Game Capture - Day 2

Yup, you guessed it, out at the farm again by 6 am (talk about about early mornings)! Melanie unfortunately sat this morning out due to the excessive rockin' and rollin' of the bucky which did not agree well with most of our stomachs. So we headed out and met Tertius and Pierre at another game farm. This one was owned by Nico, an ex-chopper pilot who used to work for Tertius. Nico wanted us to move 6 sable from his farm to the farm that we worked on yesterday. So we split up into 2 groups of 3, one group went out and caught the sable while the other loaded it into the trailer and gave some medications. It ended up that my group just stayed in the trailer the whole time and gave some dewormer, tick and parasite treatment, wound treatment and then reversed the sedation. The other group just went out and did all of the catching. This went very smoothly and within 3 hours we had all of the sables caught, awake and in the trailer ready to be moved. Unlike yesterday, the sables were reversed because they were in the trailer without humans so there was no danger associated with them being awake. We then drove to the farm and tried to unload 1 specific sable into a pen for breeding. This was rather difficult as the others all wanted to get out as well. After about 45 minutes of trying to get the one out, Tertius decided just to move them all into the pen where the others would go and then move the breeder into the separate pen later. We thought this was a much better idea as it was soooo hot and we were all waiting in the boiling sun! Once the trailer was set up in the pen, the men opened the doors and all of the sable ran out together and were happy and fine. The sables were the only thing on our agenda for the day, with a possible cheetah capture later if they could get it.

The way the cheetah capture would work was different. You don't dart cheetahs as they are too hard to find in the open plains, so you set up a large pen called a "boma" in which you place meat inside to lure them in. Once they go in, then you shut the doors and can then chemically sedate them. As far as Tertius knew, the boma was set up and we were just waiting for the cheetah. He sent us back to the resort and told us he'd call if the cheetah was a go.

So we came back to the resort, had some lunch and then read and swam for a bit. Mel was feeling much better and ready for the rest of the day! By 4 o'clock there was no call, so we decided that the cheetah was a no go. Then we saw Tertius's bucky and thought maybe cheetah, but it turned out him and Pierre just came to visit as it was not caught yet. So we all just visited for awhile and then they left and it was lights out.