Abstract Animals

Having gone on a trip to London Zoo with work colleagues recently it occurred to me that I go to quite a lot of zoos, farms, country houses and other such animal focussed places. Many of my colleagues hadn't been to a zoo since they were children whereas that was my third visit of the year - London Zoo twice and the excellent Whipsnade Zoo as well - and this is not unusual. My friends and I are rarely more happy than when in the presence of something furry and cute so we often go on trips planned around exactly that.



But I find zoos very frustrating from a photographic point of view, I nearly always come away disappointed. Very often there is some sort of cage or mesh that you have to try and shoot through or that gives you an unpleasant background; or thick, dirty glass which leaves your pictures looking flat, dark and grainy; and that's if you can even see the creature at all. On top of that there is the issue of whether the behaviour on display is natural or not; it's not often I've seen a large mammal get up to do anything other than pace the same strip of land, a sight that always leaves me feeling uncomfortable (a topic I shall look at in more detail in a future post). I don't think I have ever come away from a zoo with a photo that I felt did the majesty of the animal any justice.

With this in mind I decided that this year I would take a different approach. It was time to stop maligning the poor conditions and make the most of what was there. The new strategy, then, was to take extreme close ups of the animals, but not of their faces; just of their fur or scales or feathers; so close as to render some of them abstract. Certain animals it is almost impossible to disguise: giraffe, zebra, peacock. A child of five could pick those out. But how many people could spot the difference between a lion, a camel and a goat when you can only see a few square inches of their side? Sometimes I have to have a think myself, and I took the photos.

I think I'll keep this technique up for the time being. It feels good to look at familiar subjects with a fresh eye and a new angle and it certainly produces some interesting images.

Interview with Donna Hanssen

In the writing of my last post on my visit to the AfriCat Foundation in 2009 I found that my memory wasn't as good as I might hope and I found myself wondering if I might be able to get some more up to date, first hand information about AfriCat and how their work there has been progressing. It's just as well I did as there have been significant changes in that small amount of time as Donna Hannsen, co-owner of the Okonjima-based reserve, was good enough to explain.

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Namibia is a vast, very empty country. Imagine one quarter of the population of London spread out over an area more than twice the size of Germany; Namibia's old colonial occupier. You can travel for hour after hour without coming close to another soul. This, for me, lends it a tranquillity and beauty that is difficult to match. But not many people seem to know about it; they may have just about heard of Namibia but very few could point it out on a world map. Whilst this may be an awkward situation for the Namibian tourist industry the main reason behind this ignorance is actually a good one: Namibia is a very safe, stable and democratic country. We don't hear about Namibia on the news in the West because it hasn't been ravaged by a civil war like it's northern neighbour Angola; there doesn't seem to be the hang over of apartheid looming over the country like there can be in South Africa, from which Namibia gained independence in the early 1990s; the Government doesn't brutally suppress citizens that speak out against it like in Zimbabwe and they also do a better job than most of looking after their environment and the creatures that live in it. They just quietly go about their business.

At the cutting edge of these conservational efforts for the past 18 years has been the AfriCat Foundation. Created and now maintained by the next generation of the Hanssen family, who themselves were cattle farmers that used to consider the big cats pests, they realised that there are ways to go about farming that both increase survival rates of cattle and allow large predators to co-exist on the same land.

At the time of my visit all talk was of the imminent completion of an electrified fence that would encircle the 20,000 hectares of land that had been acquired by the Foundation. This had been a major expense for many years costing N$7m (over £600,000 at today's rate) and I was curious to know if it's completion meant that there was more money around to spend on other projects. Donna explained, "The fence being finished is a major step for AfriCat. Healthy cats that don't need any care can now go into the reserve in a wild and free manner". But that doesn't mean the expenses are declining. "There are over 300km of roads within the reserve and after the last rains many of them became unusable, we were getting stuck a lot. So a big future step is to get all of them weatherproofed". Another expense will be to de-bush the land within the reserve, "Bush encroachment means that the reserve isn't perfect cheetah territory yet, they prefer the plains to hunt on. The grass is too long and there aren't any impala, hartebeest or springbok, their preferred prey, so the cheetahs are being forced to hunt in the more mountainous areas of the reserve which is bringing them into conflict with the leopards. We need to make the reserve look like it did 100 years ago before the farmers arrived".

But new expenses aside money is still problematic. Most of AfriCat's funding comes from the Okonjima Camps - which include Main Camp, Bush Camp, the Bush Suite and Villa and the Omboroko campsite - where the tourists stay. Okonjima provides all the land, facilities and staff to AfriCat for free, and AfriCat provides a unique selling point for Okonjima, but Okonjima has to be financially viable for the symbiotic relationship to work. "Low season has been nearly non-existent, barely covering costs. People are still coming but they're downgrading the level of accommodation they stay in. They're also not spending much when they get here; they're not buying curios or fancy drinks or expensive wine. Donations are down too, enormously".

An example of good cheetah country in Etosha National park, north of Okonjima

AfriCat can proudly boast of rescuing over 1,000 cheetahs and leopards over their history but, I asked, have you noticed a decrease in the number of cats that are getting injured or trapped and having to be rescued in the first place? "The issue of human-wildlife conflict is enormous," a frustrated tone in her voice now. Apparently there are 3 main types of farmer in Namibia and they all have their own problems. There are the game farmers that allow hunters to come onto their land to make kills. "These are worse than the traditional cattle farmers. Their zebras and other exotics cost far more than a cow. They erect huge fences that stop the natural migration patterns of the game and they set lots and lots of traps because they want their clients to kill the game, not the big cats. But the predators are attracted because of all the game and the absence of established, local, territorial predators." There are the hobby farmers that can't really make farming pay and so work in the towns during the week, then when they come back on the weekend they see that they have lost some cattle and assume it is because of cats when it could just as well be due to poachers, disease, puff adders or black mambas. Thirdly, there are the Affirmative Action farmers. These are people who have been given land by the government at preferential rates but don't actually have the skills or knowledge to use it properly. "They don't know how to farm for the long term. They don't know which are the good grasses and which are the bad, they don't know what a good cattle density is, they don't know about moving the cattle on through the land to spread the impact more thinly. Because they can't farm properly they end up hunting more intensively. Good farmers don't have the time to hunt."

But there is another way. If you allow the predators and game to make their own way a natural equilibrium establishes itself. "AfriCat has shown on our 4,000 hectare reserve that game numbers have gone up by 14-17% every year. If you allow cats to settle then they become territorial and fight off any random roamers that come by. This ultimately leads to less cats on the land and the game can thrive."

Before the interview I looked through the AfriCat website and saw that they do lots of work with local children to try to educate them as to the benefits of working with the predators and not against them. I asked Donna if she felt they were making progress in this area presumably with a goal to long term solutions. "Education is the only way to succeed," she says passionately. "The rescue and release programme has essentially been put on hold." This is quite a bombshell. Rescue and release is what AfriCat is known for, but it would appear that times have changed and AfriCat has had to change with them.

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"Last year the poaching of rhino in South Africa got totally out of hand. A new syndicate of poachers arrived that didn't use guns and bullets to kill the rhino which would give away their position. They used darts to silently knock out the animal and then cut off it's horn, and often half of it's face, and then let the poor thing just bleed to death. You may have seen the terrible footage of it coming out of South Africa." I hadn't, but I have subsequently. There is an example here but it is not pleasant viewing. A police investigation revealed that the poachers were getting the sedatives used from a group of vets. She goes on to explain that this led to a severe crackdown by the South African and then Namibian governments on the practices of organisations that work with large mammals. All of a sudden every last millilitre of ketamine or M99 had to be accounted for and only registered vets were allowed to dart an animal. Vets, however, are in very short supply in Namibia and they don't come cheap. The consequence of this was that every time an AfriCat team went to a farm to pick up an animal they had to pay the wage of a vet for the whole day, a huge cost that wasn't sustainable. There seems to be a clear need to refine the law so that organisations like AfriCat, the Cheetah Conservation Fund, N/A an ku se, HARNAS, and BIOSPHERE can continue to help these animals.

Then earlier this year at a meeting of the Large Carnivore Management Association of Namibia, a consortium of like minded NGO's, the government announced that there must now be highly detailed audits of the work done. Where are the animals released? Do they survive? Do they stay in the area or move on? The charities involved don't have the money to collar and track the animals that they release and so no one had any answers  to these questions. Donna's tone now changes to that of someone who has had to do a lot of solemn soul searching. "We sat down as a group and asked ourselves: what would happen if we all died tomorrow? What have we left behind? Where is the hope? After 18 years of work we might only be able to point to 10 farmers that have completely changed their ways and don't kill cats anymore. The only light at the end of the tunnel recently has been when we speak to a farmer and says he kills cheetahs, he kills leopards, he kills anything that threatens his livestock. But then his daughter went for a weekend away with AfriCat or the CCF and now she says that they mustn't do that anymore. The next generation is the only hope for the predator."

A cheetah rescued and soon to be released by AfriCat

It transpires that no one even really knows how many big cats there are out there, it's all guesswork. So now there is a need for more co-operation. "We need to take a proper census so we at least know how many cats there are. We need to rate all the farmers; green for good and changing their ways, orange for the potential to change and red if there is no hope. Rescue and release with no post-release follow up is not working. Are we going to spend our money driving around picking up cats from farmers that aren't changing their ways and not having any clue what happens to them afterwards, or are we going to spend our money on education?

Educating children has now become the main thrust of AfriCat, and it is a multi-pronged strategy. Speaking with enthusiasm now, "We have run lots of environmentally themed camps where the children come to learn but you only get them for one weekend of the year if you're lucky. Now we're planning to pick out the children that have shown the most interest in conservation, take down their contact details and invite them back during their holidays for a week or 10 days to really try and reinforce the message."

Apparently it is not uncommon for Namibian children to throw stones at horses and kill dogs; they're often set a very poor example by their parents. With this in mind AfriCat has set up a mainstream education centre with room for about 40 students ranging from kindergarten to grade 3. There is a dog in the classroom and horses on the grounds for the children to ride and the school motto is Conservation Through Education. Next year there are plans to open a farm school where children will feed and milk goats, take eggs from chickens. It's all about changing attitudes. There is also a substantial project in the works for an adult education programme. This would involve grouping a local conservation student of university age, a local communal farmer or herdsman who doesn't need to be educated but is keen to learn and a foreign volunteer from their PAWS volunteer programme. "The group will work together based at Okonjima using the 20,000 hectares as a university; the student teaches the other two the theory of conservation; the farmer teaches them practical skills, survival, tracking; and the foreigner explains how things are done in their own country and international impact." This is a massive change of direction but it really does sound like the sort of plan that could bear fruit down the road.

A perusal of the foundation website reveals that they have recently won Best Wildlife Organisation in Africa at the Safari Awards. Results are ultimately based on feedback from people who have visited the places involved and so are a good indicator of first hand experience. I ask Donna if this has excited the team and if she thinks it will give a boost to their profile and result in more funding and/or tourists. Her reply is modest to say the least, "I forgot about that! Obviously it's nice to be able to put the logo on your website and it's a wonderful compliment, but there are 20, maybe 50, other organisations out there that do just as good work but don't get the recognition in this instance because they don't get involved in tourism."

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I feel that AfriCat and other organisations like it have been through a tough time of late, but this new direction brings with it a new sense of hope and so I ask the big question: What does the future hold for big cats in Namibia? Will numbers begin to stabilise and grow again or is it a losing battle? She pauses now to collect her thoughts. "We are very lucky in Namibia to have a new minister of Environment and Tourism, Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah, an amazing woman who understands the environment, understands the balance required." It has been a long time since I've heard anyone speak so positively about a politician, but then there haven't been many shining lights in British politics of late. "She wants to encourage the philosophy started by Nelson Mandela. The reserves and parks of the country have to be loved by the people of the country and they have to provide benefits to the people of the country otherwise they won't work. The people must want to protect them."

The desert elephants of Damaraland

"In Damaraland, where they have the desert elephants, there is an incredible amount of income being developed for the local community. There are also now jobs in the local area. For the first time, people don't have to up and move to the towns if they want to work. This makes a big difference. They can see the value of tourism and therefore the value of encouraging an increase in the numbers of these larger animals. It is things like this that the new minister is really trying to get behind."

Recent surveys have discovered reserves of a different kind in Namibia. At least 4 billion barrels of oil have been discovered off of the coast and production is expected to develop rapidly. Other African countries that have exploited such reserves have often struggled. All of a sudden it becomes much more profitable to be a corrupt politician, people start to argue over land, massive wealth can lead to rivalries and war; not to mention the potential environmental impact. Is this cause for concern? "Namibia is very lucky in that the government is very stable. Namibia has benefited from international donations and funding and to be eligible for these it has had to be stable and democratic. But then Zimbabwe was a very wealthy, educated and stable country until Mugabe came along and now it is a mess. Namibia is one of very few African countries, though, where conservation is still very high on the agenda."

Termite mounds are very common. This one was just outside our villa

Conditions remain tough, however; farmers still don't like predators. With a note of incredulity Donna tells of one area where farmers have even started shooting aardvarks. Why? Because they are exceptional diggers and when they encounter a fence they simply burrow right under it leaving a convenient access tunnel for predators to get through. But does this solve the problem? No. This has led to an increase in termites which have eaten through the fence posts of the farmer and the ruin of his fence. A perfect example of the harmony of nature that is as comic as it is tragic.

As our conversation draws to a close Donna is very keen to stress that the farmers should not be painted as monsters in this story; recriminations won't help. "It is important to tell both sides of the story. I point out to farmers that we do understand the hardships, my family was a farming family. My father used to lose a lot of stock to predators but then we changed the way we farmed and that helped. But the farmers ask, 'Why must I have a leopard on my farm?' the only real answer is that to be successful you must keep the balance. Nature is about balance. Research and rehabilitation are still important but education is really the only hope for the future."

Out of Africat

Cheaters. I hate them. Cheetahs, on the other hand, I love. They're not quite as sexy as lions and tigers but to me they're the best big cat out there and Namibia is home to over a quarter of Africa's total. Taken as a whole, the population of cheetahs is falling and is Africa's most endangered big cat, but Namibia's population is growing, significantly too. This is in no small part to the good work done by the Africat Foundation.

Saving the cheetah can be achieved through remarkably easy steps. One of the most successful projects (arranged by the Cheetah Conservation Fund) has been the introduction of guard dogs to protect herds of livestock. Hundreds of Anatolian Kangals were imported from Turkey and handed out to farmers. The dogs grow up with the herd from a puppy and if a cheetah, or other predator, comes near they bark them away, or fight to the death; and the herd knows to stick near to the dog when it's barking. The benefits are two fold: far less livestock get picked off by cheetahs so more food for humans, and farmers no longer feel the need to hunt the cheetahs to protect their herds. This has led the cheetah population to increase by a third. In fact, the project has been so successful that the initiative is now being exported to Kenya's Masai Mara reserve and the limiting factor in it's success is the speed at which the Turkish suppliers can breed the dogs.

My wife and I were staying at Africat's Okonjima reserve in central Namibia - a hostile environment for humans but perfect cheetah country. Here they have recently completed a project to enclose, with a 15ft electrified fence, 22,000 hectares of bush land, a huge undertaking. Here, the cheetahs and other native wildlife can live without fear from human hunting. That's not to say they're completely safe; the second biggest threat to cheetahs after humans is predation by leopards, and there are several known leopards also in the reserve. But this is a natural threat and one that the cheetahs must ultimately learn to deal with.

One of the resident leopards at Okonjima. I have digitally removed his tracking collar.

Part of the work that Africat does is to take in cheetahs that have been injured and/or captured by local farmers and hunters. If the cheetah involved is a female then there may well be cubs that need to be cared for. The Africat Foundation has the facilities and expertise to heal and rehabilitate these animals with a view to either releasing them in the area they were found or into their own vast enclosure. It was just such a group of cheetahs that I had the good fortune to see up close on my visit. They were just a couple of weeks from being released into the, at that point, unfinished reserve; and they were clearly as keen as anyone for this to happen. A springbok wondering nearby had them up and trying to get through the fence, their hunting instinct undiminished by their time in captivity. This was a very good sign, though, and good evidence that the formula employed is a successful one.

As well as providing a safe haven for big cats the Foundation provides excellent accommodation for humans. Five star lodges; home made meals around a large wooden table that are more like a family get together than hotel catering; friendly and informative hosts and guides; a private watering hole where you can spend the evening watching the local animals refresh themselves as you do the same with a sundowner; all this lures in paying guests that provide vital funds so that the conservation work may continue. Wild warthogs merrily wondering around and a warning to stay away from the long grass at the boundary of the complex remind you, however, that you are a guest in a wild place where you are not top dog. Over a dozen leopards are known to frequent the area and a close encounter with these enchantingly beautiful animals is only recommended from the safety of a jeep.

One thing that always piqued my curiosity before going on safari was the notion that you were apparently completely safe if you are in a vehicle, and this seemed to be true. Humans are very much in the size category of prey for big cats and yet a car full of them, with no doors to stop access, doesn't get the slightest response out of them. A leopard can be sitting just yards away, well within pouncing distance, but people in vehicles just seem to be invisible. Perhaps this is a deal they have struck with Africa's tourist industry: Don't eat the tourists! This phenomenon was highlighted when one of our guides had to get out of the vehicle for a minute to help shift us off of a mound we had got stuck on. The second his foot touched the floor the leopard's full attention was on him, he was instantly a potential meal. It was at this point I understood why the other guide had gotten a good high position on the vehicle and drawn his gun in preparation. Fortunately we were freed and on our way quickly.

On our third and final day with Africat, having gone on several trips out into the reserve and been told repeatedly that, no matter what, never ever get out of the vehicle, the guide, who up until this point had seemed like a very sensible gentleman not prone to insanity, suggested that we go out and look for hyenas on foot. We initially thought that this was a joke. I mean, of course it was a joke. Right? Wrong. The plan, if you can call it that, was to find two male hyenas that were fitted with radio collars and approach them on foot for the last kilometre or so. This would involve spending a good twenty odd minutes away from the fabled safety of the jeep, a terrifying yet highly exciting proposition. We decided to go along with it, reasoning that if it was really all that dangerous then they wouldn't take us; so off we went.

Rugged yet comfortable

On the drive out, with no apparent interest in calming nerves, they gave us the natural history of this most misunderstood of creatures. So often portrayed as the baddie or a low life and bottom feeder the hyena is actually a proficient hunter getting the majority of it's food from legitimate kills of it's own as opposed to scavenging those of others. This was not helping. Still, it wasn't really the hyenas I was worried about. Hyenas are many things but stealthy is not one of them. You would know if a hyena was hunting you and I felt like I at least had half a chance of outrunning it as far as the vehicle. What worried me was the leopard that you wouldn't know was there until your neck was firmly locked in it's jaws. At least it would be a quick ending.

I am eternally pleased to report that all, of course, went well. After some nervous tracking we managed to get within about 60 yards of the two hyenas, which was plenty close enough when you're on foot. Although these were not animals that had excited me much in the past, this proved to be one of the most exhilarating experiences of my life; much like skydiving, when you entirely put your trust, and life, into equipment and the experience of those around you. I highly recommend it.

In May this year, Africat won Best Wildlife Organisation in Africa at the Safari Awards. Organisations are nominated and ultimately judged based on feedback from tourists given back to their tour operators and so is a good reflection on the services they provide to both man and beast. It's a great achievement and a real testament to the success of the good work that they do. Long may it continue.


If you would like to support Africat financially or otherwise then you can do so here.

P.S. Since writing this article I have been lucky enough to be given an interview with Africat co-owner Donna Hanssen. I shall be writing this up into a separate post in the coming days.

Sunset over our watering hole at Africat

Upcoming Africat interview.

I shall shortly be putting up a post about my time visiting Africat in Namibia and the good work they do in big cat conservation. I intended to contact Africat with a view to getting up to date information from them but they ended up being so helpful, even providing me with an interview with co-owner Donna Hanssen, that I shall work up a second post to properly do it justice. So watch this space.....