This isn’t a tack sharp photo, but the symbolism in this photo depicts how I felt about my time working at Cango Wildlife Ranch in South Africa. I went as a volunteer to work with cheetahs, assuming they had been rescued and were “ambassadors” of conservation. Little did I know that the center was nothing more than a breeding center for zoos, a money making machine, disguised as a conservation society, a wolf in sheep’s clothing. These beautiful creatures were breeding machines for profit, locked in cages their entire lives, forced to breed, only to have their babies taken away from them year after year. Some of the babies, like this one, were hand raised by staff as profit ambassadors for the ranch. After spending most of their lives with humans, forming special bonds with their caregivers, once they were too big they were either sent to the breeding camp or sold to zoos and conservation societies around the world. These beautiful creatures, on the brink of extinction caused by humans are now forced to be slaves all in the name of saving their species. But who are we really saving the species for, them, or ourselves?
Garrett Eriksen
March 27, 2010 at 1:28 pm
Dear Kristen,
My name is Garrett Eriksen, I’m the son of the Cango Wildlife Ranch’s owners, Andrew and Glenn Erikisen. I found your site when I Googled the CWR’s name, which I do on occasion to check what sites are posting reviews etc about us.
I was very excited to find your site, and your photographs are stunning. I was especially blown away by Baby Cheetah 2. She is sooo cute!
Anyway, the reason I am commenting on this picture specifically, is that I am deeply saddened and hurt that you would say such things about a facility my family, and many, many others, have sacrificed everything for.
You were only at the Ranch as a volunteer for about a week or so, and you barely scratched the surface of what goes on there, yet you feel you have the right to judge the people who work there and the facility and what we do.
Of course you are welcome to have your own opinion, and I am not asking you to remove this at all, as it is your site and I have no right to ask you to censor what you say. I simply want you to understand what effect your words have, and I also want to ask that you keep my comment on this site, as it is only fair that we should be able to defend ourselves.
You say you assumed that the cheetahs we had were “rescued”, but nowhere on our site, or in any of our brochures or press statements does it say we rescue cheetahs. Occasionally we may take in a few rescued cheetahs, true, but we are not a rescue-facility. Therefore, your impression that they were “”ambassadors” of conservation” was your own concoction, not ours. As a point of interest, all of our founder stock were in fact animals we rescued from farmers in Namibia. We were given permits from Nature Conservation for these cheetahs, which we drove up to collect ourselves. The cheetahs we did not have permits for, the farmers shot in front of us. At this time, we were one of the only breeding programs for wild cheetahs in the world, the other being De Wildt. In Africa, we are the second oldest and largest and second only to De Wildt for breeding. Last year, we were the best in the world with the highest breeding success / survival rate in the world.
You then accuse us of being a “breeding center for zoos, a money making machine, disguised as a conservation society, a wolf in sheep’s clothing.” First, I would like to address this by saying that half of it is true, but not in the way you think. Let me explain: we are a breeding centre, we have never hidden this fact. We provide bloodlines to many zoos and parks and wildlife sanctuaries around the world for a variety of animals, so as to strengthen their bloodlines.
You see, the problem is that, as an animal becomes more endangered, the chances of it inbreeding are severely increased. It is known that almost every cheetah in the world currently is related to the other, as the cheetah population, many thousands of years ago, fell to the brink of extinction but eventually recovered. As a result, they are all inbred and suffer a range of ailments, from liver failure to kidney nephritis. The reason we are rated one of the best cheetah breeding programs in the world, is that we recognised this early on and embarked on a program to increase bloodline diversity, thus ensuring the progression of cheetahs and the thinning out of inbred ailments. You should also note that we cannot release cheetahs into the wild as, by Cites and Nature Conservation laws, wildlife reserves need to have a certain carrying capacity of predators and game, has to be a certain size, cannot contain other predators that would be harmful to the cheetah (and a multitude of other laws). Simply put, there are simply not enough parks in the world to release our cheetahs in to. If you know of any that fulfil these criteria and if you know of anyone who can afford to completely fund the breeding program of the cheetah and associated costs, please let us know. I’m not being sarcastic there, simply pointing out the difficulties we face which you blithely ignore.
You should also note that we have successfully bred over 250 cheetahs, who have contributed and continue to contribute to the gene pools in a number of top institutions around the world. Additionally, we are held in extremely high standing around the world, as evidenced by our accreditation by PAAZAB, which is an association that rates zoos based on quality of facility and animal care and who in turn are a member of the World Association of Zoos and Aquaria (WAZA).
So, yes, we are a breeding centre, for if we left them out in the wild they would either inbreed again and perpetuate the weakened genes, or be killed by poachers and farmers who wish to protect their land and livestock. I assure you, if we could leave it to nature, we would, but that would lead to the extinction of the cheetah as you know and love them.
To your second point, that of us being a “money making machine”, this is also true. We are a business. We do not receive monetary aid from the government, and Cheetah Conservation Foundation is a non-profit organisation, in other words, any money made there, goes straight into our breeding program, which I have already explained as very necessary to the continuation of not only cheetahs, but the other species we also breed, including Bengal Tigers, Wallabies, Pygmy Hippos, Lemurs and, until recently, we had a very successful endangered reptile breeding program. The only way for the Cango Wildlife Ranch to exist and be successful is through the generous aid of public donations, as well as the profit gained from our tourist attractions. Where else would we gain funds from? What endangered species program in the world does not use business-practices to ensure constant funding? We are rated as a third-world country, please explain where we would gain constant funding from if we didn’t run a secondary tourism business?
As for being “disguised as a conservation society, a wolf in sheep’s clothing”, this would imply that we have hidden our intentions, but this is simply not the case. Not once have we ever hidden our activities or disguised them as something they are not. This line in particular is very upsetting as you are doubting the integrity, not only of my parents but also, of many people I have come to know and love as friends who work at the Ranch. Many of us have dedicated our lives to building the Ranch up from scratch, and to call us a “wolf in sheep’s clothing” is very hurtful. You see now the end result of over 24 years work on a place that was once barely manageable. My parents spent most of my childhood creating the Ranch, caring for the animals, raising them at our home, spending money out of their own wallets to pay for vet services, food supplies and staff. When I was old enough I also joined in on the effort and spent many a day working at the Ranch after school. My first companion was a cheetah, a happy coincidence from raising them at home. I’ve raised more cheetahs than years you’ve been alive. You dare judge our commitment to them on a brief visit? Spend 24 years dedicating your life to the perpetuation of a doomed species, and keep trying anyway because you can’t let them down, and THEN you might have the experience necessary to have an opinion. Right now, you’re simply being naive and ignorant. You say you care for animals, but then you attack a facility that has dedicated itself to their conservation.
Moving on, you then say the cheetahs are “locked in cages their entire lives, forced to breed, only to have their babies taken away from them year after year”, again this is a very slanted version of the truth. We have made every effort to increase the space of our cages for our cheetahs comfort, but funds and land space are scarce, the only other alternative is to dump them in reserves where they will be prey to poachers or inbreeding, or to dump them “in the wild” (which doesn’t really exist in Africa anymore) where they would be killed by poachers, bushmeat hunters and farmers. As for being “forced to breed”, I can assure you that this is not true. Forcing them to breed would mean something along the lines of locking them in apparatus’ and essentially forcing the males to rape the females, like they do with cows and horses, we DO NOT do this. Our males and females CHOOSE to mate. We have had many a season where no mating occurs and we gain no new cubs, and we have to simply leave it at that, for to do anything else would simply be unnatural, and we put great effort into being as natural as possible within the bounds of our restrictions.
We haven’t chosen the world’s current situation wherein animals need to be in captivity. We are doing what we need to, and we have proven at our facility that, our hand-raised cheetahs enjoy a higher quality of life, breed better and are far less stressed than our cheetahs that are not hand-raised .
As for removing cubs from their mothers: we agree, it is a sad procedure, but necessary for the long-term quality of life for the cubs, as I have already stressed the importance of hand-raising. This is not to say that they do not suffer some form of sadness when separated from their cubs, but our cheetahs trust our breeders. I have seen it myself where a mother will not stop our breeders from taking her cubs as she trusts the breeder with her cubs. And yes, every year there is a new breeding season, but we do not constantly use the same females, we continuously cycle them out so as to give them a break as well as increase bloodline quality. Sometimes the females simply do not wish to breed, and we accept this, they are not penalised or separated for this. The health and welfare, emotionally and physically, of our cheetahs is of paramount importance to us.
Now, to address the hand-raising aspect of our cheetah program beyond the cheetahs personal well-being: another reason some are hand-raised is to allow the public a chance, eventually, to encounter these beautiful creatures one-on-one, in hopes that an encounter with them will encourage the visitor to take an active interest in conservation and conserving our cheetahs, and obviously their financial contribution is of assistance in helping us to continue our programs.
“After spending most of their lives with humans, forming special bonds with their caregivers, once they were too big they were either sent to the breeding camp or sold to zoos and conservation societies around the world.” Although this is also partially true and is one of the saddest aspects of working at the ranch your implied connotation is that this is an extremely negative experience for our cheetah-what nonsense! All facilities they go to are of the highest quality in facility and care giving .Whilst at the breeding centre they get to breed- a natural and enriching experience for them ! Imagine spending most of your young adult life raising a cheetah, only to have him shipped off to an animal reserve somewhere in the world. It sucks, and it hurts, but it is necessary. The staff at the Ranch understand this, and for you to accuse them of doing it purely for profit is simply despicable. How dare you make light of the time, effort and emotional bonds they have invested. Our primary mission is to continue the species, we keep sight of this, whilst people like you can’t see further than their noses! Also, if they are shifted to the breeding camp, our staff can still visit them, which many do. And again, yes they are sold, how else do you expect us to continue our programs, as we are totally self-funded, in a third-world country which has to put the plight of humans above animals, and is therefore of no assistance to us in the form of grants or funds (as is often the case for institutions similar to ours in first-world countries). This is simply the world we live in. We wish to God the world wasn’t in the state that it is in. Unfortunately we don’t have a choice, as anything else would mean death for many species. We are doing what we must to preserve several species who are in the process of being destroyed by man. Direct your anger at the governments who cannot agree on a global warming program, at the companies who are responsible for the destroyed ecosystems, the poachers who kill indiscriminately for a quick buck and at the zoos who stick their animals in tiny, concrete hovels that are never cleaned.
We agree, most vehemently, that this is a very sad situation. But, what else would you have us do? And think realistically before you let your emotions guide your answer.
They are not slaves, they are not forced to do anything. We do not abuse them, we do not injure them, we treat them with all the love and care we can provide, we spend all our time and effort nursing them to health if they get sick, and enriching their lives when they are with us and we mourn them when they die. Many of us invest our lives into the lives of our charges, you have no right to judge us when you have not felt that kind of loss. Of course we are saving them for them. If they did not need saving, we wouldn’t save them.
With regards to the caption under your photo “Rare Emotions”, I believe that most of the issues you raise in that caption can also be dealt with in this reply.
We thank you for your time and effort Kristen, and these photos are stunning. But please, take into account the effort people put in to something before you decide you disapprove of it. A bit of research into our activities and you would have understood better, instead of insulting my families lifetime of work.
Sincerely,
Garrett Eriksen
kristen
March 31, 2010 at 6:29 pm
Dear Mr. Eriksen,
Wow that was a long and in-depth comment and while most people may take your side of the comment, most people aren’t vegan like I am. And if you know anything about Vegans and the fact that we believe in Animal Rights than you will understand my thoughts on this subject matter better. I believe that no animal should be ever locked behind bars, or in a cage, whether it is in a zoo or conservation facility. Please do not take the “wolf in sheep’s clothing” comment too personally as I believe most conservation societies are just that, not only yours. Humans like to play God, picking and choosing which species are worth “saving” and which are nothing more than objects to be shot, hacked to pieces, and thrown into the back of a truck to be food for the chosen special species “worth saving.” I believe all creatures are special, that no life, including human life, is more important than another, and therefore humans have no right to dictate who lives and who shall die, all death at our hands unless for absolute survival, or in a tragic accident, is murder.
All wild animals, and I would assume most humans, would choose freedom and the possibility of a shorter life, over life imprisonment; because let’s face it we all die someday, I personally would much rather live the short amount of time I have on this earth as free of a human being as possible, and thankfully I live in a country that allows me to do so. I’m sure given the choice, if the cheetahs could speak English (or Afrikaans) they would ask for their freedom.
I personally would rather see a species go extinct than live its entire life behind bars…aren’t we being a little selfish in making this decision for them?
Instead of spending all your money and resources on breeding the animals for captivity you should be spending it on buying land for them to remain free, away from conflict with farmers, you should be spending money on public awareness, solutions to keep humans and cheetahs living together as peacefully as possible, and passing government laws to protect them.
As for one more thing I haven’t addressed, I signed up as a volunteer with i-to-i…I was not informed of the status or your ranch nor was I given a name when I signed up…I assumed that your facility was more of a sanctuary, rescuing and rehabilitating cheetahs to go back into the wild, not breeding them for zoos. Had I known beforehand I would not have signed up to volunteer with your organization.
I can’t say that my time volunteering was a purely happy one, I cried probably most days working there, my heart aching for the animals…I almost cut the trip short and went home, but thankfully I was paired with amazing women who managed to make my stay a little more pleasant.