British photographer captures lion on hill of bones in South Africa

In a captivating shot reminiscent of Simba standing at the edge of Pride Rock in Lion King, a British photographer managed to capture a lion standing proudly on a hill of bones.

In this magnificent snap, a 500lb male lion stood majestically atop a pile of carcass bones as he surveyed the landscape with the golden sunrise behind him.

If you weren’t told, you would easily assume the hot was culled from a high budget Hollywood film. But the moment—among several equally incredible snaps— was captured by Simon Needham, 52, from Leeds, UK.

Getting the prized shot

He chanced upon these glorious moments whilst visiting the GG Conservation Wildlife Reserve and Lion Sanctuary, south of Johannesburg in South Africa where he had been invited to create some marketing content for them.

Simon stood just 30 feet away as he took the images using his Canon 1DX Mark II camera.

In one of the images, a lioness and a fellow male joined the king of the bone hill as they sniffed around the carcasses looking for any leftover scraps of meat.

A proud lion king

Simon spoke of how he came across this career-boosting image:

At their GC Conservation location they have a bone yard where all the animal carcasses are taken once the lion's finish eating. One morning, I decided to hang there and was lucky enough to catch one large male lion as he stood on top of the bone hill overlooking his land. He only stood there for a minute or so, but I was lucky enough to get a few shots before he moved on.

Like any photographer worth his salt, capturing that moment was something out of a dream. People have given different meanings to the image, putting their own spin to it.

But for Simon, he only saw one thing,

the proud lion king surveying his land.

Nearly all wild lions can be found in Africa, below the Sahara desert. On average, male lions weigh 190kg (30 stones) while lionesses could weigh as much as 126kg.

They are ravenous eaters, and a male lion can consume up to 15 per cent of their body weight. On an average day, a male lion consumes around 15 pounds of food.