SEMINAR: AB seminar series : 25 years of Cheetah Conservation Research � a race against time

The cheetah is the world’s fastest land animal and Africa’s most endangered big cat. Cheetah numbers have declined from around 100,000 in 1900 to fewer than 7,000 today due to habitat loss, decline of prey, and conflict with livestock farming. Historically, cheetahs have a small gene pool making the species more vulnerable to ecological and environmental changes. Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF), an international, research organization in Namibia, has worked the past 25 years developing predator friendly livestock and game management strategies. Working on nearly 1000 wild cheetahs, CCF’s biological research monitors the genetics of this population, contributing to knowledge on species health while genome resource banking conducted in CCF’s veterinary clinic and genetics laboratory include sperm banking of male cheetahs and the use of detection dogs to find cheetah scat in the wild used for DNA analysis of the population. Studies on cheetah ecology includes long-term radio-telemetry and satellite collar studies. CCF’s research is baseline for developing conservation strategies for the long-term survival of the cheetah.

About the speaker: Dr. Laurie Marker moved to Namibia in 1990 to found the Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF), now a global leader in cheetah research, dedicated to saving wild cheetah populations using innovative conservation methods that address the welfare of both cheetah and human populations. CCF houses an international research centre with a genetics lab, a visitor and education centre and a model farm. It incorporates the livestock guard dog program, Bushblok- and Future Farmer for Africa program. Among numerous awards, Dr. Marker has been recognised as one of ‘Time Magazines Heroes for the planet in 2000’ and most recently received the ‘Edward O Wilson Biodiversity Technology Pioneer Award in 2015’.