Man finds 'stray lion', turns out to be a bag

Wildlife officers were called in to deal with a stray lion in the bushes, only to be find later that it was a bag carrying an image of the big cat.

The incident occurred in Kenya, a kilometer away from the Mt Kenya National park after a man working at a farm saw glimpses of a lion in the bushes.

Since the national park was near, the man immediately approached forest authorities telling them that a stray lion is hiding near the hedge.

“We received numerous reports from locals at Kiangua location, Meru County of a lion hiding in a hedge,” Kenya Wildlife Service said in its message from Twitter handle.

“KWS Meru team swiftly rushed to scene in a bid to mitigate a possible Human Wildlife Conflict case.”

However, it later emerged that it was a bag carrying photo of a lion and was placed in the hedge by the homeowner, who had put some avocado tree seedlings in it and wanted to stop them from drying out.

On arrival, KWS rangers were astonished to find out that the ‘alleged lion’ was a lion printed carrier bag.

Despite this being a false alarm, we laud the public for raising an alarm in order to mitigate a possible conflict. pic.twitter.com/spiYlpNNso

— Kenya Wildlife Service (@kwskenya) May 5, 2022

“We treated the incident with a lot of caution and seriousness. We first ensured everyone was safe then wildlife officials investigated and discovered that it was a bag,” the wildlife official said while speaking to media.

Despite the false alarm, the Kenya Wildlife Service said it lauded “the public for raising an alarm in order to mitigate a possible conflict”.