Holiday Greetings from Namibia!

I just want to thank all of our Cheetah Family for your support this past year.

Over here we are in the middle of the Namibian summer and it is hot – dams are getting low, we need rain.

With the holidays upon us, we are all working on finishing up many projects before the year ends and many CCF staff are away for the holidays. With this we are finishing up data around out camera trapping census and are very excited with our preliminary findings.

Sadly, we lost one of our beautiful resident cheetahs, Elsie. But we had some happy events too: we had two litters of puppies, now at nearly eight weeks and they will be heading out to their new homes this week and just after Christmas.

We worked on a wild male cheetah last week and the farmer’s entire family came over to the CCF to help work him up and then after tagging the cheetah the farmer let us release the cheetah back on his farm. He was not having any problems with cheetahs towards his livestock – not sure why he had the trap open – but the grand daughters talked him into taking the trap away! Also, we have a film crew here and they were able to document this whole process. It was very nice.

All else is going on OK and we do hope for a Great 2007!

Laurie

Sad news about Elsie

Dear Cheetah Friends,

We are writing to you with some sad news about one of our captive cheetahs, Elsie.

Elsie's keeper, Marianne, found Elsie dead while checking fences last Sunday. She was only about two meters from her empty food bowl that was given to her on Saturday, so she must have died soon after she ate on that day.

Marianna immediately brought Elsie to back to the CCF clinic in order to perform a necropsy and find the cause of death. Her spleen and her heart were both enlarged. She evidently died of old age. It is possible that she had a stroke because the right side of her face was a bit bruised, probably from the fall.

We are so sorry to give you this news. Elsie was approximately 15 years old and came to CCF just over two years ago, after she was caught taking livestock. She had cataracts in both eyes, very blunt canines, and was missing all her incisors. Notwithstanding, she was a grand old lady who endeared all of us at CCF, and will be missed very much.

We hope that you will consider sponsoring another one of the cheetahs residing at CCF that need your help. You can choose one by visiting the Sponsorship Pages on this web site.

With many thanks, and our warmest wishes for a Happy Holiday Season,

Patricia Tricorache
Asst. Director, International Programs
Cheetah Conservation Fund

From Algeria to Ethiopia

I have just returned from Algeria. We learned a lot and there is a lot more to do. There is a good possibility that members from both National Parks where there are cheetahs will be coming to CCF for more training, and that we will be assisting in more extensive training courses for their staff and other professionals in both the Ministry of Environment and the Forestry Departments.

Now I am about to leave for Ethiopia for a planning workshop on Monday around the issues of captive and wild large carnivores. This workshop has come about as a result of the two cheetah cubs that were confiscated in November 2005 in Ethiopia, and now the lion issues are really bringing things to the forefront.

The meeting will also be discussing the illegal trade of the large carnivores from the region (cheetahs and lions)- and how to begin a strategy around protecting the wild populations of these cats.

Laurie