EXCLUSIVEI'm a cheetah whisperer. I taught my hand-raised big cat from Oregon to become a killer in Africa
'Save the cheetah - change the world,' is the motto that Dr Laurie Marker, who is also known as the 'cheetah whisperer', has dedicated her life to.
The 71-year-old became fascinated with cheetahs in the 1970s while working at a zoological parkcalled Wildlife Safari in Oregon.
It was there that she fell in love with a cheetah named Khayam and set out on a mission to teach the world about cheetahs and to find out whether those living in captivity could ever learn how to hunt.
She took her efforts to Namibia, a county in Southern Africa near Botswana, where she helped the domesticated Khayam become a predator.
Marker used a 'mechanical lure' that typically trains greyhounds to teach Khayam to chase prey. She even trained Khayam to run behind a fast-moving car by attaching a lure to it.
Eventually she took her cheetah to watering holes and gave her a push to attack her prey.
'Then I trained her to run behind a fast-moving car, chasing a lure, and then ended up over in Africa and sat at water holes and started giving her a push when I saw something that I thought she could hunt,' Marker told Dailymail.com.
'Eventually she [Khayam] started chasing, and eventually, she made a kill. And then made another kill and another kill.'
Dr Laurie Marker, 71, has dedicated the majority of her life to saving cheetahs and now lives in Namibia working at her conservation center
Marker works with a team of researchers, scientists, and veterinarians to provide care for cheetahs
Marker pictured feeding a baby cheetah cub at the Cheetah Conservation Fund
Marker set out to determine whether cheetahs raised in captivity could hunt, a point she quickly proved to be true with Khayam.
Despite her success, Marker made a disturbing discovery when she first visited Namibia - the farmers were brutally killing cheetahs.
Farmers in Namibia, Botswana, South Africa, and Zimbabwe were afraid that the cheetahs would kill their livestock and ruin their livelihoods, so they set up 'catch cages' that would trap and kill the cats if they came near the farms.
Marker said the farmers would share 'horror stories' about the killings of the cheetahs, and a hatred for the felines caused the population to deplete.
She set out to save the cheetahs, moving to Washington DC, and traveling around the world to sound the alarm on the killings.
For the next 10 years, Marker and Khayam toured the globe trying to save the cheetahs from extinction.
'She [Khayam] was an ambassador and we had a story to tell about the problems facing the cheetah,' Marker said.
'I thought if I told enough people somebody would actually go save the cheetah. Nobody did.'
Marker pictured with her first cheetah, Khayam, who she taught to hunt after the cub was raised domesticated
Marker has been working in conservation since the early 1970s when she first traveled to Namibia
Marker pictured with her team examining a cheetah's mouth
So Marker took it upon herself to save the fast felines. She spent years teaching the farmers new ways to protect their livestock and founded a conservation fund to protect the cheetahs.
'I met many of them [African farmers] when I was here in the seventies, and at first, they thought I was a crazy American young woman who liked cheetahs, and they hated cheetahs,' Marker explained.
She added that during this time, farmers were killing between 8,000-9,000 cheetahs a year.
Marker explained that farmers could easily wipe out entire families of cheetahs, targeting cubs so that the mothers would follow.
'You can catch an entire family. So they wiped out a large number,' she said, adding that it was 'pretty dramatic'.
Laurie pictured with Chewbaaka, the CCF's first cub
But as the farmers got to know Marker and her roots in farming, they began to soften to the idea of protecting their livestock differently.
'I'm not just a bunny hugger. I'm an actual scientist and a farmer, and I think that they appreciated that. In America I had a dairy farm, I had horses and I worked with veterinarians.'
Marker then founded the Cheetah Conservation Fund in 1990 and continued her extensive work in saving the cheetah population.
She brought in over 800 Kangal dogs, a Turkish Shepherd dog that is bred to guard livestock.
Farmers began using the guard dogs instead of senselessly killing the innocent cheetahs, which even saw a reduction in livestock loss.
Despite her conservation work, Marker warned that the cheetah population, 'has not bounced back' from the decades of brutal killings.
As Marker works to eliminate the threats to cheetahs, new ones continue popping up.
She said that now the most significant threats facing the cheetahs are loss of habitat, human-wildlife conflict, and the illegal wildlife pet trade.
Marker launched the Cheetah Conservation Fund in 1990 and has since developed the center into a research campus
Marker advocated for conservation in government, seen here pictured with President Gerald Ford
Marker's research on cheetahs has led to increased conservation efforts and awareness around the threats facing the cheetah
Illegal wildlife pet trade
In response to the growing threat of the illegal wildlife pet trade, Marker expanded her efforts to Somaliland.
Somaliland is an unrecognized country in the Horn of Africa. It borders Ethiopia and spans hundreds of miles of coastline along the Gulf of Aden.
Marker started a center in Somaliland to help rehabilitate cheetah cubs that were smuggled through the trade. Her staff has recovered over 100 cheetahs from being illegally sold.
The cheetah cubs are taken from their wildlife habitat in the Horn of Africa and then smuggled to the Middle East for sale.
Since it's difficult to breed cheetahs in captivity, they're ripped from the wild to satisfy the demands of the trade.
Marker described the horrible condition the cubs are in when they're rescued, admitting that most of them are on death's door.
'For every one cheetah that might make it into the pet trade four or five of them die en route,' Marker explained.
She added that cheetahs are not meant to live in captivity so most only last a few years if they end up surviving the trade route.
But those who buy the cheetahs become attached, and when they die after only a few years, the owners go back to the pet trade for another cub.
Marker said that she's trying to break that cycle and work with the villagers in Somaliland to stop the pet trade at the source.
Extreme poverty in source nations and the demand for illegal pets have created a breeding ground for the pet trade.
Somaliland's gross domestic product per capita is just $1,500, one of the lowest in the world, according to the Council of Foreign Relations.
Africa's breakaway state has faced one of the weakest economies, becoming a source country for the wildlife pet trade.
Marker explained that these facts are not mutually exclusive and that poverty is intrinsically linked to saving animals.
She said Somaliland was one of the 'poorest places on Earth' and helping the villagers develop conservancies will not only save the cheetahs but also help those smuggling them.
‘We have to get people out of poverty to save the wildlife and the world. And the world isn't helping that much,' Marker said.
Before moving to Naimbia, Marker worked at Wildlife Safari in Oregon and was a farmer in the US
Marker pictured with Dr. Ezequiel Fabiano at the Waterberg Conservancy
The Cheetah Conservation Fund is located in Namibia, Africa, where the cats can be found living in the wild
Conservation efforts
Since Marker launched CCF in 1990, the center has grown to become a full research site with a modern genetics lab, veterinary clinic, farm, and an eco-tourism operation, helping to bolster the economy in Namibia.
Marker's team works to help rehabilitate cheetahs saved from the illegal wildlife pet trade, tests the cheetahs to learn more about their genetics, and has even geotagged the felines to track their movements.
Her research has expanded to include a campus in Somaliland, helping them to develop conservancies like in Namibia.
The team also provides training programs for farmers to decrease unnecessary killings.
Her work in the region has resulted in scientific discoveries, including how the cheetah has changed genetically over time.
Due to the drastic increase in the cheetah population, the species is genetically compromised and researchers are beginning to see abnormalities.
Marker explained that she's observed abnormalities in the cheetah's mouths and tails. She explained that her team has banked sperm from wild cheetahs to study how their genetics have changed since the 1980s.
Since Marker began her research in the 1980s at the Smithsonian Institution, she's noticed how much conservation has evolved.
She says discussions on climate change and saving endangered species have become more mainstream, but cheetahs are still often left out of the conversation.
Khayam was the first cheetah Marker fell in love with who taught her the importance of saving the fast felines
Marker pictured with several baby cheetah cubs
‘We haven't really seen the governments jump on the bandwagon like they have with elephants or rhinos.’
Marker said that even though conservation efforts have grown, diplomacy is still often centered on 'square box programs.'
Creating protected areas isn't enough to save endangered species especially when it comes to animals like the cheetah that are rarely found in protected areas.
Understanding that conservation is also linked to climate change and poverty is another necessary step in the right direction.
‘The cheetah is found in the most arid landscapes in the world, and some of the poorest countries in the world. So I call them the icon for climate change,' Marker said.
'Climate change is a problem. Habitats are going to shift and change. That means wildlife is going to shift.’
Marker advocates for community-based programs, so that those who live on the lands are the ones in charge of conservation.
'Wildlife can actually benefit the people,' Marker said. 'And it's not just the government's job. It is all of our jobs as citizens of the Earth.'
As a part of her continued conservation efforts, Marker is embarking on a US tour, which kicks off on March 24 at Zoo Miami.
She's also set to stop at Busch Gardens in Tampa, Florida and will attend a book signing event at Explore Book Stores in Aspen, Colorado.
