Spending each day exploring the reserve, one of the biggest thrills is welcoming new and unexpected wildlife to Londolozi. As I’m sure many of you would have seen in the recent TWIP’s and in Nick‘s recent blog, there have been some magical moments in the last month spent with a new young male cheetah. Where has he come from? Will he stay? What does this mean? And why are we all so excited at this prospect? Well for starters, look at this magical moment…

New Behaviour

With reports that a cheetah was making his way west, onto Londolozi around the Sand River, excitement levels ramped up, and the search began. Most likely having come all the way from Kruger National Park, when we found this young male he was understandably a little nervous and in need of a good meal.

Being in the nomadic stage of his life (without a permanent territory) he was constantly on the move. This is all about exploring new areas in search of a place to settle down. Cheetahs are usually skittish by nature, but this young male was hyper-aware. Constantly looking back over his shoulder, hardly resting and constantly moving. This is a very formative time in his life, learning valuable survival skills that will enable him to become a successful hunter and thrive in a territory is paramount.

The young Male climbs on a fallen Marula tree to scan for any prey.

However, as days progressed into weeks we watched as he explored the area east of camp, further south and then back north again. Now, having spent almost a month in the same area the chances of this becoming his territory increase daily. Likely having travelled a large distance already, we can only hope that since the area is devoid of other cheetahs, he is staking his claim.

New Areas

Perhaps more unusual than the sightings themself, is the area which this cheetah is frequenting. Normally we expect to find cheetahs in the southwestern parts of the reserve. Dominated by flat, open grassland (perfect cheetah country) the assumption was this male would continue on his journey west, yet we were all wrong. The young male has exclusively been seen east of the camp, an area devoid of cheetah activity, densely populated with lions, and even more so with leopards. The rolling open crests, dotted with marula trees, dry river beds and bushwillow thickets don’t usually conjure up images of a cheetah. Yet perhaps that’s the reason. Sensing no competing males, this young and timid male is taking a chance. With plentiful impala herds, and just enough open clearings, maybe, just maybe his gamble will pay off and he might make this new territory work.

Spending time in an area usually devoid of cheetahs. One gloomy, windy morning we followed for hours as he desperately searched in vain for a herd of impala. Pausing to scan his surroundings, and with a picturesque backdrop, this shot captures a great memory for me.

Uniqueness: What makes this so exciting?

As any seasoned Londolozi guide will tell you (and show you through their sheer excitement at the prospect) seeing a cheetah is not all that common. With such a high density of lions, leopards and hyenas, all of which outrank cheetahs on the predator hierarchy, the odds are stacked against them. Add in challenging terrain (for the most part), a generally low population number due to their space requirements, and your chances get even slimmer. If that’s not enough, cheetahs’ own genes also pose a challenge to their continued survival. Cheetahs have a low rate of reproductive success, meaning that as a species they are not always able to reproduce. With fewer offspring, the population can neither grow nor adapt to changes in the environment.

So now you can imagine our excitement (and hope) at the prospect of this young male staying around.

Weakened Genes

Cheetah populations today are heading toward extinction. Importantly, however, cheetahs have faced and overcome the threat of extinction before. Genetic analysis of cheetahs shows they may have survived two historical bottleneck events that sharply reduce the size of a population. When this happens, the few remaining individuals end up inbreeding or mating with relatives. Inbreeding reduces the size of the gene pool, which can lead to problems such as decreased genetic variability and the persistence of potentially harmful mutations, making it harder for the remaining population to adapt to changes in their environment. In a very small population, any mutations that occur are much more likely to be passed on to offspring and propagate through successive generations.

Historical bottlenecks

The first bottleneck event that cheetahs may have undergone occurred around 100,000 years ago when cheetahs expanded their range into Asia, Europe, and Africa. This range expansion is believed to have occurred rapidly, dispersing the cheetahs over a very large area and thus restricting their ability to exchange genes.

The second likely bottleneck event occurred about 10,000 to 12,000 years ago, around the end of the last ice age. In this bottleneck the cheetahs of North America and Europe went extinct, leaving extant only the species’ Asian and African populations. As large mammals died out across the world, the number of surviving cheetahs dwindled, which caused extreme inbreeding. Even though the number of cheetahs grew to as many as 100,000 during the 19th century, their genetic variability remained low due to the extreme bottleneck event that took place thousands of years previously.

We struck luck with a rare sighting of a mother cheetah and her two cubs (which are around 14 months old) recently. With the young male and these three, perhaps the future of the cheetah at Londolozi is in good hands. We can hope.

Despite all the challenges this young male will face, with skill, perseverance and a healthy bit of luck we hope he is going to stick around. Only time will tell if that’s to be the case but keep a lookout for updates in the future as we continue to enjoy the magical moments we spend with him. I hope you get to enjoy some of those on your next visit.