Spottyblog

We ran the girls today! Usually, the pen the four boys (Little C, Ron, N’dungu and Shunga) are in is the one they use to run the cheetahs, since it is bigger and better equipped for the running of cheetahs. However, every now and then there will be an exchange and the girls get in there while the boys get the girl’s pen. This gives the cheetahs a little variety and also some time to rest after having had two or maybe three runs in a row (one per day, of course).

So I went in there and was able to record some more footage,  only that this time I set my tripod lower. Since it’s not allowed (and advisable) to crouch while shooting pictures and/or videos since the cats could mistake you for smaller prey, this was the best thing I could do to get to about eye level with the cheetahs. I’m glad it seemed to have worked 🙂

We also got to go to the feeding. Since we were four people besides Kate, one of the keepers, I opted to sit inside the car since it would become crowded on the loading area of the pickup. Besides, this allowed me to gain another perspective since I was able to film through the open window. At one point one of the males got so close to it I could have touched him if I wanted. However, since that’s not the best thing you can do with a hungry animal wanting to eat, I of course didn’t. Now, back to video editing… 😀

My first duty today was to assist during a scat walk around our cheetah pens. We didn’t find anything today unlike on the last time I helped when we found two pieces of scat, one probably coming from a cheetah, the other one likely from a hyena. Unfortunately, though, our GPS device ran out of battery so we couldn’t write down where the scat was found. Of course, this time we didn’t even need it.

Poop coming from cheetahs is likely to have been placed there by two cheetahs simply called the “Wild Boys”. They are quite interested in the Elands pen, which is full of females (of which at least one is in heat at almost any given time). We do these scat walks because we know there are other carnivores around. We are, of course, especially interested in cheetahs, meaning we are especially happy whenever we find cheetah scat. The poop is then analyzed – we extract, for example, Cortisol that we think might be involved with the pathogenesis of gastritis, but also extract hair from the scat and try to determine the prey species of the cheetahs around here.

The scat collecting was followed by CD data entry, and not only the morning, but also in the evening. Since we are now done with this year’s camera trap data entry, we are now doing the 2007 pictures since the CCF only catalogued the cheetah pictures so far. This means we’re going to be identifying oryx, kudu, eland, porcupines etc. for a little longer. 😉

“You’ll be on goat dipping. Oh, and you’ll be doing this until lunch.” – I was on goat dipping, but I was on it until after lunch. The goats and sheep were not always cooperative; it was hot and exhausting work.

Basically, what we had to do was to bathe the animals in water with a compound in it that is supposed to kill ticks, fleas and other parasites after they had been fed with a dewormer. This wasn’t as easy as one might think it was – while grabbing the young, small goats on their legs and literally dipping them in the solution was fairly easy, this became more challenging with the goats becoming bigger. Especially sheep were very stubborn and didn’t seem to like the bathing at all, struggling to come free and thus spilling about half of the stuff on our clothing. Not that it mattered that much, we had to replenish the solution every now and then anyway.

After one of the quickest meals in my life I left for Bruce’s and Laurie’s house, as I was again scheduled to help with the cub’s pen makeover. This time we finally finished and water should easily find its way down into the small river bed we prepared. Hopefully, working on the expansion of said pen will be less exhausting.

I also noticed I got myself a nice sunburn on my neck as well as on my upper arms… where I didn’t put any sunscreen on since I usually don’t take off my shirt. However, with all the water spilling on my clothes I decided to take it off. Not the best choice, as it seems… 😀