"Walter White Witness Statement"

Apparently the legal eagles have given this a loving nickname:

Walter White witness statement

Who can blame them?

MICROCHIPPING MADONNA’S LOTTERY WIN

Madonna and Cubs

Jan 28, 2011

Everything was going according to plan. We managed to get Madonna into another camp leaving her 3 babies alone so we can walk into the camp, catch them and microchip them. Joseph was called immediately and it would take him 2.5 hours to drive from Kimberly, but unfortunately he had to take care of an emergency veterinary operation for a horse somewhere first.

I informed team my rough idea:  we were to station ourselves at different locations of the camp, thus preventing the cubs from getting close so they could potentially crawl under/through/over the fence, all of which had been part of our Laohu experience!  And we were to catch the cubs with capture net and fishing net, a effective and harmless technique learned from Chinese zoos. In the end we agreed on a plan, that just before the vet arrives we would proceeding with the operation and two of the three cubs would be put into each of the two travel boxes while a third will receive microchip. Microchipping itself doesn’t last long-it’s the preparation that takes time. But having had plenty of experiences and learning from past mistakes I think our plan covered all grounds. However more often than not, dealing with nature does not go according to plan. 

Xa in the net

I was so looking forward to it. Not that I care so much about the microchipping which is a government requirement, but we could use this opportunity to sex the cubs. Last week, I was telling our tiger supervisor Vivienne that for some reason all the three cubs I observed through my cameras and binos were females. Was I imposing my wish on what I saw? Vivienne said the next day that she definitely saw a male. Well, I said, in that case hopefully we had at least two girls. We badly need more female tigers to address the imbalance between males and females in our second generation South China Tigers born in SA.

One hour, two hours passed. Still no news from Joseph. I was worried about the cubs as today was quite a sunny day. We moved the little concrete water tray next to the big tree which they preferred. Madonna showed up from the deep thicket of 7 Ha camp and watched the commotion, attentively. As soon as they saw mom the cubs all came out to the fence trying to get to mom. At one point one of the cub was zapped by the electrified tripwire which immediately got Madonna to return to the fence, just when she was about to head back into the cool thicket.

It was not until 5pm before we heard from Joseph, but he was only one hour away now from us.

We sprang into action. We used the big capture net to form a barrier so if the cubs would run they would get caught into it. Then we approached the cubs who were now all cowered into the corner of the camp. Madonna, watching from the other side of the fence, started charging the fence at us but got shocked by the electricity which made her even angrier. I kept telling her we were not stealing her babies and they would be fine but all the same, she gave us menacing growls and charges.

Yoya

It turned out to be fairly easy to scoop up the first and second cub with the fishing net, however they tried to threaten us with their little snarls. They were still quite small though very solid and strong. They were put into two cages. The last one was a bit of challenge as it escaped the fishing scoop and ran to the capture net, where it got caught.  Hein scooped it up and Joseph was, as usual, very quick in his actions and micro-chipped the cub. Time to sex the cub! A girl! She was given a temp name Xa.

The second microchipping also went very smoothly as the cubs seemed to freeze once they were caught. We took head shots from different sides and body shots in order to identify them, as they looked remarkably similar. I lifted her leg to sex her, yet another female!! She was nick-named Yoya and like the first one she was immediately put back into her Ravine camp and she also ran straight into the dense vegetations of the stream.

The third one proved to be more difficult to handle. First we had trouble getting the cub out of the cage. Then the cub was fighting us. We managed to get the chip in and photos taken in the end, not without a bit of casualties. At one point my finger was bitten but no harm done. However, Thinus (our assistant reserve manager) got a bit on his arm, which still looked bloody after the operation completed.

Well what is the chance that ALL 3 cubs in our FIRST ever TRIPLET litter are ALL girls?? When I gently lifted the cub’s little but strong leg, I couldn't contain my excitement! INDEED, ALL 3 of Madonna’s cubs are baby girls!!!!  

WE WON A LOTTERY! AND WE ARE ROCKING!!  We named her Zeta for now.

Feb 2^st  2012

Yoya being examined

After Microchipping, we left all the gates connecting three camps open, hoping Madonna would reunite with her 3 cubs overnight. However, the next morning on Jan 29^th she was found inside the 2 Ha Ravine camp with two cubs, pacing with another cub on the other side of the fence inside 7 Ha Catkins camp.  For the whole family to get back together, either the lone cub had to come through to the mini-management camp to the Ravine, or Madonna had to come to Catkins to fetch her. During afternoon monitoring this had not yet happened. We managed to coax Madonna into Catkins, hoping the lone cub would follow her back into Mini-camp, then back to Ravine. But the cub refused to cross the threshold. It had to be the same cub that refused to cross the gate in reverse the other day! We left them for the night but by this morning, the status quo remained the same. I had to find ways to get them all back together so Madonna doesn’t have to be caught spending time with two households. The best method again, is the fishing scoop net.

But easily said than done! The cub was much smarter than us! And certainly a lot faster than us! We spent the day yesterday figuring out way to catch her, using Madonna as lure, but needless to say we failed. Her little told her not to trust us and her little legs can certainly run. In the darkness we abandoned our effort to reunite the family and let Madonna decide if she should spend time in Catkins or in Ravines and with which cubs, leaving the two gates between the three camps open. It was not without pity that I retired for the evening, thinking how much of a challenge it was for a tiger mother. Despite having to go back and  forth between the three camps, at no time did she express any sign of anger or impatience to her screaming and demanding cubs, and always showered them with tenderness and patience, no matter how helpless she felt…

The next morning, one more cub moved into Catkins and the cry of the lone cub in Ravine camp was loud and clear. Despite that the eland was not completely finished though Madonna’s family did an impressive job eating most part of it, we decided to give Madonna some fresh carcass. Thinus shot two blesbok and tied them together in the mini-management camp to prevent her from dragging it away, and Vivienne blew the whistle. This time however, Madonna refused to come out to the sound of the whistle or food. She must be getting back to us for using a springbok as bait last night but not giving her the full deal!

Zeta in the net

Another night and no one appeared, not even Madonna. At this point I began to worry seriously that should the cubs be split too long, Madonna could lose patience and stop caring one of them. I doubt tiger mothers do that but still I feared. We had no idea where Madonna was or any of the cubs was. I decided that we should be on whole day monitoring so our staff would do the observation in turn. But by 4pm, not even a shadow of anyone in sight. I was praying that this would be a sure sign that Madonna and her cubs had all gotten together. By 5pm however, only Madonna and one cub was sighted but they soon also disappeared, which made me worry seriously once more.

A tiger-loving journalist from Hong Kong was visiting us to report on our project yesterday. Just when I was prepared to tell him that he was out of luck with Madonna’s cubs and that my team ought to prepare for a day search the next day, when all three cubs were spotted grouping together on Catkins side of the fence line with Ravine Camp.  I was elated..

Zeta taking temperature

I drove into Catkins camp with Ivan the journalist, and we were soon reward with the most incredible sighting: Madonna strolling with three tiny cubs trailing behind her, towards us. She seemed a bit startled when she saw my vehicle, but calmly went into tall grass and lied down just a few meters from us. The cubs, with the aid of the onset of dusk, appeared to be bolder than usual, moving even closer to our vehicle. They soon joined mom demanding milk from her. The they played, chasing one another in the grass and amongst trees. As the light dimmed further, the cubs seemed even more bullish, with one of them approached our vehicle to within 5 meters. She was then distracted by the big stone and started investigating it: looking from one side to another and climbing on top etc. This undaunted little cub turned out to be Xa.

At sunset of today’s sunless day, I again saw Madonna’s family of four. While mom was feeding in adjacent camps, the cubs put on the most exciting show in nature’s stage: chasing and tumbling on top of one another, wrestling and hugging etc. When mom finished eating, they jumped on top of mom demanding to be fed, to which Madonna obeyed obediently and with such love and gentleness. She licked and hugged her cubs tenderly and watch them frolicking with such pride and content..

-From Li Quan at Laohu Valley Reserve, South Africa

TIGER MOTHERS ARE FANTASTIC MOTHERS

Ever since Huwaa was reunited with her family she would spend some time with mother and little brothers and some other time with King Henry to continue their bonding. King Henry is a gentle soul in the company of Huwaa, putting up with all her antics continuously, even though he has matured sexually and looking for females through calling and Huwaa is just too young for him.

Meanwhile, Hulooo is even more fascinated now that there are increased activities and excitement with the addition of Huwaa in his neighbouring camp. He spends significant among of time gluing himself to the gate between the two camps which does not please Cathay at all. Having charged through the fence to attack King Henry a few month before, she now decides her grown-up son Hulooo is the threat and picks a daily fight with him through the gate, destroying quite a bit of the metal mesh on her side in the process. Hulooo refuses to give way. Perhaps because he didn't socialize properly as a tiger that he doesn't know that he should do as Henry does -chuffing back at Cathay to appease her? Poor Hulooo- I wonder what goes on in his head? Does he find his little siblings so amusing to watch? Or  does he want to relive his childhood? Even at this age he is certainly pretty playful with his brother JenB, stalking and chasing him, and jumping around happily in the open grassland at times. JenB refuses to be drawn into the fight between his mother and brother, wondering what is fuss is all about and looking very puzzled and embarassed by the showdown.

 

Temporarily named Alpha & Beta, the little brothers emulated sister Huwaa's every step and follows her up the trees if she climbs it and down into the water drainage if she chooses so. No doubt Cathay finds in her a good baby sitter as her boundless energy could keep her little sons entertained to no bound, freeing up her time to pick on Hulooo.

I am continuously amazed at what good mothers the tigers are. Cathay always let her babies eat first even though she was so hungry. Reuniting with Huwaa means that she has to share food with one more mouth but she is as gentle to her daughter now as she was when Huwaa was a little baby. Once just after she started feeding on a leftover carcass, when all her children decided to follow her example and monopolized it. She just let them eat while lying a few meters away. Only when they have their share would she starts eating. When Alpha tries to take it over again, she would warn him off but never does she touch them a finger.

Madonna proves to be even more extraordinary. Being in the camp far more removed from any human activities and shielded from Cathay has given her added sense of security and she hasn't  once paced with a cub in her mouth during the two months since she gave birth on Oct 9th, unlike when she was raising King Henry and Princess which worried me sick but from which I also learned a big lesson and therefore put her into this fairly isolated camp. Since we accidentally saw she actually has three cubs, we wanted to catch them and microchip them when they are about two months and still easy. But first we need to understand their movement and find out where she hides them. Madonna wouldn't take the bait! One day she tried to distract us by walking to a completely different direction when she saw us on the watch and she wandered around pretending not to be interested in getting back to her cubs. She won this round.

The next day we shut her into an adjacent camp from early in the morning thinking she may call the cubs out sometime during the day, but we waited in shifts in vain -she didn't make a single call to her cubs. After the sunset I knew she won again so she was let back into her camp. One would have thought that after a whole day being away from her cubs she would rush to them. But NO! Seeing humans still around she took her time, smelling the grass and rolling on the ground as if she was in no hurry. Suddenly roars came from KH causing one of her cubs' reactive cry. Instead of running to her cubs, she ran in the opposite direction into the river! The crying cub emerged, puzzled why mom ran away, but quickly followed her in her foot steps...Clearly even during such emergency situation she did not forget to fool us..

I gave up on sighting them, never mind catching them and microchip them. We informed the vet Joseph not to bother being on standby any more and we will wait a month or two more till they become a bit more independent and can follow Madonna out of the cover.

Yesterday was the day I decided not to bother monitoring Madonna and her cubs. I was just watching Hulooo and JenB when loud cries of cubs came out of Madonna's camp, in response once more to KH's roars. I rushed over into KH"s camp from where I could see into Madonna's camp and there! She and her three mini tigers were again on the river bank on the other side, in the shade of trees. I battled to see them even through the Binos but I could see two cubs suckling for a while before Madonna decided it was time to get up and wandered off. The two suckling cubs were taken by surprise and looked puzzled but quickly followed mom away. 

I drove around to another side of the camp and saw Madonna patrolling the fences by herself. How on earth she give instructions to her cubs to stay undercover just puzzles me. I know how tigers invite others to participate in something -by chuffing, but how on earth do they tell them don't follow me out in the open and stay where you are?! I did see the tiger mothers snarl mildly when they get a bit annoyed from their cubs constant energetic play or when their cubs wouldn't let mothers eat at all,  so perhaps that's what they do.

I must confess that watching the tiger mothers and how they raise their cubs got to be the most gratifying experience one can have on this planet. I wouldn't exchange it with anything else.

-TigerLi from Laohu Valley Reserve

Dec 15, 2011

Collaring JenB and Coco

Visit SCT Gallery to view the whole process of collaring

We have been planning to collar JenB and Coco brothers for the past half year so we can collect valuable hunting data in the 100 ha hunting camp where it has proven difficult to monitor the tigers during the last year, due to its huge size and difficult terrain.

This morning our vet Joseph arrived at 7am punctually. We have had various dramas collaring our tigers in the past, such as JenB climbing over the electrified fence and Princess running through it, and we hid our anxiety by joking about possible surprises we may encounter today.

JenB and Coco have been separated from Brother Hulooo in preparation of this operation. When we arrived at their camp the two brothers were having an argument, roaring and jumping up and down, but was interrupted by our arrival. That didn't last long as more conflict occurred between JenB and King Henry, who was on the other side of the fence.

We wondered how to get them close to us and into a position which was easier to shoot the dart that carried the sedatives. Just when my new colleague Thinus came back with a leg of meat as enticement, Coco lied down a few meters away from the fence. It would be good to shoot the dart in their butt, but the big cats must have felt something important was happening so they faced us, observing our movement.

Not wanting to loose this opportunity, Joseph fired the dart gun and the dart went into Coco's neck as intended. Coco dashed off in shock. We waited for the drug to take effect. Being a cautious vet, as I mentioned in my previous diaries about the different operations with Laohu Valley's South China Tigers, he'd rather applying less drugs initially and top it up, than overdosing the tigers potentially causing death, especially since we could only guess the weight of the tigers.

After a few minutes the drugs took effect and Coco's pace slowed down. To my anticipated fear, he chose to lie down in the ditch close to the fence which made our operation very difficult. It turned out we were grossly wrong in our estimates of their body weights. When Joseph went forward to test if Coco was asleep, Coco suddenly got up and ran off, repeating the scenes we had before with King Henry in this very same camp two years ago. It took another two top-up of drugs to finally get him properly asleep.

JenB went through the same drama but Joseph did succeed in getting him to sleep too. A nerve wrecking operation started in checking their health conditions, taking blood samples, collaring, and measuring their body sizes.
I was pleased and proud to see how good a condition they are both in, finding only just a few ticks on their body (parasites such as ticks are an indication of the animal's health). But we grossly underestimated their weight. The 150kg scale was simply not enough to get the precise weight but we believed they were at least 200kgs each, not 150kg as we had estimated.

Antidote was applied to revert the effect of the sedatives. After about 10 minutes, their ears moved and tails twitched. Another 10mins, Coco first lifted up his head, then his front body. But feeling drowsy, he froze in each position for a few moments before making another move, and then lied down again. Only after Joseph made a thump on the ground with his testing stick, did Coco suddenly jump up and ran off into the ditch to hide.

JenB woke up soon after at about 10.20am,and also went into the little bushy area. It was important to observe their recovery so my team was on watch continuously till after the sun set. Just like when Cathay and Hope were collared, these two also finding the newly acquired accessory was a nuisance, trying to fight the collar off. In the end, the collars won and stayed on their neck.

Seeing both walking about by sun set, we were all very relieved that another operation completed successfully.

May 17th, 2011
Laohu Valley Reserve

PS: A couple of days later a blesbok was also collared and the two brothers were let into the 100 ha camp.

The first collared blesbok was hunted by JenB after a few days. Here is a photo of the left over. The second blesbok was killed three days after collaring.

Both tigers’s movements can be followed through GPS data. http://english.savechinastigers.org/node/626