"L" is for Leopard

CCF has carried out a number of camera trapping surveys, and also maintains a network of cameras positioned for ongoing monitoring of the wildlife on our land.  While we are mainly focused on cheetahs, there are many other species out there, and the cameras will trigger no matter what passes them by.  In this series of weekly blog entries, I will use these pictures to illustrate some of the wealth of animal life in Namibia - one species per week.  I hope you will enjoy seeing a little more of our world here in the bush.

It gives me considerable pleasure to talk this week about my undoubted favourite of the big cats; the Leopard. Graceful and lethal, males can weigh up 90 kg, and are nearly 2m long.  Yet despite their size, they are rarely seen, and most historical estimates of their population have been found to have been produced using highly unreliable methods.  We do know that they existed over a significantly larger range than they do today.

Despite that range reduction, leopards can still be found in over 70 countries across sub-saharan Africa, the Middle East, India, and SE Asia.   They are highly adaptable and can survive in a wide variety of habitats from deserts to swamps, to grasslands, and even rain-forests.  They seem most at home in mountainous and rocky areas, however.  Leopards are often portrayed as the most intelligent, and dangerous of the big cats. San Bushmen in Namibia have reported that while their hunting parties will sometimes chase lions off a kill and take the meat back to their village, they would never dare to steal from a leopard for fear of it following them home and taking something, (or someone) else, in return!

The IUCN lists the leopard as "Near Threatened", but also say that it might be reclassified as "Vulnerable" in the future, due to habitat losses and the numbers of leopards killed in an effort at "pest control" (mainly to protect against livestock losses).  It is legal to trophy hunt leopards in most countries, and while these hunts may or may not have a significant impact, their inclusion in that most infamous of hunting lists -- "the Big Five" -- has resulted in massive numbers of leopards being killed for their skins.

Leopards eat a wide variety of prey, from small rodents, arthropods and birds, to larger antelopes, and, where wild prey is unavailable, they will, like other predators, take domestic livestock.  Such incidents are less common than is generally believed, and many leopards are unnecessarily killed as a result of perceived and unfounded threats.

Here at CCF, we have a large and healthy leopard population dominated by an 8 or 9 year old male that some staff have nicknamed Goliath.  Both our field staff and camera traps see leopards frequently, and they never fail to inspire a sense of awe and joy.

-- Ryan Sucaet

Update from Dr. Laurie Marker

Hello! We are having intermittent email reception due to satellite issues, but thought I’d send a quick update on what’s going on here at CCF.

Our international course has been here for a week – and all the participants are great! They come from Namibia, Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Kenya, Benin and Brazil. CCF’s 2010 Cheetah Conservationist of the Year Award recipient, John Kasaona, was here to talk to the course participants and did a fantastic job. John is Chairman of the Namibian Association of Community Based Natural Resource Management (CBNRM) Support Organisations (NACSO).

Incidentally, John will be in the US as a speaker at the Association for the Promotion of Tourism to Africa (APTA)’s events: Focus on Africa and Discover Africa, which will be held in Denver, Seattle, Phoenix and Los Angeles starting the 8 March. For information please visit the APTA web site. These events will provide a wonderful opportunity to meet trade representatives from Africa.

We have a new vet, Anna Haw, and she’s great. Saturday was her first day working on cheetahs when we worked up on three males with the help of the international course people. The males, Chuck, Geno and Crosby, have been here for about a year and were recently moved to the Scar males’ enclosure. All six of these male cheetahs will be moving to Naua Naua – a lodge near Etosha, where we have had four other cheetahs over the years. One of those cats has a bad molar and we need to take him to the dentist; it will be either a root canal or an extraction.

Yesterday we fitted a collar on the wild female cheetah that arrived here at the end of October. Remember? She had had some dental work done. We had been waiting for a satellite collar which after two months finally arrived from New Zealand – it apparently was lost en route for a month so they finally sent another one. She and her two sons, along with two other female cheetahs, have been living together for the past month to get used to each other so they can all be released together. We hope will stay together as a family.

Isha, our scat detection dog killed a spitting cobra a few days ago. She scared us all badly as we originally thought that it was a mamba, which would have meant certain death, but fortunately she is OK. It is interesting that she has gone through snake avoidance training, and yet I think her guarding bloodlines are just so very strong.

At CCF’s teaching farm, all our goats and sheep are having their kids and lambs. Yesterday morning we had two lambs. We now have ~ 28 goat kids and ~ 8 lambs with more to come. Timing births of livestock is an important element of avoiding conflict with predators.

Rains have continued. Sunday we had what we call a “dam-filling rain,” with about 40 mm in just about 30 minutes. Heavy rains have caused a few problems on our thatch roofs, so some will need to be repaired or replaced. For those of you who have been here, The Hot Spot, our common dining area, had roof damage and we had to put a tarp over it. However, with heavy winds, the tarp blew off! That roof will have to be replaced. With the rains we have also welcomed our first group of volunteers this year: five from Earthwatch and four private volunteers. We also have a film crew from Wildlife SOS in the UK, so there is plenty going on here!

Finally, all the cheetah cubs are growing like weeds.

All the best,
Laurie