Naankuse's New Camera Traps

N/a’an ku sê are very grateful for the sponsorship of our new and very exciting camera traps. The first few have been set up around the Windhoek study area in locations where regular activity has been recorded previously, e.g. in riverbeds for leopards, at marking trees for cheetahs and at water holes.

The cameras are being set up to capture pictures of large carnivores and other animals in order to gather data of their movements, especially at night when they are most active. Camera traps are the latest technology in monitoring and the infra-red light means they go unnoticed and can take pictures at night when the cats are most active. Our new cameras will add a new dimension to our conservation research work and help us assess population, nocturnal activities and identify free-roaming carnivores.

When the National Leopard Census with the MET begins we will also pool our cameras at a specific site to assist with data collection on leopards in Namibia. They will then be part of 400km squared sampling grids which are rotated between different study sites in the country.

The cameras have captured a huge amount of great pictures in just a few weeks including 8 different cheetahs from several different coalitions, a large male leopard and much more besides! Flo is beside himself with excitement at the data collected already and the input and insight this will give into the lives of large carnivores in and around N/a’an ku sê. For example, some pictures taken at 2am demonstrate that cheetahs clearly are not entirely diurnal like most textbooks say. There was a good moonlight that night and the cat’s activity demonstrates that they make use of natural light for explorations.

Thank you to our camera traps sponsors so far; Rennies Travel, Dan Mortimer, Maarten Weehuizen, Glyn Hale, Les Heal and Uta, Kurt & Ingo Weise. If you would like to sponsor one please email donations@naankuse.com

Here’s some of pictures captured so far