Sense and Sensibility –Flying Tire

We got the autopsy report of Madonna's cub back from Lory Park, authored by a Senior Researcher of the Zoological Pathology and Research Program at the National Zoological Gardens of South Africa. The report was full of technical terms, so I spoke to the researcher Dr. Emily herself to gain my layman's understanding. Essentially, the cub was perfectly formed with no genetic defects of any kind. The cause of death was heart failure resulting from the infection caused by the omni present bacteria E. coli. The lack of maternal colostrum may have increased the susceptibility of the cub to infection.

The report brought me back again to that sad Saturday over a week ago. When I was informed of the cub's illness at first that afternoon, I already had an uneasy feeling, unlike the feeling I had when Hulooo got severe constipation. Despite that later Kim told me the cub's fever and convulsion had gone down, I still felt uneasy, and did not want to go to sleep until the early hours of Sunday morning, when I received the phone call of nightmare at 2.15am.

Two days ago, when Tigris told me he needed to get the Nissan truck I was using at Laohu washed and tanked to get ready for my trip to Bloemfontain airport, I felt uneasy. We normally use another - newer and far more reliable- vehicle for long distance trips, particularly for when we have guests to transport, like now. Early this morning, on the two-hour trip to Bloemfontain airport to catch the 9.50am flight, I said to Tigris again that we should be taking the Toyota Hilux as we normally do. Not long after that, I heard our Nissan crashing down on the N1 highway and the wheel flying off from the left front of the Nissan! For a moment, I thought our truck was going to turn upside down, having lost the balance. Tigris did a remarkable job of controlling the truck that we finally had a smooth landing on the hard shoulder of the Highway. Boy, thank goodness there were no vehicles directly after us-we may well end up in hospital at the least.

Out of our truck, for a moment, we wondered where the wheel flew off and if it could be repaired. However, the bolts seemed to be broken. Then Robert, who has been visiting me at Laohu Valley with his friend, alerted us that we had a flight to catch in an hour and half. Still determined to try catching the flight, Robert's Zulu friend stepped on the side of the highway, hitchhiking. A little utility truck stopped by. A Khosa gentleman in his 50s got out. Despite being late for work himself, he kindly took us in the direction of Bloemfontein, still a 100 kilometers away. Zulu and myself squeezed into the small driver's cabin while Robert and Tigris got onto the back of his mini truck. He was phoned by his boss five times before he had to stop another car, getting a Sotho driver to continue taking us all the way to the airport. Christian, who was on his way to his farm, was so kind to also offer organizing having our vehicle taken first to the nearby town of Edenburg, for fear that it might get stolen or broken apart, if it continued left abandoned on the highway.. Christian told me of incidences that he knew where vehicles turned over completely when front wheels fell off. It did make me feel as if I won a lottery!

We remarkably made it to the airport right before the flight was due to depart. All I could say is: we lucked out today, in more ways than one!!! A Tigris well in control of the wheel, and two such kindly South Africans!

Quan Li
Johannesburg

Genes and Testosterone

I managed to find a little bit of time to have a better read of the recent messages left on my blog last night. I know I am repeating myself with the same limited vocabulary here but I just want to say, yet again, that I am moved by all your messages! I want to say to all of you, both to my supporters and to my sceptics, that I thank you for leaving me messages which I really enjoy reading. I am sorry I can't reply to all of you one by one, given the limited internet access I have now in South Africa.

But I want to let you know what I feel: I feel proud of you for sharing the same sentiment for China's Tigers. I feel grateful to and protected by you to come to my defence. I feel encouraged by you with all your praises and encouragement. I feel hopeful for China's nature knowing I can count on your support. I want to let you know that I will try my best not to disappoint you - I won't give up. I would like to meet you, all of you, and I promise we will do that when we celebrate the establishment of the China Tiger Foundation. Speaking of supporters, it is always fun to see our delightful friend Dr. H. M., who despite recent troubles remains cheerful and humourous. H, being the Chief Ecologist, is the second in command at a major State Wildlife organization. He has been supportive of our efforts from the very start when he learned of our objectives of saving the South China Tiger and its habitat, using SA as a springboard for its land, game and expertise etc. He shared with us his views of the genetics issues when we spoke about our project. Through doing a study of Indian Wolves which bred to over 700 individuals from just two, the researchers has observed that there were some physically defective individuals born when the numbers reached about 300 from 2, but such defects actually disappear as the numbers further increase.

I have been informed of other similar studies before. For example, a moose (an ungulate) had prospered on an island off Greenland from just 2 individuals to 1000 in hundred years, with no genetic defects found. Also all the David's Deer are descended from a dozen or so ancestors brought out of China over hundred years ago which then thrived in Europe. H also commented that research shows that the testosterone levels of captive animals decline significantly in small confined conditions, which I had always made comparisons as free man versus prisoners. This could partly explain why the South China Tigers in Chinese Zoos have been experiencing a huge hurdle in breeding but why TigerWoods in a natural environment here in SA has been keen to mate, and successfully! Even married human males have highly reduced testosterone levels, which make them better fathers.

H's research obviously added weight to my otherwise layman's instinctive speculation, coming out of observations of animal and human species. I am pleased to know, however, that academic studies in this case support a layman's empirical observations, which has actually led to our program of Rewilding and breeding the South China Tigers in natural environment in South Africa.
Johannesburg
March 28th 2008

Eventful March

I have been very occupied recently and no chance to write a blog. Just to keep my readers posted, I have been in South Africa and there have been many projects that reader friends will no doubt hear in the next month or so.
We have had to evaluate all the over 7600 names for Junior and select just one! It has proven to be a humongous undertaking to select just one name out of many good suggestions. We also need to make sure it is a unique name that has not been used by anyone so it is special, since our Junior is VERY special.
I saw Junior last week, and he was 16 kilos and I could now barely lift him up. He is still very playful and was excited to see us -his playmates - visiting him. I took the precaution of bringing my leather jacket so he could not leave any teeth marks on my arms but I was still bruised on my legs. He was inexhaustible. Eddie told me that his idea of putting Junior together with the little lioness in her enclosure did not work the first time, as the little lioness continued to charge and threaten Junior, who just showed submissiveness. Eddie promised to give another try by bringing the little lioness to Junior's territory.
March has been a month of eventfulness. A fantastic in-depth front page Column 1 story was published in the Los Angeles Times on our project. This was another triumph after our project was covered a couple of years ago in the Christian Science Monitor and Chicago Tribune in the US and it goes to show how much the public supports us.
However, the unfortunate event was that I found out that the SPCA of South Africa, issued a press release back in January, equating our efforts to live feeding in zoos in China for the entertainment of zoo visitors and announced its renewed effort to appeal in the High Court of Appeals. After years of failed attempt to incriminate us and lost civil case against us (the SPCA was ordered to pay our cost), one would have thought that the SPCA would now focus the much needed donor funding on so many animal abuses such as Battery farming, and canned lion hunting. But no, the SPCA decides to spend more donor money on continued legal fight against our conservation project. I am however very pleased at the letters of suport we have received from the public in reply to our public response to the SPCA and the outrage at the SPCA's abuse of donor funding. However, we have yet to receive a letter of apology or retraction from the SPCA regarding its defamatory remarks against us as of now.
I also did something totally out of character, considering that I am not a fan of cars and prefer public transportation. Thinking that this might be the last time we could call Cape Town HOME, we splashed a little and rented a replica Cobra- a powerful 1960's sports car - instead of a normal Alamo rental. It proved to be a fun experience, driving along the azure seashore of Cape Town and the scenic routes of its wine countries. The roars it made sounded as if we were driving at the speed of a airplane and it turned heads. People would look with a sense of bewilderment when they saw a mad Chinese woman in patent white rain coat behind its steering wheel...
Meanwhile, all else is proceeding well. I am looking forward to all the exciting news coming soon!