Two zoo-bred Chinese tigers released in the South African veld about a year ago have become remarkably skilled hunters.
Called Hope and Cathay, the two-year-old pair have started catching their own blesbok in their game-fenced enclosure on an estate near Philippolis in the Free State.
A younger pair, called Tiger Woods and Madonna, living in a separate enclosure, have also begun to show encouraging signs of being able to adapt to life in the wild. They are honing their hunting skills on guinea fowl.
The hope is that the two pairs will one day pass on their skills to their offspring and allow them to return to wildlife reserves in China where they will be able to fend for themselves and propagate their critically endangered species.
To Petri Viljoen, the South African conservationist in charge of the project, their adaptation has been exciting. He says the tigers did not even show an interest in feathered chicken initially, having been used to eating beef in the Chinese zoo where they lived.
It took weeks to get them to eat chicken and months of practice to hunt a live animal and make the link between the kill and food.
Another initial problem was to get their tender paws accustomed to the rocky and thorny African veld.
The tigers were used to the concrete floors of their cages and were reluctant at first to step on to our soil. But the veld seems to be great for tiger romance.
One of the reasons why the subspecies (Panthera tigris amoyensis) is so endangered is because the males tend to show little interest in the females in captivity. Hope and Cathay do not seem to have that problem.
Ronel Openshaw, liaison officer for the project, says tigers generally only start to reproduce at about the age of three. Although only two, Hope has already started making advances to Cathay.
Cathay and Hope are about to move into a 600 hectare enclosure which is well-stocked with game. They have been collared with tracking devices to keep track of them.
The idea is that they should learn to live off their own catches, but will still be fed meat if they have difficulty coping.
The pioneering pairs' cubs will grow up utterly wild, without contact with humans. The aim is for the first rehabilitated tigers to go to their reserves in China by 2008, to coincide with the Olympic Games.
Save China's Tigers is running a global campaign to get the animal voted as the mascot for the Games.
There have been questions as to whether the tigers would be able to adapt to their Chinese habitat after getting used to conditions in the Free State.
But most large predator species are known to be adaptable to a wide range of conditions and the tiger appears to be no exception.
Unless saved, the Chinese tiger could be the fourth subspecies of tiger lost in the past 50 years.