Africa's Last Wild Cats

This is the last remaining stronghold for wild cats. Yet even in the vast landscapes of sub-Saharan Africa, their territories are fragmented. Fences dividing the land prevent them from following the migrations of the wild animals they feed on. Their natural habitats have suffered large-scale destruction, forcing them to move closer to human settlements and bringing them into conflict. To try and prevent the disappearance of these cats, conservation programs have sprung up all over the continent. For four different species in southern Africa, just surviving is a daily challenge. In the dry African savannah, even the slightest rainfall results in an array of shades of green. It's still early, and most animals are sleeping. But caracals are nocturnal creatures. Even though the sun is up, this caracal takes advantage of the peaceful early hours to make its way discreetly through the tall grass. Something has caught its eye. A huge nest in an acacia tree, constructed by tiny birds weighing a mere 30 grams. Sociable weaver birds live in groups and build some of the most astonishing structures in the animal kingdom. Some nests weigh several tons. This huge bale of hay attached to the tree can provide shelter for hundreds of birds. It's a tempting target for several African predators, like the cape cobra. Adapted to hunting in trees, the cobra is light enough to be able to slide along even the smallest branches. But the entrances to the nest face downwards, an ingenious method to prevent non-flying animals from making their way in. The snake's smooth body is unable to grip onto the nest and gain access. But perhaps the caracal will be able to use these entryways. These cats are also agile climbers. But the branches are covered in sharp spines, and caracals are much heavier than cobras. The largest males weigh around 40 pounds, so they can only walk on the sturdiest branches. There is no way in from above, and like the snake, the caracal can't reach the bird's entrances. But it has another trick up its sleeve, though it doesn't always work. On average, about three attempts end in failure. The sun is high in the sky, and it's too late to hunt. Better luck this evening, perhaps. When there is a lack of wild prey, caracals make their way to human settlements and attack domestic sheep and goats, a major source of conflict with farmers. This caracal is not like all the others. His name is Duke. Duke was confiscated from a situation where he was being hand-reared as a pet. The most likely reason was that the mother was shot, perhaps by a farmer, coming in to steal poultry on small holdings. But usually, it's a predator conflict with humans that results in the mother dying, and then the kitten's being found and rescued by other people. Duke has been lucky enough to find someone who will return him to the wild. In South Africa and Namibia, farmers have free reign to hunt caracals. In most other countries, they are a protected species. Caracals are still relatively common in southern Africa, but are classed as threatened in northern Africa, and rare in Central Asia and India. As a youngster, Duke was given to a wildlife reserve far from human settlements. Their aim is to return animals to the wild. We're releasing him in what they call a soft release method. We kept him in the house for about two weeks or so, where he got fed every day. He was given his water every day. So he knows where to come back to in case he needs food or water. And then after that, we opened up for him, and he's been exploring all around the lodge. He can get in and out very easily, off the deck, through the gates. He's out in the bush two, three nights. We only need to feed now every second to third day, which is fantastic. He's looking after himself. He's healthy. He's in great condition. He's actually shed a lot of excess fat. They don't need to learn how to hunt. These cats do, just like domestic cats. I think that instinct is probably even better developed in wild cats like caracals. As well as birds, caracals eat a range of animals, such as hares, rodents, monkeys, and antelopes. They use an unusual hunting technique, leaping in the air nearly ten feet high. The thing of your caracals, they are quite smaller like we all know, and they can run, but they don't have enough speed to chase the animal from long distance. So they climb up in the trees. And if the animal is quite far from the tree where it climbs, then it will move down to the ground and try to go closer as much as possible to go for the animal that it would like to hunt. Compared to other cats released in the past, Duke seems reluctant to move away from the company of humans. But he is gaining independence little by little. Whilst it will be bittersweet to see him go, it is the right thing to do. And hopefully over the next few months we will only see him once a week, maybe twice a month even. It will be brilliant just to have the cat reintegrate himself into the existing wild population, as things should be. When he is on his own, he will need to defend himself from other big cats like lions and leopards that live in the reserve. And he will need to resist the temptation to return to the settlement to pilfer food. If he makes it through the first six months, Duke should have the same chance of survival as any other wild caracal. Reserves and national parks provide relative peace and an abundance of prey. But where there is prey, there are predators. Competition for food is a reality that numerous African felines have to contend with. Straddling South Africa and Botswana, a unique protected area has been created in the undulating scrubland that stretches into the distance. Nearly 15,000 square miles of arid savannah, almost the same size as Switzerland, in the middle of the Kalahari Desert. This is Galagadi, the place of thirst in the local language. Only the hardiest animals can survive in this arid landscape. There are 50 or so watering holes in the park, but at the end of the dry season, there is more mud than water. And what remains is too salty to drink. This female cheetah can survive nearly 10 days without water, but she has two young cubs with her who need to drink. Judging by the silver fur on their backs, they must be less than a year old. It is vital for the mother to find a watering hole in the hope that it isn't dry. Their long journey begins in the shade of acacia bushes, out of sight of the park's many large carnivores. Cheetahs are poorly equipped for combat. Their short claws are worn down by running. Their small teeth allow air to flow, but they don't inspire fear in predators. In reserves that are full of hyenas, leopards and lions, infant mortality can be as high as 80%. To avoid dangerous encounters, cheetahs are active during the day while most other big cats are sleeping. So that means they have to deal with the scorching heat. When the sun is high in the sky, the mammals of Kalagadi must find a way of coping with dehydration and overheating in order to maintain their body temperature around 98 degrees Fahrenheit. The heat can be escaped by building underground dens. Like those used by cape foxes that hunt at night, and will soon go and sleep in the cool of the earth. Striped ground squirrels also live in holes, but remain active during the day, using their impressive tails to provide shelter. Sometimes they share their burrows with meerkats, who seem to be untroubled by the heat. They don't even need to drink. Water contained in their prey is sufficient. Animals that don't live in dens must make their way from watering hole to watering hole. The Kalahari Desert is a high plateau at an altitude over 3,000 feet. Temperatures can fall below freezing at night, but rise above 104 degrees Fahrenheit during the day. Cheetahs cope with these extremes thanks to their fur. It keeps them warm at night, and during the day, air trapped between the hairs provides insulation from the heat. Springboks have much shorter fur, which serves a different function. The light brown coloring reflects the sun. They also have an efficient internal cooling system. Their muzzle contains hundreds of tiny arteries. Each time the animal breathes, its blood is cooled down. Cheetahs have no such cooling system, but their short snouts, wide nostrils and large lungs allow them to suck in large volumes of air. Their respiratory tract opens wider than any other feline, a major advantage for keeping cool or when they need to run. But for the moment, this oryx has no need to run in the midday sun. These bovines prefer dry conditions thanks to their remarkable metabolism. Rather than sweating, they deal with the heat by tolerating a substantial rise in body temperature, which allows them to conserve water and thrive in the desert. Compared to cheetahs and other mammals, birds in the desert have an advantage. They can let their body temperature rise up to 109 degrees Fahrenheit. In addition, some are equipped with long legs keeping them away from the hot earth, though young ostriches are still close to the ground. For them, and many other desert creatures, getting to a watering hole is vital. After walking for hours under the burning sun, the cheetahs are within sight of their goal. These wells were dug in the 19th century. Mammals and birds are forced into close proximity, but they remain alert. The cheetahs quickly quench their thirst since the sun is setting, and dusk will bring large carnivores to the well. Day breaks. The young cheetahs have had enough to drink, but now they need to eat before the sun is too high in the sky. It's a race against time. The female cheetah has only a few hours to find them their daily ration of protein. The sun is already well risen when a herd of springboks finally appears. These antelopes are some of the fastest animals on earth, capable of reaching speeds of 50 miles an hour. Luckily, with her long legs, small streamlined head and light bones, the female cheetah is designed for speed. Cheetahs are the fastest land animals on earth, reaching top speeds of nearly 80 miles per hour. First, she hides her young carefully in the shadow of a bush. The cubs are interested in hunting, but it is too dangerous for them. For the time being, things learn by watching. The springboks are heedless of the danger. The springbok is too heavy to move in overwhelming heat. The female is exhausted by the physical exertion, as well as by the mental burden. While they recover after hunting, cheetahs are at the mercy of thieves. Their body temperature continues to increase due to the fear of a potential attack, a condition known as stress-induced hypothermia. The springboks haven't moved, but the herd is disorganized, and one youngster has become separated from the others. It's too good an opportunity. The female draws on her last ounce of strength. With an average success rate of 40%, two kills in one day is extremely rare for cheetahs. But when occasion arises, cheetahs sometimes kill more than they need. The young antelope is lighter than the cheetah's first victim. But once again, the female is overcome by stress-induced hypothermia. The cubs know the risks of having their prey stolen, and immediately start feeding. When the female has recovered, she finally joins in. But she remains constantly alert, keeping her eye on the second antelope. To avoid having her meal stolen by another larger predator, she will eat as much as she can in one sitting. Adult cheetahs are able to consume 22 pounds of fresh meat in just a few hours. Unfortunately, this is in no way representative of the species' current situation. Once spread over a territory that stretched from the Cape of Good Hope to Myanmar, cheetah populations have been reduced to a few isolated pockets. From 100,000 individuals at the beginning of the 20th century, now there are barely 7,000 left. Cheetah numbers have fallen so low that the genetic diversity of the species is suffering. Inbreeding in various areas has led to high infertility rates in cheetahs, and increased vulnerability to disease. Humans may have a role to play in allowing subpopulations to interbreed and save the species from extinction. Cheetahs survive in conservation areas, where they live without coming into conflict with humans. Kalagadi is one park where traditional people have been involved in managing the wilderness. The San people, formerly known as Bushmen, led a semi-nomadic way of life, roaming the Kalahari Desert. When the park was created, they and the sedentary Mya people were initially excluded from the area. However, in 2002 the land was returned to them, and a joint lodge was established for both ethnic groups. Some San have found jobs as trackers, using their ancestral skills to find animals in the dry savanna. The wives would stay behind with the kids, clean up the village and go and gather some fruits and berries, like the chamomile, which is one of our water resources here in the park, and the hens with cucumber. Those were most of the water resources that they were reliable on. Where once they roamed the desert, these descendants of the Bushmen no longer hunt animals, including cheetahs, but play a role in their conservation. To allow cheetahs in the southwest Kalahari to move around, and mix with cheetahs in the central and northern desert, biodiversity corridors are being created in Botswana. In these areas, where humans and big cats share the land, cheetahs are fitted with radio collars to study their home range. The aim is to help local people better understand the cheetahs' movements, accept their presence, and prevent possible attacks on livestock. Not all Africa's cats are endangered, but most of them are suffering from the degradation or the disappearance of their habitat. Each species has adapted over thousands of years to a specific ecosystem in which it is efficient, effective, discreet. But if this environment disappears, the cats are forced to move to areas where they are vulnerable and poorly adapted. Among the most threatened ecosystems in Africa are the tall grass savannas and wetlands. Despite their rich biodiversity, each year vast areas of these marshes disappear due to urban sprawl, or are converted into agricultural land. In some places, the savanna is deliberately burned to fertilize the soil to prepare it for farming. These tall grass savannas are the preferred habitat of servals, small cats with long legs, measuring two feet tall at the shoulder. Long prized by hunters for their spotted fur, these elegant creatures were nearly wiped out. Trading in serval fur is prohibited, though poaching is still a problem. Because of their diminutive size, servals can make do with small prey, and less extensive territories than caracals and cheetahs, as long as there is tall grass to camouflage them. It is dusk. Strangely, the sounds of the savanna have fallen silent. Replaced, the sound is terrifying, and the smell strikes fear in the hearts of all the inhabitants. The animals flee as best they can. The following morning, the savanna no longer exists. Without the cover of long grass to sneak up on its prey, the serval is unable to hunt. Its natural habitat has been destroyed, and it is forced to roam in search of more suitable land. In the course of its wanderings, the serval has stumbled upon a strangely unspoiled area. Abundance of prey hiding in the tall grass, and a stream for drinking, and for hunting tasty amphibians. But this haven of peace is no wilderness. It's a huge factory, used for turning coal into petrochemicals. It's also the largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world, located in Secunda, in South Africa. Paradoxically, a natural habitat has sprung up surrounded by barbed wire, an island of wilderness in the midst of an urban area. Thousands of herbivores and water birds have taken refuge in this area, where there is no hunting or farming. Small predators like servals can find a rich source of food here, but despite keeping a low profile, humans have become aware of their presence. It all started about 20 years ago, when we got the area, and some of the people working here were very frightened about these sightings, and they would refuse to work. So then at that time we really realised that we need to research this, we need to get an understanding of these animals, and also understand if there's a certain danger to these animals on site, also having this large number of people here. That was basically what triggered the research. Camera traps with motion detectors have been installed to count the animals. Despite the rumours, no cheetahs or leopards have been recorded on the site, but plenty of other animals have. And the only large predator discovered is the serval. There's no other carnivores or any other predators that would prey on serval, or being a danger to serval. So serval is the apex predator on site. We were quickly astounded by the numbers of serval. After the first research, we quickly found out that this is the largest population ever recorded by scientists. Servals need landscapes with high grass to hide, with their long legs and large ears perched on top of their heads. They are well adapted to this environment. Their hearing is more acute than most other cats. Servals are able to locate rodents in their underground burrows and wait patiently for them to appear. While one third of the world's wetlands have disappeared over the last 40 years, this industrial site, covering nearly 30 square miles and surrounded by near wilderness, has become a conservation area. Interestingly, the site is not that large in terms of larger or other known conservancies. We quickly knew that the animals would use smaller iron mines than what was already reported by other scientists. In terms of their habitat loss, that's the area that we need to protect. Though servals are not considered endangered around the world, in South Africa, they are threatened by the rapid loss of their habitat. But further research is required to investigate the impact of noise, air and water pollution on the animals living in the vicinity of the petrochemical plant. Small cats are able to squeeze into small protected areas, but for big cats, space has become hard to come by in Southern Africa. Yet lions are known for their ability to adapt to different environments and climates. In the past, lions were found throughout Africa, Europe, the Middle East and India. But gradually, their territory has been reduced to Northern India and Sub-Saharan Africa, where somewhere between 16 and 30,000 individuals still live in the wild. Over the last 25 years, their population has declined by 50%. Today, lions live surrounded by barriers and fences. They can no longer travel long distances to follow the large herds of herbivores they feed on. Hungry lions turn to domestic animals for their food, resulting in retaliation from humans who poison them. To save these huge cats weighing between 400 and 600 pounds, conservation measures have been put in place. The idea is to make living lions a precious commodity for local populations and to find new and simple methods of discouraging attacks based on studies of large predators. In the wild, lions attack cattle from the rear, knowing that their limited peripheral vision is their weak spot. For days, this pride of lions has paced the fence line, but it's impossible to get to the other side, where the grass certainly seems greener. These lions have caught nothing for days. They need food soon. Even worse, there are watering holes on the other side, full of birds and wild game. When they eat regularly, an adult lion can survive on 10 to 15 pounds of meat per day. But when they haven't eaten for several days, females can consume 60 pounds in one meal, while males can eat 80 pounds at a time. To feed the entire pride, they would need at least two wildebeest, or an adult zebra. Other large prey are too dangerous and should be avoided. But on the lion's side of the fence, there is nothing. Unable to hunt, they rest, their stomachs empty. Within the pride, some females are accompanied by their young. They no longer have any brown markings, meaning they are at least a year old, and will soon be learning to hunt. The young females will remain with their mothers, while the young males will leave to form another pride, or roam the land with other males. For the moment, the pride is well balanced. The females without young copulates with the dominant male. He doesn't hunt, he simply protects his territory. The lionesses wait for nightfall, before getting ready to hunt. The temperature drops. A scent carried in the air reveals the presence of nearby cattle. The females make their way discreetly, ready to ambush. The failing light works to their advantage. But just as she is about to attack, the leading lion sees something strange, something she has never seen before. She decides to retreat, taking the others with her. Another night. Across Botswana, thousands of miles of land have been fenced off to ensure that cattle herds are confined. In order to meet the health requirements of the European meat market, these barriers cut across the country and prevent the seasonal migration of wildlife looking for food resources. Deprived of wild prey, lions venture closer to farms and attack livestock with increasing frequency. That's a big conflict, that depends on the situations. For me, for instance, when I see lions coming here, I can just try to chase them back. But if they keep on coming time and again, the only solution is to take them down, to shoot them and kill them. In an attempt to reduce conflicts between farmers and large carnivores, one researcher has devised a simple and inexpensive project. He observed that a prowling lion usually abandons its attack as soon as it realizes it has been seen. We use a stamp, a wooden stamp, just cut a piece of wood, we shape it, just try to make sure that it looks like an eye. So then we use a white and black paint. The Eye Cow project encourages farmers to paint the rumps of their cattle in order to ward off predators. It's the first time that I'll be doing that in my prowl. I'll see the situation and see how it works. But I think it works because it looks like there are some eyes behind the cow. And then definitely if something comes, we'll say, oh, maybe that thing has seen me and then maybe retreat back a little bit. We'll see how it works. They are predators and they are also cowards. Because if they come behind the cow, they start wondering, is this cow coming towards me or is it going backwards or is it looking at me or what? So the time is thinking about the cow. The cow is in the process of going. So it works. It works, yeah. The first results are encouraging. And the technique is easy to put in place. We didn't paint the whole cattle. We just painted one third of the crop because there are some big cows that lead the others. If you take this way, all the cows go this way. Some lions have also been equipped with GPS collars in order to localize them and warn farmers when they are close to their cattle. I'm one person that always reports to the wildlife officers and to come and see if they can do something onto that before I take actions. But I only take actions when the situation goes out of control because I can't allow things or my livestock to get disappeared because of something that I can get hold of or get rid of. I like lions. I like lions a lot. The idea that a live lion is worth more than a dead lion is beginning to be recognized by the local people who are making money in new ways, thanks to the big cats. I'm working in tourism industries. I'm one of the people that is looking after those things. I would say I'm looking after those wild animals. I'll just put it that way. To mention what I'm doing or my profession, I won't even say that. But what you have to know is that I'm looking after them too. Other avenues are being tested to bring traditional herders on board. Clocks of sheep scatter the land causing overgrazing, erosion and desertification while also being at the mercy of large predators such as lions. It seems that these protection policies are showing the first signs of success. They are at the top of the food chain. Yet wild cats are struggling to find their place in southern Africa. These four conservation initiatives provide some hope. And fortunately there are many more. Other programs are spreading across sub-Saharan Africa. Finances are being put in place to compensate farmers after attacks. And game reserves are being converted into national parks in order to protect the environment. In order to maintain prey for big cats and provide gene pool diversification programs. Cheetahs, servals, caracals or lions. These wild cats are symbolic of environments undergoing profound transformations. However, every natural ecosystem needs healthy and effective predators to maintain their fragile balance.