Cat Conservation Trust1
PO Box 713  Cradock, 5880  Eastern Cape  South Africa
Tel 048 8812814  Cell 082 868 1936 ~Email: [email protected]
Web: www.karoocats.org
01 Jan 2014
We would like to keep you updated with the events here at the Cat Conservation Trust during the year of 2013.
Cat News
Blackfooted cat/ Small spotted cats:
It was a year of mixed fortunes with this species. At the beginning of January we lost both Alan and Anja to amyloidosis.
April also succumbed to the disease after being brought to us as a rescue cat in Jun 2011. We were left with no blackfooted
cats and unable to obtain any as they are so scarce and difficult to breed in captivity.
Later in the year we entered into a working agreement with Wild Cats World (based in the Netherlands) for this species.
They have sent two cats to Clifton, namely Diva and Blacky.
DIVA
BLACKY
1
Cat Conservation Trust (IT1239/2004) PBO Exemption number 930 016 368
Patrons: Dr MPM Pfleiderer, Ms B Wilson and Dr K Robertson
Founding Trustees: Richard Holmes and Marion Holmes. Trustees: Walter Schulze and Lalase Maso
During the latter of half 2013 the Blackfooted Cat Advisory Group was formed to pool our knowledge with the keeping of
this species in captivity.
African wild cats:
Two successful litters were raised during last year. Our main breeding female, Cleo, gave birth to two kittens – Sid and Ola.
Sid went off to Daniel Cheetah Project / Spotted Cats Conservation in the middle of the year to start their breeding
programme in this species while Ola went off to Felidae SA. Louise, an unrelated female, joined Sid later in 2013.
Another breeding female, Daisy, flew up to the Johannesburg Zoo on a breeding loan.
The trip was sponsored by extreme conservationist, Braam Malherbe. When
interviewed by the Eastern Cape radio station, Radio Algoa, he gave our work a good
mention. Daisy has since given birth and mother and kittens are doing fine. They were
in the hospital wing at the zoo but they plan to put them in the ‘general population’
towards the beginning of 2014. The next litter born to Daisy from their male will be
ours.
Daisy shortly before her departure.
We decided to put two breeding females together simultaneously with Eddie this year. Cleo gave birth to 3 kittens first in
September and Dani decided that, although pregnant herself, this was also her litter! Dani gave birth to 1 kitten in October.
Both females have been nursing all the kittens and caring for them. The interaction between family members is very
interesting to observe. One of the males from Cleo’s litter, Max, has taken on the role of big brother to the youngest
member, Mimi and is very protective of her. Cleo’s litter were named by learners from a school in Grahamstown just before
the end of the school year and the winners will be receiving chocolates when they return to school this year. Once we are
assured of the kittens survival and good health we will start looking for reserves for their release.
It was a very sad end to the year for us. Eddie, our breeding male, was euthanized on Friday the 13th December. He had
been battling with a cancerous growth on his mouth for a few weeks and the vet felt that at the age of 16+ years, the battle
would be too much for him.
Eddie – photo taken in 2011. He will be terribly missed.
Servals:
Once again a busy year! Towards the end of February 2012 we took 2 serval females, Hope and Artemis, off to Kariega
Game Reserve to join the two males, Killian and Kelpie. After being kept in a boma for a few months, they were collared
and released. There were several sightings of them before they ‘went off the grid’. Once of the females, Artemis, has been
found but last we heard, they are still trying to locate Hope. It seems that no fence can keep a serval in if they want out –
typical cat!
In the middle of the year Milo and Gisette moved down to Lalibela Private Game Reserve to be part of their breeding
project. Bolt flew up to Lory Park in Johannesburg to be their new breeding male once he has grown out at matured.
It was once again a sad occasion when the main breeding male, Arno, had to be
euthanized on 11 February 2013. This turned out to be 8 days before his litter to
new female, Nala, was born. Arno was wild caught and we think he was about 13
years old at the time of his death. He had lost the love of his life, Bonnie, a few years
earlier and had been introduced to a new female, Nala, who he took too
immediately.
Arno in younger days (2004)
Nala gave birth on 19th February to a rather large first litter of 4 kittens. All 4 kittens survived and Nala turned out to be a
wonderful mother. There were 3 males (Monty, Mick and Mitch) and 1 female (Moira). In November 2013 Moira travelled
up to Klein Kunkura Private Game Reserve to join Dude who has been waiting a year for a female to join him. I am told he
was very excited for the new company!
Mitch
Monty
Emily gave birth to one female in April, Shiela. Towards the end of January Shiela will be travelling with Monty and Mitch
down to Hopewell Private Game Reserve near Port Elizabeth. They will be joined by unrelated female, Mara, and kept in
bomas until they are fully grown and have acclimatised before being released on the reserve as part of a group of 7.
Shiela
Nala has now joined new male, Krato, who is the son of Arno. They seem to be hitting it off – except at meal times. We
hope that they will breed in the future.
Caracals:
Flippie moved to Mount Camdeboo Private Game Reserve towards the end of 2012 and was released in February 2013.
Flippie
Educational Outreach
We were not able to visit any schools in 2013 largely due to the lack of interest from schools that we have approached
about us visiting them. We have 2 visits lined up with private schools in the Eastern Cape for the first half of 2014.
The number of visitors to our facility here on Clifton increased during 2013. We were fortunate to obtain media coverage
for a few of the species that we deal with during the last year. We continue to work with media and researchers from
around the world.
Financial news:
Our last two applications to the National Lottery Distribution Trust Fund have been turned down and even after lodging an
appeal we have had no reply from them. We continue to fund the project between ourselves (Holmes’s & Pfleiderer’s).
We have increased our cat tour visit fee to R50 per person.
We managed to place a deepfreeze “offsite” near Graaff Reinet as a drop of point for farmers who have food for our cats
only to find that it was damaged in transit and is not working. Due to the Christmas holidays we have not been able to have
an electrician repair it. Hopefully this will be sorted out early this year. This has left us short of a deepfreeze here at Clifton
– if anyone can assist, please let us know.
Other news:
Dr Mircea Pfleiderer has completed work on her 2nd book on cat behaviour and it will reach the shelves in Europe at the
beginning of 2014. The book entitled “Katzenverhalten: Von der Wildkatze zur Hauskatze” (Cat Behaviour: Wild Cat to
Domestic Tabby) will unfortunately, at this stage, only be available in German.
After working on the cat project for 8 years, Mr Nesbert Makwarimba, has been promoted to Cat Manager. Both trainees
that joined us in 2013 left in the same year. It is unfortunate that there is such a lack of work ethic.
We received a visit from freelance writers Chris and Julie Marais who regularly write for Country Life. Our work was
featured in a French magazine thanks to predator researcher Marine Drouilly. Marine is currently studying the
predator/livestock issue in the Western Karoo. Mircea may be hosting a German TV crew at her base here in SA towards
the beginning of the year.
One of our patrons, Ms Beryl Wilson, was honoured for her work with vultures in SA this year. She also heads up the
Blackfooted Cat Working Group which is based in Kimberley.
You can follow our news on Facebook and on Twitter. Please see both websites for more information: www.karoocats.org
and www.predatours.co.za .
We would like to thank you once again for your interest in our programme.
Yours in conservation
Marion Holmes