Serengeti Cheetah Project - June 2014: Prepared Exclusively For Africa Dream Safaris

World Headquarters (877) 572-3274 31244 Palos Verdes Drive West.
Suite 239 Rancho Palos Verdes, CA 90275

Serengeti Cheetah Project June 2014
Prepared Exclusively for Africa Dream Safaris

May has been hard. The dry season has come fast and strong. The wildebeest came through Seronera in April,
when it is more usual for them to move north in J une. While gazelles are able to tolerate drier grasses and stay out
longer on the short grass plains than the wildebeest, they too have started moving north and into the long grass
plains.

Thomson's gazelle are always rather high strung, but they get even jumpier in the long grass. They do not stroll or
linger through the tall grass, but bound and bounce through from patch to patch of relatively shorter grass.
Considering how hard it is to see cheetahs in the tall grass, I don't blame them.

Nervous gazelle Courtney in the long grass Sunset colored by smoke

Cheetahs follow the gazelles, and they too are moving into the long grass where it is difficult to spot them. The
national parks staff burns the grasslands at the end of the wet season, when it is dry enough to burn, but not so dry
the fires burn hot and consume everything. The burning of the long grass makes our job much easier; both the
cheetahs and the aardvark holes are more visible. The burning has just started in our study area, and I hope that
soon there will be large open areas.

As the dry season settles in to its grind, more and more game come back to the areas around Seronera, dependent
on the water in the river. Cheetahs as well come back and we are able to find them much closer to our research
house. This means less driving per day which is a relief. But during the transitory period when they are leaving the
short grass and moving north, it is harder to find them, and we have struggled in May to find our quota of 20 unique
cheetahs or groups of cheetahs.

However we have found some. Courtney is an old female of about 11 years old. She was born in 2003 to a female
named Angie, who was an extremely prolific mother who also tended to adopt abandoned cubs. Courtney has been
a pretty good mother herself, and within a couple of days we saw three generations of cheetahs.

First we spent a couple of days following Courtney around Zebra kopjes, then we saw her daughter Laura down at
Cub Valley a few days later. And then at Barafu we found three adolescents, two females and a male. The two
females were Laura's newly independent daughters who were hanging out with an unrelated young male. That was
the only time I have come across three independent generations of cheetahs in such as short time span.

World Headquarters (877) 572-3274 31244 Palos Verdes Drive West. Suite 239 Rancho Palos Verdes, CA 90275

Courtney Laura Lauras independent cubs

Cheetahs have a unique social system amongst cats. Instead of having territories like other species, female
cheetahs instead roam widely following the gazelle migration. Males can be either solitary or in coalitions with
other males, and either territorial or nomadic. Females are solitary except when they have cubs, which they keep
with them for about 18 months.

After independence from their mother, siblings stay together for 6 months, then the sisters will strike out on their
own while brothers will form lifelong coalitions. Adolescence is a socially flexible time. Males without brothers
will sometimes find another and form a coalition.

Recently we have seen numerous examples of unrelated young cheetahs being together for a while. Not only did
Laura's daughters join up with an unrelated male, but Strudel's newly independent male cub is hanging up with
Campari, a slightly older female who had already left her brother Curacao. These will be only temporary social
groups, and some young cheetahs never join up with others.

This sort of social flexibility keeps us on our toes, sometimes our assumptions about who we are seeing can be
quite wrong. Thankfully the computer program we have to identify the cheetahs by their spots makes figuring out
what is going on much easier.

There have been small cubs in abundance this year. As well as MoneyPenny and Shameka with their two cubs
each, Asti has turned up in Cub valley with five small ones. The grass is quite long in that area and the first time I
saw them I could barely see anything besides their waving tails. In fact I was worried that Asti had lost a couple
because for long stretches of time I could only see one or two. However at the end of May I saw her again with all
five. While in the long grass they aren't very visible, she took them across the valley where I could see them
clearly. Although they are hard to sex at this age, I think there are three males and two females.

Raising cubs is a tiring business, they are constantly running around and causing trouble. These five seemed very
keen on climbing up and falling out of a small thorn bush. Cheetahs are extremely clumsy climbers, their limbs
aren't built for it and their claws are dull. However they do persist in doing it, especially when young. Doing it in
thorn trees seems to be a painful business, and watching one of them face dive through the thorns, it occurred to me
that perhaps that is how Shameka's cubs hurt their eyes (see last newsletter).


Astis cubs tackle a thorn tree

Asti and her cubs

I saw Asti and her cubs on three separate mornings. I found them early on the third morning crouched on top of a
termite mound. Two hyenas were nearby, and as they came near Asti hunkered down and eyed them closely.

Keeping an eye on the passing hyena


Many cheetah cubs are killed by lions and hyenas so mothers have to be careful when they are around. One passed
them by without incident, but soon afterwards Asti sat up and shot off the termite mound while her cubs scattered
in the other direction. She ran towards the second hyena, but to my surprise went clear by it, and hared off up the
hill towards a third hyena. It was hard to see what happened in the long grass but she soon ran back down to the
second hyena. Slowing down as she drew nearer, she raised her back into an aggressive posture.

The hyena ignores Astis attempts at intimidation

However, there was no contact or vocalization, and the hyena ignored her pretty effectively. Asti then went back
to her cubs and led them quickly across the valley to potential safety. Hopefully she will be able to keep them as
safe in the future.

Heres hoping for more plentiful cheetahs next month.

Serengeti Cheetah Project - June 2014: Prepared Exclusively For Africa Dream Safaris

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World Headquarters (877) 572-3274 31244 Palos Verdes Drive West.

Suite 239 Rancho Palos Verdes, CA 90275

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