I often wonder how many of the thousands of tourists who flock to South Africa’s game reserves every year are aware of the dangers facing the country’s big cats.
Unlike elephants and rhino, big cat species enjoy little international protection and farming, hunting and urbanisation have placed increasing pressures on their numbers. In fact, the lion population throughout Africa has dropped by 50% in the past twenty years, while the number of wild cheetahs in South Africa has fallen to less than 900, partly as a result of farmers shooting them to reduce the threat to their livestock.
Encouragingly, though, South Africa is now home to a number of initiatives which aim to redress the balance and provide a more secure future for these spectacular felines. Several of these projects allow visitors to view their work in action and I have been lucky enough to visit a few, so here’s a round-up of some of the options.
Meeting Enigma the cheetah at the Spier estate
First up is the Cheetah Outreach Programme at the Spier wine estate near Stellenbosch. Set up to assist the international Cheetah Conservation Fund, its cats form part of an education programme which targets children and farmers. Visitors can pay to enter the enclosure for a face to face encounter, with proceeds funding the programme and a sister project which supplies dogs to farmers to protect livestock and prevent shootings.
Another Western Cape initiative can be found at Inverdoorn Game Reserve, which lies in the Karoo some three hours north of Cape Town. Funded by the income generated from the reserve’s gamedrives, its cheetah rehabilitation centre provides specialised care and a controlled breeding programme. Visitors are able to visit the centre at feeding time, entering the cheetahs’ huge enclosure in open jeeps for a close-up view of their speed and prowess.
Elsewhere in South Africa, the Cheetah Rehabilitation Project near Parys breeds cheetahs for re-introduction into the wild. Since 2001 it has successfully raised 20 young cats and now offers a range of volunteering stays ranging from two weeks to three months.
Finally, Boskoppie Lion Park in Free State offers two-week volunteering holidays as part of its carnivore breeding programme. A friend of mine has just returned from such a trip and spent most of her time acting as surrogate mother to five boisterous lion cubs, as well as delivering adult cats to game reserves elsewhere to help maintain their populations. For those with less time to spare, the park also opens for guided tours on Sunday afternoons.
Spier Estate – www.spier.co.za
Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF) – www.cheetah.org
Inverdoorn Game Reserve – www.inervdoorn.com
South African Cheetah Rehabilitation Project – www.africanimpact.com
Boskoppie Lion Park – www.boskoppie.co.za
Just a quick note following a few comments on the photo in the above post – Enigma the cheetah was not dead or sedated for my visit, he was just fast asleep! He was also purring – cheetahs are one of the few big cat species which purr like domestic cats.