Meet the cheetah matchmaker who's helping revive African wild cat population
'They really are not fussy at all when it comes to choosing partners,' Vincent van der Merwe says
Animal conservationist Vincent van der Merwe is helping cheetahs find love.
Long gone are the wide-open spaces for Southern African cheetahs to move freely and look for a mate, as they live across tiny islands of reserves and national parks, separated by increasing road networks, agriculture and urban development.
In this concrete jungle, van der Merwe plays matchmaker for the wild cat, coordinating swaps between each population.
"Cheetahs are quite promiscuous," the National Geographic Explorer told As It Happens host Carol Off. "They really are not fussy at all when it comes to choosing partners."
As the cheetah metapopulation coordinator for Endangered Wildlife Trust, van der Merwe mostly monitors a database of cheetah populations on 68 reserves and national parks across southern Africa. When the only mating options for cheetahs are their brothers, sisters and cousins, the human plays Cupid.
"We'll just take two males from the one reserve and swap it with two males from [another] reserve," he said. "We'll physically go out and catch the cheetahs, either with helicopters or with traps. And then we'll physically relocate them between the national parks."
Matchmaking prevents inbreeding, disease
Van der Merwe, whose work is funded by the National Geographic Society, has been moving the male wildcats for 10 years now. His work has helped revive the region's big cat metapopulation to 468 cheetahs.
But to the conservationist, the cheetah swap is really a preventative measure.
"Inevitably over time, they would be inbreeding," he explained. "There would be loss in [their] ability to fight diseases. A smaller body size. Smaller litter size."
And while it was easy for them to make two cheetahs mate, developing a successful method to capture the animals was a difficult process that took two years.
"We chased them for too long with helicopters," van der Merwe recalled. "We transported them, dehydrated in high temperatures. And we moved large coalitions to new reserves and they killed other cheetahs."
"We learned the hard way."
The program started to see significant results, like population growth, once van der Merwe began working closely with governments and veterinarians.
Now, the matchmaking program has expanded from South Africa into Malawi, Zambia, Mozambique and Zimbabwe, along with interest from India to help revitalize their Asiatic cheetahs.
"A lot of exciting work to look forward to," van der Merwe said.
Written by Mehek Mazhar. Interview with Vincent van der Merwe produced by Niza Lyapa Nondo.
