A leopard ensnared in a trap on a Northern Cape farm is lucky to still be alive, thanks to the fact-acting team that sped to his assistance on Wednesday.
Non-governmental organisation, Landmark Leopard & Predator Project, were alerted by the Northern Cape Department of Environmental Conservation and rushed off to Nieuwoudtville to help free the leopard trapped in a caracal cage.
The male leopard, believed to be about 3 – 4 years old, was dehydrated and in a really bad condition.
“Six hours later, with several unsung heroes in tow, inclusive of veterinarians, researchers, field workers, Nature Conservation officials (all having dashed several hours across the countryside), and local farmers we were able to rescue a dehydrated male leopard,” Landmark Leopard & Predator Project said on their Facebook page.
“He required intravenous fluid resuscitation and close observation prior to release. We have placed a research tracking collar on him as he is operating close to the village and he was released him near the location of his capture in his presumed home range.We will enter him into Landmark Foundation and UWC’s research project and efforts wherein we are assessing connectivity of leopard populations, the role they play in human wildlife conflicts, the effectiveness of conflict mitigations, the genetic structure of populations and the general population dynamics in this sparsely populated leopard distribution,” they said.
The population of leopards roaming free in the Northern Cape is unknown and according to the organisation, these traps, and worse ones like gin traps, snares, conibear traps, poison lures, dog hunting, night and helicopter culling, indiscriminately kill thousands of animals each month on livestock farms in South Africa, and is a slow attrition to this country’s amazing biodiversity.
They praised the farmers Johanna, Chrisjan and her labourers who called for help instead of killing this amazing creature.
“We consider it a rare privilege to do this work, yet the need to do it takes us to a sad reality as these creatures remain imperilled in the farming areas.”
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