An apple a day keeps the dentist away...

Up to 75% of the work that africat does is funded by tourism, however with over 100 large animals to feed with 3 lots of 5kg bags of Iams per day and 12 donkies (yes donkies) per week, as well as the 4 members of staff to pay, the money does not go far. They don't have a resident vet, and calling the vet out is extremely expensive, so they keep track of which animals need vetinary attention, and when they have enough animals that need seeing they call the vet out for 3 days at a time.

 

I was extremely lucky that I was working with PAWS for one of the very few visits that the vets make every year, and as such I got to see all the action. Over 3 days I saw an incredible number of procedures. Animals in captivity are prone to dental problems, and Africat uses a vet who has specialised in animal dentistry- over the 9 years Africat have been using him, he has learnt to identify problems from just a photograph (this is only way to get an opinion on the animal's health without paying for the vet to come out).

 

Pooh the hyenah on the table

On the first night Pooh, one of the 3 spotted hyena, was darted and brought in as it was believed he had some dental problems. A clan of hyena are actually above a pride of lions in nature's hierarchy, based on the power of their jaws; simply put you keep your distance from a spotted hyena! We got to see Pooh close up on the table and even stroke him! [His teeth were fine by the way, just a bit of tartar!]

A newly toothless Willow

As I didn't get to see a procedure on a cheetah the day before, I was one of 4 who were allowed into the clinic to watch one of the welfare cheetahs, Willow, being operated on. He is one of the biggest cheetah on the reserve, and one of the oldest. Cheetah have a number of health problems as they get older, which in nature may well kill them. Cheetah tend to lose their teeth at about 8 years old, however in captivity a cheetah may live to 14 or 15. Willow is 14, and is fed only on a diet of Iams and donkey meat (no bones), however his teeth were so bad that almost all of them had to be removed. One tooth was so absessed that when it was removed the hole could fit an entire swab and you could see through the bone up to the nose.

Luckily I couldn't see the blood!

You would think I would have passed out by this point, but I conquered my fears and stayed for the whole procedure- I even held up his leg while the vet was trying to put a catheter into Willow's artery. Goodness knows what would have happened if that catherter came out, but luckily I remained standing throughout (if a little green looking).

The highlight of the week has to be going to capture Toby. Toby is a solitary cheetah living in the largest (32,000 acres) rehabilitation enclosure. An unfortunate side effect of all the farming in Namibia is that it is overgrown with invasive thorny bushes. This poses a problem to cheetah, as they are susceptible to scratching their eyes, which is exactly what happened to Toby in April this year. It took 4 darts to actually put Toby out as the darts kept bouncing off the poor guy, and he was still struggling when we got him on the truck!

 

In the wild, catching Toby

While we were there, there was actually a cameraman filming for the production company Tigress, who are producing a documentary called something like Case Files, looking at the case of Toby and how the invasive bushes are protecting cheetah from humans but also are causing injury. I was definitely filmed as part of Toby's capture, and I think I may well be in the programme so you will have to keep an eye out for me!

 

Beautiful Wahoo

On the last day, when we were supposed to be catching up on all the work that had been missed by going to see the vet checks, we got a call that a leopard called Wahoo was coming in and would we like to see him.... that was a no brainer! So we downed tools after a grouling 25 minutes and got to see Wahoo have a root canal. Wahoo was brought to Africat before his eyes were even open, taken from a farmer's land. He was brought up by Wayne Hannsen, the owner of the reserve, until Wahoo turned 4 when he matured and became a solitary animal. He is an absolutely beautiful cat who is used as an ambassador for leopards, used

to teach children about his species. We got to go and re-release him once he had been awake for a few hours- unfortunately he was still pretty dosed up so all he managed was to stand up, wobble around before slumping back down again dribbling.

Not sure if Matata was roaring more loudly
before or after the 4 root canals!

Then as if we thought it couldn't get any better, we were told that they were bringing in Matata, a fully grown, 250kg male lion! Matata had such extensive problems that they were operating on him for 4.5 hours and had to draft someone to get extra anaesthetic from the nearest town 1 hour away as he would use a bottle in himself.

I have been so lucky to not only have seen this animals up close, but stroke them, help with procedures and even have stuck my head in a lion's mouth! Not something you do every day!