VOLUNTEERS GET THEIR HANDS DIRTY
Many parts of the Karoo including the land on which Samara is situated today has a long history of farming and unfortunately poor farming practices in some areas such as overstocking has lead to the degradation of natural vegetation, which has subsequently promoted soil erosion. It has been a priority for Samara to restore both the land and the abundant wildlife of the Karoo to its natural state prior to European settlement, as the condition of the soil and vegetation is the foundation on which a healthy ecosystem is built. Since the establishment of the Samara volunteer programme in April 2010 the volunteers have been actively involved with land rehabilitation efforts, getting their hands dirty building rock dams and gabions to stabilize erosion gulleys and planting indigenous trees in areas where overgrazing has left the land bare. Two years on and the positive results of all this hard work are clear to see as the gulleys have started to silt up and many of the trees we have planted have successfully established themselves, creating micro-habitats for further plant colonization. In this way a small group of people have made a significant contribution to conservation efforts on our beautiful reserve.
HABITUATING CHEETAH
For the past six months a highlight of the daily volunteer activities has been spending time with one of our beautiful female cheetahs during her habituation process. An animal is considered to be habituated when they view people as neutral in their environment. In other words, they are not threatened by people and this gives us the unique opportunity to view them as wild cheetahs going about their lives in their natural habitat, without interference. Because there is such a low density of vehicles on Samara our cheetahs are unaccustomed to being viewed by people and that is why we need to put them through this habituation process prior to their release. The benefit of this process is two-fold; it allows visitors to our reserve some spectacular sightings of cheetah in their natural habitat. It also greatly benefits our reserve management team as we are able to closely monitor our cheetah population for management and research purposes. We are currently conducting a study in to the feeding ecology of cheetah on the reserve and based on these results will be able to estimate the number of cheetah which can sustainably be supported on the reserve.
To this end the Samara Volunteers have spent countless hours in the presence of this beautiful animal, ensuring that she is comfortable in the presence of people and ready to be released. In order to get her used to the sounds and smells associated with people, the volunteers have, as strange as this sounds, been reading to them and playing them music. Bellini isn’t a big fan of books, this is usually when she gets up to relieve herself, but a bit of classical music is just what she needs for a good sleep. Belini made amazing progress and has subsequently been released on to the 27 000ha of pristine habitat with an abundance of natural prey on Samara Private Game Reserve.
