Please become a conservation
partner and assist us by covering part or all of the annual costs for
caring for these non-releasable cheetahs. Each cheetah costs CCF an
estimated £2,500 a year in care. These costs include food, veterinary
care and pen maintenance.
If you sponsor the cost of
the care of a CCF non-releasable cheetah (of your choice!) for £100
or more, you will receive a personal letter of thanks and
a CCF sticker. If you sponsor a cheetah at any level, you'll receive
a link to a special web page containing up to date news from Namibia
including the latest on how our resident cheetahs are doing.
In addition, you can create
your own personalised Sponsorship Certificate to print out, anddownload
a special photo poster of your cheetah, taken from the official cheetah
ID book in Namibia.Each JPEG poster file is up
to 1MB in size and up to 250mm across, and shows pictures of the
cheetah, highlighting distinguishing markings for identification.
To create a Sponsorship Certificate,
download a poster, or access the latest cheetah news from Namibia,
be sure to click ‘Return to Merchant’ after you have
completed your PayPal transaction, or you will not see our ‘Thank
You’ page, which contains the information required.
If you sponsor a cheetah
for a whole year (£2,500) you will receive special recognition
at our headquarters in Namibia.
Sponsoring is simple! Just click
the 'Sponsor Me' button under any cheetah's story. You will
be taken to a PayPal secure payment page, where you can choose how
much you want to sponsor your cheetah for. Once you've sponsored one
cheetah, you can
come back and sponsor another one
if you wish. Here are six of our resident cheetahs. See the other pages for more.
Rosy
Rosy and her sister Daisy were born in March 2002, and arrived
at CCF in Feb 2003 with their brother Mushara.
One of our Anatolian livestock guarding dog owners was delivering
cattle on a farm near Omaruru and saw these three sitting in a
small cage on the farm. They called CCF, who obtained permission
from the Ministry of Environment and Tourism to confiscate them.
They were held for at least five months in a 4 x 6 metre cage
that looked as if it had never been cleaned. Despite the heat
there was no water in the cage when CCF collected them. The cage
was full of carrion, including rotting baboon and jackal carcasses.
Large carnivores may not be held without the appropriate permits
in Namibia.
Misty
In November 2002, Misty’s previous owner asked CCF to
hold her and three other cheetahs temporarily. As no records were
kept, it is unknown where she came from originally or why she
was caught. The owner has since abandoned ownership of Misty. Members of the public in Namibia, particularly lodge owners for
tourism purposes, hold a variety of carnivores in captivity. Currently
it is legal to do so, although new and improved legislation will
hopefully reduce the numbers of wild animals being caught indiscriminately
just for tourism purposes. All facilities holding carnivores are
required to register these facilities, and be in possession of
the required permits from the Ministry of Environment and Tourism.
Tempesta
In 2003, CCF received a phone call from a distressed farmer near
Omaruru. He was forced to shoot a female cheetah after she attacked
and severely injured one
of his farm workers. The cheetah subsequently tested positive
for rabies. Two weeks later, three starving
cheetah cubs were observed in the same area. The farmer contacted
CCF and was advised on how to set a trap to try and catch the
three cubs. They were captured two weeks later.The cheetah cubs
were in very poor shape, having been without a mother for almost
a month and being only three to four months of age. Despite veterinary
care, one female cub died as a result of a severe respiratory
infection. The surviving brother (Tuono) and sister (Tempesta)
responded well to a healthy diet and rapidly regained the weight
that had been lost.
Samantha
In 2003, CCF was told of three orphaned cheetah cubs in need
of immediate attention. After negotiations with the farm owners,
the cubs were handed over to CCF. A larger male (Mr. Big) and
his two sisters (Samantha and Carey) were found in a small cage
where they had been held for two months prior to their rescue
by CCF. All three cubs exhibited signs of severe calcium deficiency,
resulting from a very poor diet. What happened to their mother
is unknown. Samantha was not walking when she arrived at CCF.
An x-ray confirmed that she had a damaged pelvis due to crumbling
bones. Her bones healed well with an improved diet. Her sister
Carey had injuries that did not heal with treatment and she had
to be euthanised. Mr. Big had damaged wrists from the poor diet,
but did not require corrective surgery. Cheetah cubs grow at a
rapid rate and require a calcium-rich diet to ensure their bones
have enough strength to support their body weight. All CCF cheetahs
receive calcium supplements.