Cheetah Tracking, Capture, and Relocation: Samara Game Reserve

The Samara tracking team had been scouring the Karoo for days, searching for two young cheetahs. Unlike their adult counterparts, these cheetahs didn’t have the aid of telemetry or a satellite collar to ease our pursuit. It was a game of patience and perseverance, played out in the rugged beauty of the South African landscape.

Late in the evening, from a small cottage in Graaff-Reinet, Vincent van der Merwe, director of The Metapopulation Initiative, finally received the call we’d been waiting for—the cheetahs had been spotted. But the capture had to wait until morning; we needed daylight for safety and the vet’s presence was necessary. 

I rose at 5:30 AM, the anticipation of the day fueling my energy. There was just enough time to prep my equipment and squeeze in a workout before the mission began. As the first light of day broke, a group of us convened at the warehouse. In a convoy of cars, we set off towards the last known location of the elusive cheetahs.

The first sign of the cheetahs came unexpectedly. A herd of blesbok burst into a sprint, betraying the predator’s presence. They had given away the cheetahs’ pursuit in the cool of the morning. We followed slowly in our vehicles, but as the cheetahs slipped into the thicket, we continued on foot, moving quickly yet quietly, parallel to its path.

Finally, the cheetahs settled under the shade of a bush, its hunt thwarted by the intensifying sun. With two hours until the vet’s arrival, we maintained a visual on the cheetahs. I alternated between napping in the game drive vehicle and sitting with the cheetahs, seizing the opportunity to capture some beautiful moments and a yawn in slow motion on video. To be so close, just five meters away from such magnificent creatures, was nothing short of mesmerizing. 

The serenity was abruptly interrupted when I heard a whisper from one of the trackers. He signaled urgently—there was a rhino nearby, known as Grumpy. I looked up to see Grumpy, only ten meters away from me. Unreal. In the focus on the cheetahs and my camera, I had almost forgotten that we were in the territory of the Big Five. Thankfully, the tracker’s keen senses allowed us to retreat safely before the massive rhino closed in.

The veterinarian arrived soon after, a friendly presence, efficient in his work. We used an impala carcass to lure the cheetahs, mimicking calls, and then waited in concealment. The one cheetah we wanted to dart approached, and the vet skillfully placed a dart. Startled, the cheetah fled. We couldn’t keep pace with the fastest land predator. 

After an anxious several minutes of navigating the uneven terrain, I used my drone to scan in a grid pattern to assist us. Miraculously, Samara’s best cheetah tracker gained visual. The cheetah was under a bush, behind where we thought it had run. This tracker’s years of experience with these animals were evident in his remarkable ability to locate her.

Following a successful collaring, we crated the cheetah and handed her over to Vincent. She was off to a new home in the lowveld of the northern Limpopo region. Vincent had to embark on a solitary 12-hour drive across the country to deliver the cheetah to her new home. It was afternoon when he set out, and he would be driving through the night, ensuring that the cheetah spent as little time as possible confined within the crate. 

Samara has been a thriving natural environment where dozens of cheetahs have naturally bred in the wild, contributing to the genetic diversity of cheetah populations in other regions of South Africa. Witnessing another one set off to repopulate other regions of South Africa was a beautiful reminder of the difficult field work and team efforts required in conservation.