Cheetah Conservation Fund

Category: Cheetah - General, Cheetahs | Date: Aug 15 2009 | By: cheetahconservation

On Sunday, we trapped two wild male cheetahs who have been hanging around the CCF facilities, to put a GPS satellite collar on one and do a medical workup on both. I came to know these cheetahs at the beginning of 2008. I always used to see tracks, and then one day we saw these two males near the offices. We’re not used to seeing wild cheetahs so close, so at first we thought they were two of our cheetahs that had escaped! They started scent-marking the walls of the office building as a territorial behavior. Because they were living so close to so many people, we had to be able to track them.

We set out cage traps on Thursday but left them open so the cats could pass through and get used to them. On Saturday night we activated the traps. The traps were so close to us that I actually heard the gates shut when the cats entered the traps in the middle of the night. Very early the next morning, I checked from a distance and could see that the gates were shut. We moved the cats into crates at about 9 a.m. and took them to the clinic for a biomedical and physical exam and to fit one with a GPS satellite collar. Part of the workup involves weighing. These were the heaviest cheetahs I have ever seen. One weighed 61 kilograms (134 lbs.) and the other was 51 kilos (112 lbs.)!

To monitor them as they woke up from the sedation, we kept them at the clinic until the next morning, Monday. That morning, we drove them out to their usual hunting grounds to release them. Jeff Corwin, who hosts shows on Animal Planet and the Food Network, and a film crew were on hand to film the cheetahs’ release. The release went exactly as it should—the cats dashed out of the crate and into the open savannah. When we next tracked them, they had traveled about 10 km away. We were worried that they were leaving us, but they were spotted this morning in CCF’s “big field” and seem to be heading back to CCF’s headquarters again.

In the photo (courtesy of Drew Gagne), Jeff Corwin and I are on top of the crates as one of the cheetahs darts out.

By the way, the Jeff Corwin show that features CCF is called “100 Heartbeats” and will air on MSNBC on Nov. 22.

–Matti Nghikembua

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Category: Cheetah - General, Cheetah - Research, Cheetahs | Date: Aug 02 2009 | By: cheetahconservation

HI – quick update on the last few days. We received two young female rhinos on Wednesday. They arrived just at dark and we drove them to the release site. These two females are 3 and 4 years of age. This release was a bit different than the males a couple days before. The one female took off like a bolt of lightning after being reversed from the sedative that kept her calm during her 3 hour trip from capture to CCF. In addition, the removal of the blindfold over her eyes and the ear plugs all made her senses come alive! So, she ran out of her crate fast into the dark and we could hear her for a couple minutes after release still running. The other female came out of her crate like a calm horse – she stepped out of the crate, walked a few feet, put up her head and sniffed, then walked slowly over to the nearest tree and just stopped. Over a half hour later, she had moved around and far enough from us that we could get the truck to our release area to pick up the crates again and drive away. Watching her, even in the dark, was such a peaceful experience. So, this week, these rhinos have given me one of my biggest thrills (the big males release) and one of the most tranquil moments – Rhinos are such a special animal. Over the last couple days, the big male (photo attached) has shown himself a couple times as our staff has been radio tracking them – he is magnificent! These are the last of the six rhinos that will be coming to CCF. We do, however, need to come up with ~$5,000 to support their transport to CCF. CCF is one of one a few sites selected by the Ministry of Environment for rhino relocation, and we are hoping that they can assist us in habitat restoration on our thickly bush encroached rhino sanctuary land.

On the cheetah front, we had to do minor surgery on one of the new cubs. Shoulder as we have been calling him, needed to have the gash on his shoulder re-stitched. We now hope that these stitches stay in better and that his shoulder heals. He and his siblings have accepted our care and are doing well, they are generally playful in our outside cub nursery area.

Chewbaaka is doing OK – from his enclosure he can see cubs and keeps a close watch on them.

We also have a BBC Film crew here for the next few days – they are filming our cheetahs running for a documentary called the Perfect Predator which will air in early 2010. We also have a group of 20 teachers from different areas of the US conducting their on-going education from Miami University in Ohio, USA. They are working on learning centered approaches in education. CCF and Miami University and Cincinnati Zoo have worked together for the past five years.

Laurie

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