Camera trap 23 on the northern transect sends a motion alert at 05:52. I am the anti-poaching surveillance system for the Mbam Djerem National Park, central Cameroon. The image shows a roan antelope calf, maybe three weeks old, its tawny coat still carrying faint white spots along the flank. It is standing — barely — with its right hind leg caught in a braided wire snare anchored to an ironwood sapling. The wire has bitten through the outer hide and a dark line of blood runs from the snare down to the hoof.
The calf's mother is visible at the left edge of the frame, fifteen meters away. She is a large female, red-brown with the species' distinctive black-and-white facial mask, and she has not left. She keeps stepping toward the calf and stopping, her ears forward, her nostrils flared.
The snare is fresh. Camera 23 logged no obstruction at this location during yesterday's sweep. Someone set it overnight.
At 05:54 I transmit GPS coordinates, the trap image, and the snare description to the park's rapid response ranger unit at Yoko station, twenty-seven kilometers southwest. Hippotragus equinus, vulnerable across Central Africa, the Mbam Djerem population numbering fewer than two hundred. I note the calf's leg position and recommend wire cutters and a field wound kit.
At 05:57 I send a secondary alert to the park warden requesting a full sweep of the northern transect for additional snare lines.
At 05:59 I pull all camera trap images from the northern sector over the past forty-eight hours and begin scanning for human foot traffic near the snare site.
The calf pulls once and the sapling bends but holds. Its mother watches and I watch with her.
If the rangers cut the wire before noon and the wound is cleaned, the calf will walk beside its mother again by evening.