Griffith University’s Dr Alexander Braczkowski leads a new study in which he and the Volcanoes Safaris Partnership Trust team of Luke Ochse, Orin Cornille, Bosco Atukwatse documented this world-first behaviour, and explored the surrounding human-wildlife conflict that compelled Jacob - the ‘lion with nine lives’ - and his brother Tibu to take such a risk.
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00:00They're taking on crocs, they're taking on hippos across immensely deep and long waters to find females.
00:06So Jacob, he's pretty incredible because he's only got three legs.
00:10He was actually caught in a poacher's trap about four years ago.
00:13His family was poisoned by poachers trying to kill lions for body parts.
00:17Then he got caught by a buffalo about a year after all of this happened.
00:20And now he's done this incredible swim.
00:23But the Kazinga Channel is actually full of crocodiles.
00:26It's got one of the highest densities of crocodiles anywhere in Africa.
00:28Jacob is a symbol of what's happening broadly to lions across Africa.
00:34This poaching crisis is one of the biggest threats to the species.
00:38Females have been taken out of the system.
00:41And now there may be as few as 40 lions left in the entire national park,
00:44which is about 2,500 square kilometers.
00:46So we're seeing lions like Jacob make these extraordinary swims
00:50to try and find the last female so that they can actually mate.