Cheetah Kingdom – Ep 3
Friday, 24 September 2010, 8:00PM – 8:30PM
Director of Park Research, AJ, has been tasked with tracking the first five cheetahs that were released. He soon spots them and has some good news which he’s keen to share with Dave and Carla. He says: “I just got a quick look and came down and saw them actually eating something, got close and saw it was a steenbok.”
For Carla, the cheetahs’ first kill makes all of her hard work worthwhile. She says: “I’m actually stunned. Stunned that they have managed this within the first 24 hours. I really didn’t expect it. It’s a wonderful surprise.”
Cyclops is an elusive five year old male cheetah and the release programme’s most challenging cat. Rescued after being trapped by farmers at the age of four, he avoids human contact whenever possible. Once released, he should do well in the reserve but when he was rescued, Cyclops was suffering with glaucoma in one eye. If his condition has deteriorated, he might have to undergo surgery to have the eye removed.
Dave needs to anaesthetize him, but has to use a box trap to lure him in with a piece of meat. He says: “I’m just going to go quickly in there, dart him, get him down so he’s less stressed…then Mark the vet can have a look at his eye.”
After anaesthetizing him Mark and Dave have to move quickly to get him to the clinic. Mark the vet checks his eye and it’s good news for Cyclops: “Obviously it’s not ideal but there’s no need to remove the eye. It’s not causing him a problem so I’d rather leave it alone than put him through anything else which is unnecessary. He’s learnt to hunt with one eye and it’s one of those natural things that happens.”
Cyclops will have a second chance at freedom and be able to be released. But for now, he’s taken to a shady area to recover from his ordeal.
In the last episode viewers met Quattro, the cheetah cub who had been hit by a car and suffered a broken leg. Today he’s having x-rays on it and Dave says: “Hopefully it doesn’t come to it but it could well come to the fact that it’s not saveable and then it has to be euthanized.”
If Quattro’s leg is too severely fractured, it could be amputated but he’d have no chance in the wild. Cheetahs rely on their speed and agility to bring down prey and if the leg can’t be saved, the kindest thing would be to put him to sleep. But
the x-rays make for shocking viewing. There are multiple breaks along Quattro’s leg and, on closer examination, the vet discovers broken bone fragments within the leg joint.
The vet carries out a complex operation on him, tackling the clean breaks along the length of his leg bone before pinning and wiring the broken bone fragments back into alignment. It’s going to be a long and drawn out procedure and there’s still no way of knowing if it will work. The life of this young cheetah cub will be determined in the coming hours.
