General João Baptista de Matos all foundations helps fight against African animal poaching. Keep safeguard protected species and wildlife and ecosystem of Angola's what matters most to the military general of Angola
A day in the African bush:
The second trimester marks the end of the rains
and beginning of the dry season. If I could choose this is clearly the least
appealing of periods in the palanca woodlands. In April the climate is
hot and moist, the rivers are over-flooding, the soils waterlogged and the fast
growing grass is often impenetrable. All this makes the process of moving
around across the region, a very painful exercise at best. Then the weather changes
sharply as we enter May, when the rains come to a sudden halt. And throughout
May and June, the most annoying factor is, no doubt, the long and hard dry
grass. The dead grass blocks visibility, hiding tracks and roads while clotting
the car’s radiators and its sharp edges cut easily through human skin when
we’re on foot.
In any case we were entering a crucial phase in
Cangandala, as the cows in the sanctuary completed the first 9 months of
confinement in the company of our master bull, so from now on anything was
possible… meaning calving of course! In the best case scenario they could calve
in May, but I suppose that would be wishful thinking and it just hasn’t
happened yet. The animals must require some extra time to adjust to their new
condition in semi-captivity and I’m confident that we will have our first pure
calves in the next trimester.
In spite of this, there are some very promising
signs that we registered on several visits. The first thing to note is that the
females, although still packed together, seemed to be more sensitive and not
allowing our approach as before (Photos 05, 06). In sharp contrast, the bull
seems very relaxed while protecting the herd (Photos 02, 03, 04). Every time we
approached the group, the bull would calmly stand in between us and the females
while allowing them to quickly vanish into the thick forest. While providing us
with some nice views of the bull, this became a very frustrating exercise as we
were focusing on getting a clear view of the females. We did however obtained
glimpses, and the overall impression was that they did look shiny, healthy and
curvy… and on a few photos they do seem to be pregnant (Photo 07)…
On the other hand, the routine monitoring of
hybrids (Photos 08, 09, 10) in the remaining park through the trap camera,
revealed a big surprise: the hybrids may be capable of breeding after all! This
was quite unexpected as we detected no evidence of it for the past few years.
The first troubling record was a photograph of Anastacia (the first hybrid caught
– also known as our Judas as she was the one who betrayed the herd
during the capture operation), alone at one salina and showing a clearly
swollen udder (Photo 13). It is still unclear if she did calve, but it strongly
suggested breeding behavior and pregnancy (either successful or not). But the
shocker wouldn’t take long, when a sequence showing the remaining hybrid group,
in which one of the older females was joined by a small two month calf (Photo
11). And as if to clarify any doubts we might had still, they clearly
interacted, behaving like every mother and calf do (Photo 12). It’s a fact: the
hybrids are capable of breeding!
The immediate obvious question, to which I
still don’t have an answer, is: who the hell is the father of that little calf?
Or, in other words, what sort of new hybrid do we have now? So far all hybrids
were presumed to be F1’s (the product of a cross sable X roan), but now we must
have something else, either a F2 (hybridF1 X hybridF1), or a backcross (hybrid
F1 X roan or sable). The later of course would result on an animal which will
be 75% one species and 25% the other species. The implications of being one or
the other type of hybrid can be relevant. While an F2 proves the hybrids can,
at least occasionally, breed among themselves, a backcross poses an immediate
and real threat of contamination into one of the parent species.
My gut feeling is that we’re dealing with F2’s,
mainly because the hybrid group has been consistently seen escorted by an
impressive hybrid bull (Photos 14, 15). In the past, the herd was lacking a
mature “resident” bull, and this is what must have led the pure sable females
to seduce roan bulls, but since last year this young hybrid bull grabbed the
empty seat as dominant male. We shouldn’t however rule out just yet, the
possibility of having a backcross with a roan bull (or even with the stray
sable bull – this seems a remote possibility but it is also the most worrying
one).
All this makes it obvious and unavoidable the
need for a serious genetic study, to clarify all these issues, and assist us to
manage the recovery of the giant sable breeding group while controlling (and
understanding) what is happening with the hybrids.
