Here, kitty, kitty, kitty…

We landed in Windhoek, the capital of Namibia and were greeted with our 4x4, Toyota Hi-Lux, which would be both our shelter and wheels while we toured Namibia for 10 days. Namibia is set up extremely well for car camping – most sites are private with individual hot water showers, electricity and water. Lodges start at US$500/night so camping is really the only affordable way to travel these parts.

After a quick overnighter in Windhoek, we set off early the next day to Okonjima, home of the AfriCat foundation, which is one of the world’s largest cheetah and leopard rescue and release programs. Since 1993, AfriCat has rescued over 1000 cheetahs and leopards on Namibian farmland, and more than 86% of these have been returned to the wild.

Historically the relationship between farmers and wild cats has been tenuous as cheetahs and leopards prey on the calves of the working farmer’s land. Farmers wanting to protect their livelihood would shoot the cats.  With the establishment of protective laws and foundations such as AfriCat, farmers are now encouraged to set traps and call the organisations who will collect the cats and set them free elsewhere.  (Though, the removed cats are quickly replaced by other wild cats, making it a somewhat futile exercise).

We secured a beautiful and secluded campsite on the side of a mountain and quickly signed up for the activity we had come to do – wild cheetah tracking on foot.

The AfriCat foundation tracks the cheetahs on their lands and monitors their health, so our guide was able to locate the animals quickly.  Luckily for us a group of cheetahs were only a 15 minute drive from the main camp – they could have been anywhere in the 22000 hectare area!  When we were in the right area, we stopped the car and set out on foot. Within 10 minutes we came upon 3 cheetahs, 2 males and one female who apparently always travel together. My heart literally stopped as Mike pointed out three heads moving up and down in the height of the grass about 20 meters from us.

These cheetahs were on the move and were hunting according to our ranger.   Then, two more cheetahs ‘surprised’ us – popping up behind us and circling to engage with the other three.  These two groups didn’t get along, and it was thrilling to see our guide get a bit nervous and suggest we should move back to the car as the sounds of the two groups beginning to fight could be heard less than 20m away!

The cheetahs we had seen were three of the six survivors from a group of 17 that had been released in 2010.  The low survivorship is partly due to some animals failing to develop appropriate hunting skills, and partly to deaths from prey defending themselves (kicked by Oryx etc.) and partly due to predation from the local leopards.  The cheetah is the fastest animal on earth and can reach speeds of up to 120km/h, but only for about 300m after which they must rest to allow their muscles to replenish.

The next morning we toured the Africat foundation. The cats which fail to develop appropriate hunting skills are given a number of attempts at rehabilitation – being reintroduced to the wild two or three times before a decision is made that they will never learn to hunt for themselves properly.  These cats are kept in smaller enclosures (10 hectares or so) and fed by the staff of AfriCats for life.

We also had the opportunity to visit a leopard who was unable to be released back into the wild. While leopards are ‘born’ with the hunting instinct, and therefore don’t present the same problems for rehabilitation as cheetahs, some leopards are raised in homes as cubs and become too accustomed to humans.  These leopards are considered too dangerous to release, as they have lost their fear of humans and begin to look at us as food when they grow up!  While not completely in the wild, it was still amazing to find a leopard and watch from up close as it devoured a meal in a tree! 

  

All in all, our first day in Namibia was truly memorable and, while we closed the night out with a lovely campfire, we couldn’t wait to see what was in store for us next!