5/15
12:30 am wake up call by Jan, our awesome and michievious student coordinator. There’s a leopard that was caught in a snare. Clothes are thrown on in a sleepy haze, headlamp grabbed and we all head up to the clinic. Fortunately we are spared a 2 hour drive as the leopard has been brought to us. His head is covered, but he is still quite impressive and marvelous. The staff quickly gets to work while we watch. I help load and unload the leopard into and out of the crate.
This leopard was in better shape than ones rescued before. His tooth was broken and root exposed from trying to get out of the trap. It was the work of human encroachment…again. Holding his massive head was unreal and I almost still don’t believe it happened.
There may be no place for this animal to go, even if he fully recovers. It’s the same sad story for so many wild beasts. A life in a cage or death. We’ve taken their land so they don’t even have a home any more. People have to know and understand this, for the animals’ and our own sakes.
Our days continued normally except that I had to help with the avery today. I can understand why everyone here hates every duty. Wake up 6 am, grate apples with a crappy grater, do it another 3 more times that day. Tomorrow Ollie and I will handle our rounds alone since some people are going on a bush walk tomorrow morning. Slowly and happily I’m getting into the groove of things and by the groove of things I mean used to the wild and unexpected=normal.
