This is the incredible moment an impala calf was hunted and caught by a python and then stolen by an opportunistic hyena.

Footage taken by Escape Safari Co. founder Mike Sutherland, 34, while on a private game drive in Mombo Camp, Okavango Delta, Botswana, shows the sighting. Spotting the impala, the python lunges for it before the animal is then snatched by the hyena.

In the footage, the impala lamb is seen writhing on the ground as the python grabs it. The hyena then appears, clamping its jaws around the baby impala’s head as the python remains wrapped around the animal.

Then, the hyena grabs at the impala calf, and carries the two animals in its mouth. The python slithers away to avoid having the same fate as the impala calf.

Mr Sutherland told LatestSightings.com: ‘We were on a morning game drive during the time of year when many animals like warthogs, impala and wildebeest have babies. As we drove around we saw loads of baby impala, some days old and others just hours. The bush was alive!’

‘There was a large herd of impala on the edge of the dry floodplain and a hyena walking in the distance. ‘A python had slithered down from a large, fruited Bushwillow tree and camouflaged itself in the leaf litter. One unlucky young calf stepped right over the snake and, in a flash, it had been caught. ‘We heard the calf bleating, a call of distress and we turned swiftly in that direction to see what had happened, the hyena did the same.’

He said everyone on the game drive was shocked by what was happening. The mother impala was watching on while the drama was unfolding and he called it a ‘rare sighting, something he had not seen in his 12 years of guiding across Africa.

Mr Sutherland added: ‘It is important to not interfere with nature and although it may be tough to watch, the events would have played out the same way whether we were there to witness it or not.’

Video: IMPALA BABY TRIES ESCAPING PYTHON & HYENA

Source: dailymail.co.uk