Provide food & care for the wildlife Orphanage

Dear Friends,

Last month has been quite busy for our animal team. First of all, we welcomed the perfect Alexia as an Animal Manager. She is from France and was working as an animal keeper in a zoo.

We have questions for you:

When a buffalo kills a lion and his cub is left as a baby by himself for several days before a human finds him, what should the human do?

- Should we let nature do its job and let this lion cub die? If so, shouldn’t we just kill him, to spare him the suffering?

- Should we just take him and give him an opportunity to live? Even if by doing so, he would have to stay in captivity for the rest of his life? 

So, what would YOUR decision be? And, in YOUR opinion, what does this lion cub hope for?

At DAKTARI, we do not have the heart to kill the lion cubs, not when they are young and cute, not when they are big and dangerous. Nevertheless, we understand and respect people that let nature run its course instead of interfering.

It is why we have decided to make improvements in our camp to welcome 2 lions that were found as cubs, and hand raised. These lions have been confiscated from their owner because they did not have any permits. Both of them, Duma the male and Knotch the female, were born in 2008.

We will make all the efforts necessary to give them a decent life in an enclosure outside of the camp. Also, lions are a symbol in South Africa, so they will become ambassadors for the children who come to our camp in order to teach them how to respect wild lions.

Lions are now marked as Vulnerable by the UICN Red List as their population in Africa decreased by 43% between 1993 and 2014. It is difficult to know all the reasons why but it has mainly to do with the expansion of the habited area. As we have seen in the past, when a lion comes near the local villages, because they can come out of the game reserves or national parks, it attacks the livestock, so people track and kill the lion. Also, the local poachers are motivated by money, because of lions' claws or teeth that are really expensive in South East Asia, to replace the traditional medicine with the claws or teeth of tigers.

Dear friends,

As Kyle, our last Animal Manager left to continue his study after more than 9 months with us, we welcome Ashleigh, who is taking over.

After hosting Luna, a blind female Southern African Hedgehog 2 months ago, we welcomed last month Hayley, an African Pygmy Hedgehog, also called four toed Hedgehog.

She is still shy at the moment, getting used to her new home, and her new friend, Luna. But at night, she forages for food with a lot of energy.

Even if Hedgehogs live usually by themselves, we can sense that Hayley is already connecting with Luna. She is going to help her live with her blindness.

For instance, being blind, Luna was not able to know when it was day or night time so she was out of her little home mostly during the day. With her new friend Hayley living at night, we have seen her shifting slowly to being a nocturnal animal again.

The african pygmy hedgehogs can be tame and become pets as they are more comfortable with human contact but they do not crave for it as other pets do. So we do not encourage taking these cute animals as pets as we would rather see them in the wild. We would have loved to release Hayley but as her species is not indigenous from South Africa, it would not be the best for her and our environment. They usually live in brush piles, rock crevices, and burrows.

Did you know that Hedgehogs have around 5000 to 7000 spines on their back. These can be raised and lowered to respond to threatening situations. Each quill/ spine lasts about a year before dropping out and being replaced!

We hope all is well on your side and thank you again for your trust and support.