This is the beginning of a lovely story, with a serious message!
I am sure you will agree that to see a living, breathing creature capable of 0-100 kph in just 3 seconds, is simply amazing. Their ability to sprint at such high speeds, wears them out and when cheetahs don’t have to hunt, they rest. Cheetahs are not predatory towards humans and this has made them vulnerable to human exploitation.
The Cheetah is both graceful and delicate. In ancient times when Cheetahs were abundant in numbers, they were kept as pets, used as a status symbol, taken to the battles, used for hunting as well as killed and used for their beautiful fur.
The cheetah has lived in association with humans since at least 3000 BCE. They have many unique features, but more about that next time!
For millions of years, the cheetahs roamed around the world, looking after their little cubs, hunting together or in solitude, wary of other predators and of humans…
We brought about much change in the world. We wanted to change the land for our own benefit and the animals had to fit around these changes. The speed with which these changes happened was unprecedented.
Right now, cheetahs are one of 10 animal species most close to extinction in our modern world.
In 1900s an estimated 100,000 cheetahs were found in habitats throughout continental Africa and from the Middle East and the Arabian Peninsula to India. Now, just over 7000 remain in the wild.
There has been a 90% loss of habitat, with wild cheetahs now mainly found in Africa, and this is where much of the conservation work now takes place to keep the cheetah species in existence.
On a positive note, Cheetah Conservation Fund, which is an international charity, has facilitated the repopulation efforts of the cheetahs into India. This has been in the making for the past 10 years, and recently, 8 cheetahs were transport from Namibia, to their new home in India!!
In August 2021, the Cheetah Cub Coalition was Born.
Who are we?? Well, first and foremost we are a group of people who have connected in Web3 space because we love animals. We may also be all slightly fond of NFTs and Art, games, crypto and anything blockchain related really.
We love all animals, as we discovered when some baby dragons were born to one of our community members and we were all glued to the photos of the growth progress and stories of how many flying insects were being consumed by the cute little lizards.
Our mission is to adopt all the cheetahs that are still left in the wild by creating a greater awareness of the vulnerability of the cheetah species.
Where and how do you even start with this mission?
Well, developing a super cute Art collection of cheetah cubs as an NFT was our first move. The idea and the utility of the project is to offer support to various animal charities. Those who mint, will get a unique NFT, generated from the collection of 7100, and part of the mint cost will be donated.
Our female artist has created the main generative collection of the Cheetah Cubs, as well as a supplementary collection for the benefit of the cub holders.
Born Free Foundation were the charity Cheetah Cub Coalition partnered with from the start. We went on to support Born Free for the next 12 months with donations of over $23,000 benefitting the charity.
We have made links with some amazing groups and individuals, also on a mission to make a positive Impact in support of good causes.
The Cheetah Cub Coalition has a relaxed community with the base on Discord, where all are welcome to pop in and socialise / engage in the ways people find comfortable. Most weeks we run an educational session, to help us learn more about the conservation of the cheetah species, and the work that is carried out by various animal charities. We also discuss other issues which negatively impact on the cheetah population, such as climate change, loss of habitat, trophy hunting and illegal pet trade. Many of these issues are very complex and linked to political and economic struggles around the world.
But, this is what motivates us – we believe that even small efforts and changes can benefit the animals. By exploring ways in which we can help with the valuable work of conservation agencies, parks, sanctuaries and charities, and utilising our Art, social platforms, community spirit and Web3 technology, we can and we will continue to make a positive Impact where it really counts.
We have many more cheetah cubs in our Art collection to mint, and each cub minted will release funds for the invaluable conservation work.
Anyone who would like to help the cause progress, can mint a cheetah cub now. Our website and the mint link can be found at www.cheetahcubcoalition.com You can follow us on Twitter https://twitter.com/CheetahCubNFT
If you are interested in joining our project, there are additional perks once you mint a cheetah cub NFT, you will get an NFT from our separate collection called The Wild Ones (more about this collection in our next chapter).
So now that you know about the conception of the Cheetah Cub Coalition, join us in the next publication for the next chapter. We will look at how the cubs have navigated through some very interesting parts of the NFT space and tell you some more of our story on the mission to save the cheetahs!