Stronger Than Lions - 32. The Cape Town Herald, June 19th, 200–

The Cape Town Herald

MORNING EDITION June 19th, 200–

NATIONAL —page 5

Jonathan missing

POLOKWANE—Staff at the Predator Reintroduction Project at the Fitzpatrick Nature Reserve are devastated that their star project, Jonathan the white lion, has gone missing. Rangers suspected as much when his radio-collar signal was found to be static a few days ago. Jonathan's reintroduction was seemingly progressing smoothly, but all tracking is now impossible after his collar was found—with no sign of Jonathan in sight—near a waterhole in the bush. Trackers have thus far failed to spot the famed white lion, who caused a sensation last year when he escaped from the Peninsula Zoo in Cape Town.

‘We are worried that he has not developed the requisite hunting skills to survive out here,’ said Marc McClarty, deputy manager of Fitzpatrick. ‘Thus far Jonathan has not brought down a large kill and until he is spotted we have no way of knowing where he is.’

While small by comparison to its neighbour, the Kruger National Park, Fitzpatrick is comprised of 600 square kilometres of bushveld with an open border at several points.

SEE ALSO: former Herald editor and anti-apartheid activist Richard Arliss writes a guest editorial about a weekend he spent in Fitzpatrick in 1995 with his protégée, late editor-in-chief Susanna Rousseau (p. 17)

— Seth Rabinowitz, Staff Reporter