The Impossible Five. Justin Fox

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СКАЧАТЬ and ended up doing zoology at the University of Cape Town. During varsity holidays, I came hiking in the Cederberg and started to notice leopard tracks. Farmers told me about the problems they were having with leopards, but no one I spoke to had ever seen one. I discovered there was hardly any research on them at all. It was an ideal opportunity.

      ‘There’s something special about these particular cats. I used to have up to six leopard sightings a day in places like South Luangwa. But here it’s a massive challenge. To me, they represent this incredible wilderness so close to Cape Town. You never see them. But they are here. If they were easy to spot, they’d all have been killed long ago. They’re such elusive, ghost-like creatures.

      ‘I initiated the research project and funded it myself. We started getting sightings and then began trapping. My best encounter was in a remote kloof on the eastern, Karoo side of the berg. It was a really tough hike to get in there. I was busy setting up a camera station next to a river when I heard a leopard vocalising close by. It’s an unmistakable rasping sound. You never hear that here. I thought the leopard might be coming along the path, so I hid a little way up the slope.

      ‘Then I heard the vocalising right below me in a riverine thicket. I scanned the bushes with my binoculars. Nothing. Lowering my binocs to get a broader perspective, I saw a tiny movement out the corner of my eye. Slowly I turned my head and there she was, peeping around a rock and staring at me, about eight metres away. She had this absolutely perplexed look on her face: what the hell is this thing?

      ‘I slowly moved my hand to my camera and she watched its progress intently. I raised this crappy digital point-and-shoot, pressed the trigger and poof, she was gone. It’s so isolated back in those kloofs, there’s a good chance she’d never seen a human in her life before. What a privilege, man, what a privilege.’

      The track petered out and the going got rougher. We crossed a river, drew to a halt beside a large boulder and got out. Before us was a scene suggestive of a slaughterhouse. A grysbok hung upside down from a hook hammered into the rock, its stomach slit open, blood dripping from nose and mouth. Heads and limbs of various animals lay scattered about. The stench was overwhelming.

      ‘The grysbok is road kill,’ explained Quinton. ‘The other body parts are offcuts from an abattoir.’

      He pointed out the invisible trap. Sticks and bushes had been arranged so there was only one easy way to reach the suspended buck. Quinton checked the foot-loop snare while I stood at a distance trying to control my nausea. Once he’d checked and reset the trap, we headed on foot up Uilsgat Kloof along a path used by F10, also known as Spot, a female leopard who frequented the valley. Quinton carried a backpack with trapping paraphernalia, which included a mallet and a number of metal stakes. The sun was low and we moved in and out of icy shadows. I realised I should have brought a jacket. We passed a second trap, right in the middle of the path. A red flag and signs warned people to keep clear. ‘I’ve asked CapeNature to close this area to the public,’ said Quinton. ‘Hikers are such a pain. They don’t read the notices. Or, if they do, the buggers come and snoop around, triggering the snare. They’re clueless.’

      I was about to mention that leopards could simply read the warning signs and avoid the area, but realised it was my childhood imagination – where literate cats were the norm – intruding.

      Quinton was looking for a suitable place to set another trap. As we headed further up the path, I noticed that he had, almost imperceptibly, begun to change. His gait was somehow different, his body slightly hunched. He seemed more alert, more twitchy, stopping often, looking at the path with a cocked head. Thinking like a leopard?

      ‘Here, this is the place,’ he said at last, lowering his backpack and taking the spade I’d been carrying. He dug a square hole, levered a foam base into position and laid the trap over the top. It comprised a simple foot plate with a trip and spring fastened to a wire noose that would tighten around the animal’s paw. The wire was thick and smooth so as not to hurt the cat. It was attached to a bungee cord so the leopard’s yanking would not break a limb. Quinton taped over any rough areas on the wire and cleared all stones and sharp sticks in the immediate vicinity so the creature couldn’t wound itself as it thrashed about trying to extricate a paw. He carefully set the spring and attached a transmitter. The contraption was secured with long metal stakes driven into the ground by a mallet. It was imperative that a leopard be prevented from breaking free and heading into the hills with a trap attached to its leg.

      ‘Aren’t these snares just like the wire ones set by poachers?’ I asked through chattering teeth.

      ‘Similar. It’s actually a more effective and safer method than the cage traps we used to employ. Animals picked up more injuries trying to force their way out of the cages. As long as we get to them soon after the trap is sprung, wire snares are okay. That’s why the transmitters have to be monitored at all times.’

      He showed me how to set up a transmitter and how, as soon as the magnetic connection was severed, it began sending an altered signal. The volunteers at Driehoek would then call Quinton on a satellite phone and he’d race to the trap. If there was indeed a leopard caught, rather than a red-faced hiker, he’d phone the nearest vets, who were on permanent standby and could be there within two hours to dart the animal. A collar would then be fitted, measurements taken, and tissue and whisker samples extracted for DNA analysis. The cat would also be weighed, its age determined by teeth colouration and wear, and its general condition assessed.

      Once fitted with a GPS collar, the animals could be tracked around the clock. Quinton was gathering valuable information from the data downloaded in the process. During the period of his PhD research, he’d managed to trap and collar thirteen leopards, and had gained considerable insight into their movements, diet and habits.

      ‘Where did you catch your first one?’ I asked.

      ‘It was on Driehoek farm in August 2005,’ he said, pushing back his floppy hat and wiping the sweat from his forehead. ‘We’d been trying to get him for three months. His name was Houdini, and for good reason. By that stage I was already nearly two years into my research, and had not yet had a proper, close encounter with a leopard. Houdini had been nailing sheep throughout the valley, but I convinced the farmers to give me a chance at nabbing him. That cat was a sly one. Eventually we lured him with a sheep carcass, but he escaped from the first trap. We reset it and caught him a week later. Again, he escaped. It took another five weeks before we finally got him.’

      Once he’d finished preparing the trap, Quinton arranged his camouflage and subterfuge devices. By now, I was so cold I was having to bounce up and down to keep the blood circulating. Quinton ignored me as he covered his contraption with sand. This couldn’t be done with a tell-tale human hand, so soil was sifted through a colander and sprinkled over the snare. Next, he cut foliage and planted it in a manner that would lead a leopard into the trap. Sticks were laid to encourage the cat to assume a particular stride and place its paw in exactly the right spot. Quinton got down on his hands and knees, head to one side, staring sceptically at the trap. He raised his front paw a little, hesitated, then adjusted a twig. If you narrowed your eyes, you could almost see his spots. Crawling a few paces on all fours, he slunk into the trap, all but triggering the snare on his wrist.

      ‘The data we’ve been collecting can be used to alleviate conflict between farmers and predators,’ he said, morphing back into semi-human form. ‘We need to understand the role of predators in eco-systems. The Cape Leopard Trust is actually more about broader environmental conservation. We’re using leopards as our flagship species for a much bigger project.’

      By now I was hugging myself to keep warm, and I could feel my lips turning blue. If I didn’t ask any more questions, maybe he’d hurry up, stop acting like a suspicious leopard and take me back to my snug cabin.

      ‘You СКАЧАТЬ