Alex Braczkowski

I don't think so.

I think, you know, generally 99% of lion encounters, you know, lions will look at you in a vehicle as sort of one single entity.

If they see a game drive vehicle, they're not going to really pay attention.

There are obviously some handful of events.

So in Zambia, in Lua Plains, there was once a lioness that developed a very strong relationship with a cameraman.

because she was the last lioness.

And she got so used to a particular cameraman that he could walk alongside her.

So she definitely recognized him.

But that was a very unique circumstance.

It's very rare that you're gonna be able to develop that kind of a bond with an individual animal.

I don't think he'd survived a lot other than he was getting pressured by his dad and his uncle.

So there was a coalition of male lions there called Surah Saleh and Sultan, also named by Mustafa.

And they were these big, black-maned, charismatic males, you know, the Romeos of this part of the world, these incredible 250-kilogram male lions, three of them.

And they were just these big tanks.

And, you know, Jacob was pushing three at that point, which is around the time where those males were not very keen to have him around.

So we got a couple of interactions on video where these big male lions are pushing Jacob, and he's not liking it, you know.

Yeah, so just after COVID, my fiancée, Anna Chrysal, and I got another gig with National Geographic to make a sequel to the documentary that we make called Tree Climbing Lions.

And we went at an interesting time because Jacob had just survived an encounter with a wheel trap.

What's a wheel trap?

A wheel trap is a particularly nasty – it's a device used to actually catch animals and maim them.