By Liz Georges | Communications Coordinator
We had a banner year at CCF in 2013 for puppies -- 5 litters! And that’s a good thing, because there’s now a two year waiting list for the dogs. We’ve also had some very good news from our research -- the dogs don’t just reduce predation, they increase tolerance among farmers for predators. In other words, our Livestock Guarding Dog Program really IS making a provable difference for the cheetah and other predators as well.
There is more good news about our dog program this year. We’ve now introduced livestock guarding dogs to Tanzania, making this the 4th African country to which we have exported this solution for non-lethal predator control. These four puppies were taken to the Ruaha Carnivore Project just last month.
Dr. Laurie Marker learned early on as she traveled rural Namibia, interviewing farmers and researching human-wildlife conflict, that a farmer was never going to choose to save the cheetah if doing so threatened his herds and his livelihood. To secure a future for the cheetah, we had to first secure the farmer’s livelihood.
So we offered the farmers tools to help them, one of which are Anatolian shepherds and Kangal dogs. They bond with the herds and scare off predators. The dogs are so effective, farmers using a CCF dog to protect their herds see their predation rates from all predators, including cheetahs, reduced by 80 to 100 percent.
Thank you for being part of our success.
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