LYDENBURG- An ambitious plan to film South Africa's rarely sighted black leopards by installing 21 digital cameras with infrared sensors at strategic spots on some 40
Mpumalanga farms was launched today.
A 20-member expedition including natural history filmmaker Graham Wallington, eight of the country's top animal trackers and members of the Mpumalanga Parks Board, will camp out for two weeks on a remote farm 40km northwest of Lydenburg to film the cats, which have never been photographed in the wild.
The black leopard is a rare melanistic version of
the leopard species and is pitch black in colour.
The team will scour more than 80,000ha of farmland, setting up baited traps in the hope of capturing a black leopard.
A GPS (global positioning system) and a cellphone device will then be attached to the captured leopard's collar so that its movements can be monitored over a period of time.
Fifteen camera traps, which were placed at different farms on a trial basis from the middle of July, have so far produced dramatic footage of three ordinary leopards.
Lydenburg zoological researcher Gerrie Comacho, an expert on lions and leopards, said about 30 people had reported sightings of black leopards since 1952.
Comacho said aside from trying to film the black leopard, they would be studying the number of leopards living in the area. They will study their age and health so as to manage the animals better and make predictions on future leopard populations.
Using the Internet, Comacho is tracking a leopard which was fitted with a satellite tracking collar and released into the wild on a mountain near Lydenburg.
He said leopards roamed large areas and the chances of seeing them were slim.
Wallington, who plans to shoot a documentary of the project, said filming black leopards in the wild would make a great story.
He said the project, which will run into several hundred thousand rands, was being funded by the Development Bank of South Africa and private individuals.
In parallel with this initiative, the Lydenburg Conservancy (LC) and Mpumalanga Parks board have started a Black Leopard Project to try track down the animals.
A tourism and wildlife centre and leopard camp for common leopards will also be established.
The centre will be owned by a local community that has won a land claim in the area.
"We realised that the community isn't really doing anything with the land and thought tourism would be a good way for them to benefit from the land," said Raath.
He said the area identified for the site had a variety of plant and wildlife that made it suitable for a wildlife conservation project.
Raath said the black leopard would not be kept in the camp as the stress of being in captivity might kill it.
Black leopards, or panthers, are common in the far east of China and are scattered around sub-Saharan Africa.
They can live up to 12 years in the wild.
Although dark, they still have spots and also the longest tail of the cat family.
A black leopard can jump as high as 5.5 metres straight up in the air, 9m in a single leap, and move at speeds of over 72km/h.
Labels: leopards, lydenburg
