Dispatches
Cape Leopard Trust – South Africa
March 6, 2009
Driving north from Cape Town, we enter into agricultural country, rolling through the vineyards this region is famous for, then slowly ascend to Bains Kloof - magnificent table mountain sandstone cliffs cut through by swift, bright streams.
In the 1840s, this pass offered migrating settlers from the Cape a departure from the verdant, fynbos settlements of Wellington and Ceres to the more arid regions of Central South Africa where they found vast tracks of land that, though dry, were still suitable for agriculture and livestock. From Bains Kloof we wound our way into the Cederberg Willderness Area, famous for its unique rock formations and numerous Bushman (San) paintings – a North American visual comparison: the Cederberg feels very like Utah’s Canyon lands sans the hoodoo spires. A former inland sea whose sedentary rock produces marine fossils from 30-40 million years ago, the upper elevations of the Cederberg receive snow in winter, while spring is an eruption of wildflowers before the harsh high temperatures of summer settle on an area dotted with small populations of klipspringers, baboons and ostriches… and even fewer leopards.
Quinton Martins, project manager of Cape Leopard Trust, fell under the spell of this unique region 6 years ago when he’d left a career as a safari guide to pursue his Ph.D. With each visit to the area, he talked to locals who told him that there were leopards in the area, unique to the region, were being taken out by farmers and on their way to extinction. Upon further investigation, he discovered that there had been no documentation of the leopards in this area since 1923.
A mission was born.
Quinton used all his cash, sold his car and camera equipment, finally hitch hiking from Cape Town into the Cederberg to track the elusive Cape leopard.
Quinton’s work has produced remarkable information that turned many prior investigations of the Cape leopard on their ears. Early animal count estimates were erroneous based on researchers’ beliefs regarding the limits of the range of the Cape leopard. When they identified fresh sets of paw prints within mileage disparate locations in a matter of days, it was presumed that the evidence indicated that there were two cats. What early researchers failed to consider was the possibility that Cape leopards might move swiftly across unusually large ranges for individual animals. After a motion-triggered camera count, original estimates of 80 animals in one area were dwarfed to an actual 2 leopards. GPS tracking helped Quinton verify the count, proving that territories, especially those of male animals, are dramatically larger (and the Cape leopard population perilously smaller) than ever believed in the past.
Local farmers have long viewed the Cape leopard population as robust - an army of predators out to extinguish farmers’ livestock and have used “gin traps” (known in North America as not-particularly-humane leg hold traps) that maim and kill whatever creatures fall into their jaws. Quinton and CLT have reached out to farmers in the community with perdator population and behavior education as well as livestock guard dog distribution… all steps to saving a species, but their work and plans are far from complete.
The Cape leopard leads an enigmatic life – they are hard to track and are even more challenging to capture and affix with tracking devices. With Quinton fast on foot, we had a few days of chasing the man who tracks the Cape leopard and we quickly determined that those cats have the right guy looking after them. With a small staff, an exceedingly elusive subject and countless miles of open territory to cover, Quinton is out early and late, standing on tiptoes atop precipices to receive transmitter signals from traps. Upon hearing a signal indicating that a walk-through trap has been triggered, he drives and then hikes into deep canyons to document and release animals (oft times, of the non-spotted ilk), or heading to the exact 2 foot square on a nameless cliff to make a call into the far end of the leopards’ territory to check on trap status. He’s been known to travel hundreds of miles in a day if he’s out of town when a leopard is captured. Quinton embodies tenacity, patience and the much abused word, passion that fuels Cape Leopard Trust. He’s a leader who does his best fundraising in person – when people can hear him speak and feel his fire for his cause.
But the rough and tumble life in the Cederberg isn’t without its own regional amusement. On our way out for tracking one afternoon in the company of Quinton and his fiancée Elizabeth, a teacher who is heading up the Cape Leopard Trust’s outdoor education program, the Cederberg Leopard Camps, the Land Cruiser screeches to a halt. A spitting cobra, dark iridescent hood open, is lurking through roadside weeds. As it turns its back on us, it’s a 50s underworld thug – dark sharkskin overcoat and fedora with shoulders shrugged, menacing even with its departure. Once the viper has slunk into the high grass, we accelerate to proceed to our tracking location. Not 30 seconds later, the car seizes to a stop once again as Quinton announces, “Jeepers, this is about as close as you’re ever gonna get to a puff adder!”
When the leopard safari doesn’t work out, poisonous snakes are a great way to entertain visitors.
Cape Leopard Trust muscles onward thanks to the will, wits and commitment of Quinton Martins who works all day most every day on behalf of creatures that rarely gift him with a glance. On the celebratory occasion that a capture occurs, Cape leopard sightings are an intoxicant that consistently supplies revealing data that pushes CLT onward. Dual credit to the tenure and tenacity of the species in this region go to both the Cape leopards’ own crafty, swift moving nature and the commitment and vigilance of Cape Leopard Trust.
