When a family of monkeys noticed a drowning leopard, they made a fuss, apparently unconcerned that the receptor of their attention may very well eat them. And, fortunately for us, the entire interaction was captured on film.
One poor leopard ended itself in the bottom of a 7.6-meter (25-foot) well in Rajasthan, a northern Indian state bordering Pakistan. A swarm of monkeys can be seen playing nearby, congregating at the top of the well and causing a ruckus.
Worshippers at the adjacent Baleshwar Temple are alerted, and they go to check what’s generating the commotion. They could just make out the faint form and blinking eyes of a large cat in need of assistance below them.
The worshipers alerted the forest rescue team, who arrived with a homemade wooden ladder. After that, the ladder was cautiously lowered to the well’s bottom.
The leopard made it out after some coaxing and a few futile efforts. Locals and forest rescuers gave the animal some breathing room so it could flee.
“We were alerted about the event at 6:00 a.m. on the morning of June 11,” Ranger Devendra Singh Rathore told the reporters. We dispatched a team of rescuers to the scene right away.
“The search and rescue effort took nearly an hour.”
Officials believe the leopard stumbled into the trap while seeking prey the night before.
There may have been one witness who was less than pleased with the operation’s success — the film shows a dog fleeing for its life as the leopard flees.
“As soon as it emerged from the well, it bolted into the bush.” It didn’t target any of the village’s residents or household animals,” Devendra stated.
To be honest, the monkeys’ rescue efforts primarily consisted of hanging around the well and staring at the unfortunate animal, so it’s a stretch to argue the leopard’s escape was made possible by Good Samaritan-ship. Nonetheless, the leopard owes its survival to the monkeys (and, of course, humans).