ILP Membership Scheme

I want to walk into the office of the CEO of Mpumalanga Parks Board next week, armed with your support and confirm our help to prevent senseless killings of wild unfenced Leopards throughout the province.
Next year will be our ten year anniversary and the biggest yet for the ILP. Provincial authorities have no funds or people to tackle the issues at hand and have asked for our help. We must act now to conserve the dwindling leopard population. Time is slipping away, but we need funds to tackle the problems and mobilise a team. That is why we have put together a membership scheme. Please make a small donation (your choice, but please don't hold back), and become a member of the ILP. You'll receive regular updates from the front line of wildlife conservation and a voucher worth $380 which you can redeem against a 2010 Wildlife Safari with On Track Safaris.
Donations can be made by credit card via our UK Representatives Research Cam www.researchcam.com. All funds raised go to the ILP.
Paste the link below into your browser:
http://www.researchcam.com/ILPmembership.html

Thanks in advance
Written by Will Fox

Kevin offers his support

We received a boost this week when large carnivore behaviour specialist Kevin Richardson agreed to work more closely with the ILP, offering his skills and expert knowledge to assist us with upcoming projects. As most of you will know, Kevin has been associated with the ILP for many years, since he presented In Search of a Legend - Black Leopard. After hearing of our busy schedule and need for more assistance, Kevin was quick to offer his support and expertise to the ILP team. He brings a unique insight into the behaviour of carnivores, which will dovetail well with our operations in 2010.
We face some huge challenges next year and need more support both from experts and research volunteers. Let me know if you can help.
Written by Will Fox

Badger Release

We finally managed to release our two Honey Badgers at Kudu Game Ranch. Until release they had been cared for by our friends at the Moholoholo Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre for over two months. This gave us time to arrange for the requisite permits and hopefully a sufficient gap to allow the badgers homing instincts to diminish. The delay also allowed us time to implant a radio tracker in one badger, such that we could monitor his progress via telemetry.
The second badger was sedated and given a VHF collar, not an easy task I can tell you. Catching and sedating him took four of us and resulted in one bitten shin and one badly chewed finger amongst the capture team. To be honest, our efforts were all in vain because no sooner had he recovered from sedation, than he managed to pull the collar off. We had expected him to shed the collar within a few days, and after we'd established his home range, but he was having none of it; and left the collar in the bottom of his transport cage. That leaves us with one badger to track, which is being monitored by volunteers from Kudu Game Ranch. Last night he wandered off the property and headed towards Lydenburg. Presumably to create havoc there. We'll do our best to follow him where ever he goes, but it won't now be easy as he's traversing a number of properties. This is new territory for us all, as we simply do not have data on Badger behaviour in these area's. What we do know is that badgers have a large home range and can trek for 25kms or more in one session. We just hope he takes an about turn and heads back to Kudu Ranch soon.
Written by Will Fox

UK tour raises some great questions

Some great questions have been raised by University students during my recent lecture tour in the UK, which have focused our thoughts on the direction of the ILP for the next years. Sure, we’re growing rapidly but it’s important to ensure that we focus on our core aims first and foremost. The object of our research is to gather data on the density and behaviour of leopards (and other carnivores) outside of formally protected areas. And why? Well it is in these areas (the largest land mass of South Africa) that leopards are in conflict with humans and in these areas where they are the last of the big five remaining truly wild.
So how can we conserve the dwindling leopard population. As said, first we need data, but also we need to develop wildlife management methods and techniques. Within this we need to become more than a pure research project and tackle some of the other issues. Education is undoubtedly a major factor. We need to get the message across in the right way. But we also need to develop and employ pragmatic management solutions. We will need a holding facility to temporarily detain problem animals, sufficient to give us time to ensure that any relocation does not compromise the genetic dynamics of an area and importantly that we do not create a problem in that area. Whether that be with local livestock, people, or other leopards.
All of this will mean we need more staff. Dedicated people who have a passion for wildlife conservation. We’ll also need more funding. But here is where we can offer something a little different. We want to create an ILP membership scheme (say$8 annual fee). However rather then just ask for a membership fee, in return we want to offer something more than a badge or membership card. Membership will then entitle folks to a 10% discount off an African Conservation Safari. As with everything we do, we look to our friends to give us their input and feedback, so if you have any thoughts on this concept then I'd love to hear from you.
Written by Will Fox

Honey Badgers - You have to love them

Finally we have some news on our Honey Badger project. As you may know we have been holding two troublesome honey badgers, that were killing Geese on a farm and removed before they could get into even deeper trouble. Of-course we have been waiting for permits but (in this case), that is no bad thing. It has provided time for the badgers to loose their homing instinct to that farm (otherwise they would just head home and into more trouble). It's also given us time to arrange for tracking equipment. In this regard, we took lots of advice from badger specialists before deciding on a two pronged approach to tracking these animals that roam in very large areas.
Firstly, one of the badgers had a radio transceiver implant yesterday (unobtrusive low range device placed under the skin by a vet), and second they will each be given VHF collars before release. Of-course with such tenacious animals the collars won't last long before the badgers have destroyed and discarded them, but by that time we hope to have logged their new home range and have an idea of where to find them. Thereafter the implant (which has only a small range) will help us to monitor the badgers for the next year or so and gather much needed data on Honey Badgers living outside of formally protected area's. You've heard it before, but these are the area's where all carnivores at the biggest and imminent risk from human conflict. So we very much hope that these two will be only the first of many, so that our study results can hep formulate pragmatic conservation policies.
For now, the badgers will be monitored at Moholoholo wildlife rehabilitation centre for another twelve days and then we'll release them into a wild area. Where we hope they'll stay out of trouble. Yea I know, fat chance of that. Badgers just seem to look for trouble. I have to be honest, it's why I love them.

Written by Will Fox

ILP team buzzing

I have to say, I’d rather report after an event, than tempt fate, but I had a very encouraging meeting with the head of wildlife services in Mpumalanga, which has the ILP team buzzing. He has indicated that he would like us to take on a much larger role, increasing our contribution to large carnivore conservation within the province.
It’s early days, and we will need to present a detailed proposal, but our meeting was very positive. In short we will step up our support to MTPA especially in terms of research and assisting with problem animal issues. We will need more people and need to raise more funds, but there is an opportunity to provide pragmatic support to provincial conservation authorities and by doing this have a positive impact on large carnivore conservation in Mpumalanga.
You may also be interested to hear that there has been another confirmed sighting of a Black Leopard. This time by experienced professionals who followed the animal for several minutes getting to within 5 meters!

Written by Will Fox

Exciting times, if we can only pull it off.

You may well know that I chair the board PAW Conservation Trust www.pawct.org, which amongst other things is the NGO that sits above the Ingwe Leopard Project.

Okay I'm the manager of the ILP as well, which makes life rather hectic, but we simply haven't enough people and everyone has to do two or three jobs.

I met today with the head of Mpumalanga Wildlife Protection Services to discuss PAW and more importantly the ILP. We focussed on the support that the ILP can offer and the mechanisms for developing the remit of ILP, such that we can not ony provde research data but assist with problem animal issues throughout Mpumalanga. If we can find the funding and our proposal is accepted, we will provide a free capture service throughout the province and a holding facility to temporarily hold any carnivores from Leopard and Lion to Hyena and Badger. Thereafter we will relocate animals to sites which we have previously surveyed.

Exciting times, but we will need help. Both in terms of research volunteers and funds. We don't want to bite off more than we can chew, but I figure that we have enough passionate support around the world that can make this thing happen.

Written by Will Fox

ILP Manager

ingweleopard@gmail.com