Cheetah Conservation Fund

CCF's conservation programs since 1990 have emphasized community-based conservation efforts aimed specifically at commercial farmers. Implementation of farmer outreach programs was intended to reduce cheetah mortality on commercial farms and associated research programs were designed to allow opportunistic data collection on individual animals that would have been otherwise destroyed. This approach has been highly successful: CCF has grown dramatically, new facilities constructed, professional collaborations established, research papers written and published. CCF has gained substantial international recognition. More importantly, by several measures, cheetah removals have declined and farmer attitudes improved. Yet, despite the relative success of CCF conservation efforts in Namibia, cheetah populations continue to face complex problems in differing ecological, social and political contexts throughout the cheetah's range. CCF's strategic vision for the next decade will facilitate the organization's ability to adapt to changing conditions and prioritise staff and resource allocation. This vision will integrate existing research information and lessons-learned from previous conservation efforts into enhanced and wider-reaching conservation programs.

CCF's current conservation science programs include combinations of in-situ and ex-situ conservation efforts. Current efforts emphasize the following:

• Cheetah biomedical, morphological, reproductive and genetic status in Namibia: CCF examines animals captured by farmers, blood and tissue samples are collected, and a standard suite of morphological measurements and biomedical assessments performed and recorded. Animals are marked with ear and pit tags and released with the farmer's permission. Continuing research provides the basis of a disease surveillance system for cheetahs in Namibia and elsewhere, as catastrophic disease is a major threat to the long-term viability of cheetah populations.
• Cheetah habitat use, home range and demographic rate: Animals captured by neighboring farmers (in a broad study area centered on CCF research station) are radio-collared, released and located weekly using standard radio-telemetry techniques. Seasonal home ranges, habitat preferences and demographic rates (i.e. birth rate, mortality rate, litter size etc.) are calculated for all tracked animals. This research has allowed us to estimate population growth rates and directly assess the rates and causes of cheetah mortality in Namibia.
• Ecological monitoring of game species through game counts on CCF farms and throughout the Waterberg Conservancy. Loss of prey base is a direct threat to the viability of cheetah populations; understanding local ungulate populations is critical for cheetah conservation in Namibia.
• The Cheetah Studbook: Support and participation in ex-situ conservation strategies for cheetahs through maintaining the Cheetah Studbook, participation in the Genome Resource Bank and other research activities related to captive cheetahs.
• The CCF Bush Project: Implemented to experimentally test the economic and ecological feasibility of harvesting bush and marketing a fuel product based on harvested bush, CCF hopes to develop ecological standards for bush harvesting with the goal of restoring landscape-scale patches of cheetah habitat throughout Namibia.