Intaka Island, Century City’s 16-hectare wetlands and conservation area, had a new visitor recently.
The island is home to 177 species of indigenous fynbos plants and 120 bird species. However, what you don’t expect when birding, is seeing a caracal. This beautiful and shy cat has been spotted in a few places across the island over the last few months.
Intaka Island started life as a degraded wetlands area known as Sewe Pannetjies. Before the development of Century City started in 1997, an environmental impact assessment had been commissioned resulting in a 16 ha portion of the 250 ha site being retained as a wetlands nature reserve which became known as Intaka Island.
Half of the site was kept as seasonal or ephemeral pans and the other 8 ha was transformed into a man-made wetland that acts as a natural purification system for the water in Century City’s 8 km of canals.
The caracal or “rooikat” is a medium-sized rufous-fawn cat with distinctive tufted black ears, creamy underbelly with faded orange spots, and long legs. Its face has exquisite markings, and it has light green to light orange eyes.
“It is incredibly special to see a caracal on Intaka Island,” says Louise de Roubaix, environmental and horticulture manager at Century City Property Owners’ Association.
“As Intaka Island is a conservation area, it is vital that we retain and protect the animals in their natural environment as much as possible, which means limiting disturbance, direct contact, or feeding,” De Roubaix says.
“Let’s respect and admire our wild animals from a distance,” De Roubaix says.
