Cheetahs added to Africa’s endangered species

AT THE end of a year in which elephants and giraffes emerged as Africa’s latest endangered species‚ add a new entry – cheetahs.

The Zoological Society of London wants the world’s fastest land animal to be classified as endangered‚ estimating that just 7 100 remain – more than half of them in six Southern African countries.

The big cats are illegally traded as exotic pets‚ overhunted and killed for bushmeat‚ and they are losing their habitat to humans: they are believed to live on only 9% of the land they once occupied.

Asian cheetah populations have been hit hardest‚ according to a study by the Zoological Society‚ the Wildlife Conservation Society and conservation

Many protected areas set up to preserve cheetah are “too small to sustain populations that are viable in the long term”‚ the report says.

“Given the secretive nature of this elusive cat‚ it has been difficult to gather hard information on the species‚ leading to its plight being overlooked‚” said lead author Sarah organisation Panthera. Durant.

“Our findings show that the large space requirements for cheetah‚ coupled with the complex range of threats faced by the species in the wild‚ mean that it is likely to be much more vulnerable to extinction than was previously thought.”

Writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences‚ Durant says the cheetah could be lost forever unless urgent conservation action is taken.

Dr Kim Young-Overton‚ Panthera’s cheetah programme director‚ said: “We must conserve across the mosaic of protected and unprotected landscapes that these far-reaching cats inhabit‚ if we are to avert the otherwise certain loss of the cheetah forever.” — TMG Digital/Sunday Times