Limpopo Valley Carnivores

Category: Cheetah, South Africa | Date: Nov 17 2008 | By: limpopocarnivores

I had a phone call from Azwifarwi, my field assistant, early one morning recently to say that there was a Cheetah stuck in his garden. Somehow it had come through the fence and could not get out. We are desperately trying to catch a Cheetah to fit a radio-collar, but this just was not the time. By the time a vet had arrived from town, an hour and a half drive away, we could not be sure the Cheetah would not be long gone, and valuable money would have been wasted. On top of this, the risk of free-darting a moving Cheetah is just too high. The risk of injury is great if the shot is even slightly off target. You have to shoot for the muscle on the rump, which is not a big area on a cat like a Cheetah, and as Cheetahs have very low density bones (to assist with speed), they are very susceptible to breaks. The dart guns that the vets use are powered by gas, which is adjustable in pressure. The problem is that you have to find the perfect trade-off between accuracy and impact. If the pressure is turned down too far, the impact may be less, but you sacrifice accuracy as the shot may arc through the air and be moved off course by the wind. On the other hand, the higher pressure required for an accurate shot means the dart hits the animal hard, and may cause injury if it is off target. It is not a job to be taken lightly, and we only use vets experienced in this work to help us.

It seemed like a perfect opportunity, but the welfare of the animals is paramount, so we are continuing with our trapping efforts.

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Category: Cheetah, Snoopy and Barclay, South Africa | Date: Nov 06 2008 | By: limpopocarnivores

We had a couple of reports of cheetahs on the roads around Venetia a couple of mornings ago, which always poses some concern as roadkill is a major threat to them. One of them went through the fence onto a carnivore-friendly farm and so was out of immediate danger, but the news in the other location was more grim. The report was of two cheetahs, one of which was dragging its back legs. I headed up to where the report had come from with Snoopy to see if we could find it. The location of the report was quite hazy and we found a spot where they had come through the fence from Mapungubwe National Park, but could not find the cat itself. The people who had seen it were later able to go back to the exact spot where they had seen it earlier and found the cheetah, sadly already dead.

There was some doubt about whether or not it had been ill before it died, so yesterday we performed a necropsy on the carcass to see if we could determine the cause of death and the health of the animal prior to its demise.

The Cheetah was a young female, that I would estimate at being about 18 months old. She was very slim, with no fat reserves on her body anywhere, suggesting she was struggling to find enough food, but this is not unusual. At this age it is highly likely that she was newly independent of her mother, probably travelling with a sibling, and they may still have been fine-tuning their hunting technique. During this stage, it can be expected that they would be burning more energy hunting for the amount that they manage to eat than an experienced adult would. If her sister can hang on for a few more weeks, then the Impalas will be lambing and so meals will become alot easier to find for a young Cheetah.

There were thankfully no signs of disease at all, and there was a ruptured spleen and badly bruised lungs, as well as trauma to the lower spine, so it seems she was clipped by a car on her back end, and died from internal bleeding. It is tragic so see such a beautiful cat killed like this, but from the level of her injuries, it seems unlikely that she would have suffered for long.

The place where she was killed is a particular danger zone as there are high electric fences on both sides of the road between Mapungubwe National Park and De Beers Venetia Limpopo Nature Reserve. The good news is that, thanks in large part to the dedication of the manager of Venetia, Warwick Davies-Mostert, those fences should be removed in the next few months to create a more open area. The tar road will still be a public road, but with strictly enforced speed limits and speed bumps will be put it. It is sad that it is coming too late for this little Cheetah, but is a wonderful step in the right direction that will benefit the carnivore populations in the area immensely.

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