beast! Heavy upfront, sturdy with shaggy fur, face and body full of brutal battle scars, from fighting both prey animals and brethren. At first, all we see are hundreds of black vultures. Suddenly the impressive cat gets up at a distance of only ten meters, and slowly disappears into the forest.
Behind the river bank lies the body of a cow that he had recently killed, and we decide to stay on the other side of the river to see if he comes back to his prey. After less than ten minutes, there are branches snapping in the bushes and the jaguar re-enters the scene. 100 kilos of super predator, this is not the sweet little pussy-cat. More like Death on Paws. It checks us out carefully before going back to its meal, seemingly pretty unafraid of humans. For a while it even lies respectlessly on the river bank facing away from us.
But the daring and mocking black vultures get attacked at once, again and again. The jaguar hissing like a compressed-air nozzle. Another one of the endless rounds between predators and scavengers. When we finally decide to start off downstream again, it makes a mock charge in our direction too, and then marches by us, great muscles playing under the beautifully spotted fur, the well-filled belly hanging, and a temperamental twitch of the tip of its’ tail.
An image of intelligent and raw brutal force.
Which suddenly is engulfed by the forest.
Text and photography: Staffan Widstrand.
Thanks Staffan to share this with
us!!!
To see the enlarge photos, visit www.staffanwidstrand.com
the Pantanal Gallery.
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