Page 19 – Africa Geographic

The Power of Unity – Cheetah coalition in Maasai Mara

The five striking and powerful cheetah males sit motionless, shoulder to shoulder, staring at grazing antelopes on a sun-drenched grassland in the Maasai Mara National Reserve. Suddenly, their attention is drawn to another cheetah, sitting at a distance in the shade of a bush. Driven by instinct, all five set out at speed to investigate the intruder, intent on discovering which cheetah has wandered into their territory and confident in their own size and strength. The female, seeing the huge males approaching, dashes for the slim protection offered by a nearby thicket, followed by her tiny cub. It is Nora with her 2-month old daughter, and she has suddenly found herself facing five male cheetahs: the largest known male coalition in the Maasai Mara.

An extraordinary coalition

This coalition of five male cheetahs has been named the Tano Bora coalition, meaning ‘The Magnificent Five’ in the local Maa language of the region. Each male has also been given a local name: Olpadan (‘Great Shooter’ in Maa), Olarishani (‘Judge’ in Maa), Leboo (‘The one who is always within a group’ in Maa), Winda (‘Hunter’ in Kiswahili), and Olonoyok (‘The one who puts efforts to achieve better results’ in Maa). Since they arrived in the Maasai Mara, the five have proved to be an extraordinary force to be reckoned with and turned people’s understanding of cheetah behaviour on its head. So how did such a coalition come to be?

A female cheetah typically leaves her cubs when they are around 20 months old, and siblings will stay together in a group for several months. Once they reach sexual maturity, female and male siblings separate. Cheetah males can either become solitary (if there was the only male in the litter) or form coalitions – lifelong unions, formed by the males-littermates, which in some cases, may accept unrelated males into the fold, or even temporary groups of unrelated individuals.

Cheetah litters may be large, but the mortalities rates for cubs are extremely high

The group of five young males came into the Maasai Mara National Reserve from the adjacent Naboisho conservancy at the end of 2016. Based on what we observed at the time, we believe that the coalition is made up of three separate parts, as two of the males were initially larger, and the three others were smaller and, therefore, most likely slightly younger. We do know that one of the smallest males at the time – Olpadan – split from his sister in November 2016 before joining four other males in December 2016. (His sister, Siligi also gained notoriety in 2019, when she emerged with 7 cubs, the largest littler recorded in the Maasai Mara.) Within a few months, Olpadan grew and established himself as the dominant male of the coalition.

Life in a group provides several benefits to its members: males can hold a “better” territory with more access to favourable habitat and prey; they can take down larger prey; they care for each other by sharing responsibilities in terms of vigilance and territorial patrols, and numbers provide better defence against rival males and kleptoparasites. The Tano Bora males are no exception to this rule and cooperate in everything, apart from breeding.

Breeding rights

The described encounter with the five males was not Nora’s first. Four of the males encountered her in December 2017, and Olarishani used his chance to mate with her while other members were off hunting. When the other three noticed the courting couple, they immediately rushed back and, not to be outdone, started mounting the pair. When in February 2019 the coalition again encountered Nora, she was with her single cub. Interestingly, although the males attacked Nora, they did not touch her cub, who fearlessly defended herself from approaching males by howling loudly, hissing, and growling at them. After investigating Nora’s reproductive status, all males lost interest and left her and the cub in peace. The same situation played out with another female – Rani. In March 2018, Olpadan mated with her, while two other males made attempts to mount. When the coalition next encountered Rani in June 2019, she was with a 4-month-old single cub. Again, the males were only interested in Rani and did not attack the cub. In August 2018, Olonyok mated with Nashipai, and 11 months later, all five males came across Nashipai with her two 2.5-months old cubs. Of all five males, Olonyok was the most persistent and interested in the female. He did not give up and returned to the female twice even after all the other males had left the spot.

The most likely explanation is that, along with the successful mating with one male, the attempts of the other coalition members to mount the female (but in fact mounting other males) helped to prevent an attack on the cub. Each of the males could have thought they had sired the cub. On the one hand, by mating with multiple males, females gain benefits including confusing paternity and thus avoiding infanticide, or else increasing the genetic diversity of offspring within a litter. On the other hand, competition among males for a female in oestrus reduces chances for all of the members of a male coalition to mate. Sometimes, only one dominates and gets the opportunity to mate successfully, which can be particularly problematic for unrelated males in a coalition. To mitigate this, the Tano Bora males implement useful tactics – one male separates from a group for a day or two, following and mating with a female and then re-joins his coalition-mates. Each member of the Tano Bora coalition has been observed mating with different females.

Who’s in charge?

Social animal groupings typically have a hierarchy with a linear or near-linear ranking and with expressed leadership of one of the members. In well-maintained cheetah coalitions, members share responsibilities, the level of affiliative behaviours between members is high, and aggression is low. However, in cases where the group consists of unrelated members, cheetah males face hierarchical instability. Olpadan became the leader of the coalition soon after he had joined the other four males. He would initiate hunts and lead the group across large distances, often walking for hours at a time. He was also the most successful hunter. By mid-2017, another big male – Olarishani – became co-leader, and both males began taking turns to decide when and which direction to move, where to cross rivers and how to approach a hunt. Interestingly, Olarishani also played the role of peacemaker during intragroup fights. The unfortunate Olonyok was often the target of Olpadan’s reverse aggression (aggression seen in a situation where, for example, groups of tourists disturb the cheetahs) and often these fights would escalate to involve all males. Under these circumstances, Olarishani would always step in to protect Olonyok.

Indications of leadership can be subtle, such as choosing the direction that the group moves in

In most cases, the dominance hierarchy is relatively stable, and members usually step aside when confronted by the leader. However, suppose the leader is weakened by injury, disease, or senility. In that case, the shift in ranking may occur, and the individual with the highest rank will move down to the lowest position. During intraspecific fights, cheetah males target anogenital area of rivals, and there have even been cases where males have bitten and cut off the testicles of intruders. That is what happened to Olpadan. His dominant status began to waver around the beginning of 2019, when two members of the coalition, Winda and Leboo, began to attack him regularly. In two cases, the fight happened during the courtship with different females. One fight in mid-March 2019 resulted in a serious injury to one of Olpadan’s testicles.

A fall from grace for Olpadan

After the necessary veterinary intervention and orchiectomy surgery, Olpadan lost his leadership position entirely, and Olarishani and Winda stepped forward to become the dominant members of the coalition. From being the most dominant, Olpadan became the lowest-ranking male in the group, the last in all joint activities from moving to feeding and was often the target of aggression when the coalition fed on smaller prey. Interestingly, Olonyok, whom Olpadan had targeted, became the one who tolerated Olpadan feeding next to him and who engaged with the ex-leader in mutual grooming after eating.

Cheetah social life is complex – unrelated males form alliances and maintain bonds for as long as it benefits all members of a group. Under certain circumstances, one of the members may start looking for an alternative group to join. In mid-February 2019, Olpadan tried to join another coalition, after the Tano Bora males chased two young males: Mkali and Mwanga, who had strayed into their territory. The ensuing pursuit saw the two intruders fleeing into a thicket, closely followed by the intimidating five. For some time, all seven disappeared deep inside bushes on the bank of a river, making sounds indicative of aggressive and defensive behaviours. After a few hours, four of the Tano Bora males departed, leaving Mkali, Mwanga and Olpadan. Instead of looking for his coalition-mates, Olpadan started following two males trying to sniff them and rest nearby, without making any attempt to harm them. When the two males responded with defensive behaviours, Olpadan would respond by displaying submissive behaviour – just sitting with his back to them.

By the next morning, Olpadan had abandoned his efforts and was desperately looking and calling for his own coalition-mates. When in the afternoon three males (Leboo, Winda and Olonyok) appeared in the area, Olpadan did not attempt to approach them, and over an hour later, they slowly approached the insecure Olpadan. While in the past, Olpadan had met returning males with aggression, this time, three males accepted him peacefully, and all set off to hunt together.

Cooperative Hunting and Cofeeding

Large groups of predators require more food, and each member must contribute to the hunt. It took five males over a year and a half to learn the necessary strategies for cooperative hunting. Initially, all members would chase different animals in a herd but, with time, developed an effective style of hunting where four would expose themselves to grazing antelopes, and the fifth would slowly stalk the prey. Group hunting by male coalition cheetahs has typically been associated with enhancing confidence among members. This we observed during the long rainy season of 2019-2020 when one male would confidently chase and tackle a bigger prey thrice its weight such as topi or even wildebeest (six times the weight of a cheetah!) Others will join the hunter when the prey is captured. Single cheetahs hardly ever hunt such big prey, unless they have recently lost coalition-mates.

When taking down large antelope, all five divide duties and act quickly and efficiently to feed as much as possible before the arrival of kleptoparasites. Cheetahs often lose their prey to larger predators – sometimes to lions and, more regularly, to hyenas. However, the Tano Bora males stand out in their relationship with other predators as well. On several occasions, they have chosen not to argue with a hyena but rather to share their kill with it instead! In both recent cases, cheetahs had made large kills (an adult topi and a wildebeest), and in both instances, Olpadan refused to feed alongside the hyena. In the first instance, all the other males were fed on the carcass from the opposite end to the hyena, while Olpadan watched from a distance. In the second instance, Olarishani and later Olonyok fed fearlessly next to a hyena while the three other males waited to the side.

Choosing to feed next to a competing predator is relatively unusual

A coalition like no other

The Tano Bora coalition is 4 years old, and it is developing through time – the relations between individuals (who are now around 5,5 years old) are undergoing dynamic changes that we never tire of watching. Nature is fraught with a variety of mysterious and amazing things, and in observing her creatures, patiently and with respect, she reveals her secrets.

About the authors

Dr Chelysheva is a renowned cheetah expert, with over 30 years experience of working with cheetahs in captivity and the wild. She is a PhD holder in cheetah ecology and behaviour and a member of the IUCN Conservation Planning Specialist Group. In 2001, Elena developed a cheetah identification method which helps to identify individuals from a month old. Using this method, she was able to determine kinship between individuals over the years and is now monitoring the fifth generation of some cheetahs. In 2011, Elena started cheetah research and conservation study in Kenya as a founder of the Mara-Meru Cheetah Project and here she shares her amazing discoveries.

Jeffrey Wu is a Canadian professional wildlife photographer based in Toronto, Canada. He is a judge of the Nikon Photo Contest and Nature’s Best Photography Africa and is also a Nikon China contracted photographer. He leads professional photo tours in Africa for ten months every year, mainly in the Masai Mara in Kenya. He is an expert on photographing cheetah hunting; he has photographed more than 300 cheetah hunting scenarios since 2013. His works have been published more than 50 magazines and newspapers internationally, including the Times, Outdoor Photography Canada, and Chinese National Geography.

POACHERS – the people behind the statistics – a reality check

Quotes from poachers:

“I just wanted to send my first-born child to school so that he could get an education and be different from me. I wanted him to have the opportunity which I was denied as a child.”

“What attracted me most is that they were living a good life, they had nice houses, and they could afford anything they wanted, whenever they wanted it. I wished for that. One day I went to the tavern with a person who poaches rhinos. We met some other people there. The way they were behaving made me look like I am not man enough because I couldn’t afford what they could. I was turned into a laughingstock in my community.”

“But you know, if I were working, I would not have gone and done this. It’s just sometimes when you are in [a] tough situation; you resort to desperate measures.”

Who are the poachers feeding the illegal wildlife trade and what motivates them? These are fundamental questions that should shape the policies surrounding the fight against illegal wildlife trade but are often dismissed or overlooked. Calling for increased security measures and harsher sentences is the inevitable rallying cry but understanding what motivates a person to enter the world of wildlife crime is equally vital. Now a new report by TRAFFIC investigates the driving factors of poaching activities and how policymakers might go about addressing them, introducing a more nuanced perspective of the first step in the trade in animal parts.

The report indicates that over the past ten years in South Africa alone poachers have taken over 8,000 rhinoceros for their horns, illegally harvested 96 million abalone between 2000 and 2016, and that the illegal trade in cycads is considered the main threat to their survival in the wild. TRAFFIC’s investigation focussed on incarcerated individuals convicted of crimes in the illegal wildlife trade (mostly poaching) in South Africa, a country considered to be key in the illicit trade in wildlife due to the role it plays as a source, transit and destination country. Of the 73 interviewed individuals, 54 were serving sentences for rhino-related offences, 10 for abalone related crimes and 9 for roles in the illegal cycad trade. Of those poachers interviewed:

97% were male
48% were South African (the remainder were Mozambican, Zimbabwean and Chinese)
5% were aged between 29 and 35
83% did not have secondary education
38% were unemployed, and 36% had informal employment
54% were influenced by peer pressure
78% had at least one dependent
66% had sufficient income to cover only the day-to-day basics of food, water, and shelter

The report goes on to identify several factors that emerged as a common thread during the interviews with poachers.

Income generation: Every single person interviewed pointed to income generation as a major influence in persuading them to participate in the illegal wildlife trade. For 70% of interviewees, this pressure related to providing for their families, in terms of either the basics such as food and schooling or more expensive hobbies or interests. Worryingly, the authors of the report note a trend to view “successful” individuals in communities as those who have accumulated wealth through involvement in poaching activities.
Opportunism: 80% of the offenders point to opportunity was a factor, usually through meeting another person actively involved in illegal wildlife trade.
Skewed perception of risk: While most of the interviewees were aware of the illegality of their actions, less than half of the interviewed individuals were aware of the seriousness or severity of the legal consequences, especially given that many members of the community were observed to be participating without consequences.
Normalisation (contested illegality): 75% of the offenders suggested that using natural resources was a normal and acceptable way to earn a living – as legitimate as fishing or harvesting plants. There were no social deterrents at play and no concerns related to retaliation or ostracisation from their communities, or even a risk of being reported by those community members.
High value of and demand for the commodity: Nearly 70% of the offenders referred to the high values of, and demand for, wildlife commodities and the fact that illegal wildlife trade was far more lucrative than other legitimate ways of earning money.
Lack of viable economic alternatives: 65% of the offenders pointed to a lack of alternative ways to improve their financial and social circumstances. Most of the interviewees from Mozambique and Zimbabwe came to South Africa to search for employment opportunities, but the official unemployment rate in South Africa is 29.1%. This is predicted to increase due to the economic fall-out from the pandemic.
Peer pressure: 44% of the interviewees indicated that they were influenced by peer pressure, almost invariably by family or close friends.
Lack of state legitimacy: 40% of the offenders made some reference to dissatisfaction with legal authorities, whether related to a lack of basic service delivery, lack of sufficient job opportunities, wasteful expenditure, or corruption. There was particular frustration with corruption linked to the illegal wildlife supply chain.
Omission: This category relates largely to those offenders that played a role in the supply chain, rather than active poaching. These interviewees perceive their activities to be distanced from the illegal wildlife trade.
Provision of employment for others: A small proportion of interviewees employed individuals involved in illegal wildlife trade and claimed that they were responsible for putting food on the table for their “employees’” families.

These factors can be roughly divided into societal, community, and individual motivating factors. Naturally, any individual could be influenced by any combination of particular factors. Therefore, the TRAFFIC report suggests that a combination of collective strategies would be needed to increase compliance and prevent engagement in the trade.

Recommendations

The authors of the TRAFFIC report put forward several recommendations based on the outcomes of the interviews with poachers and the larger socio-economic context in South Africa.

The first is that concerted effort should be placed on investigating, arresting and prosecuting individuals that occupy the higher levels of illegal wildlife trade, rather than simply arresting and prosecuting poachers and drivers. The aspects and strategies outlined by the National Integrated Strategy to Combat Wildlife Trafficking need to be approved and implemented by the South African government as a matter of urgency.

The second recommendation is that the provision of public services such as health care, quality education, employment opportunity, food security and infrastructure are provided to those communities most at risk of being exploited by criminal wildlife trade syndicates.

The third recommendation involves local community-based interventions and initiatives (such as the Black Mambas Anti-Poaching Unit), which may include increasing incentives for wildlife stewardship; supporting livelihoods unrelated to wildlife; decreasing the costs associated with human-wildlife conflict; increase the costs of participating in the illegal; or education and awareness-raising.

The final recommendation is for the development of social intervention strategies that emphasise personal and familial consequences (rather than legal ones) and equip individuals with knowledge and tools necessary to resist peer pressure. This could potentially involve the sharing of previously unreported personal consequences experienced by offenders.

Conclusion

While active measures to safeguard South Africa’s precious wildlife resources are essential, the incarceration of ground-level participants such as poachers will have little impact if societal factors continue to motivate their replacements. Addressing some of the economic and social drivers is a significant aspect of the battle against illicit wildlife trade, and this is only possible with a holistic understanding of these drivers. As such, TRAFFIC’s report has wide-reaching ramifications that extend beyond its South African context into the wider world of illegal wildlife trade.

The full report can be accessed here: “The People Beyond the Poaching: Interviews with Convicted Offenders in South Africa”, TRAFFIC (2020)

Ignorant complicity amongst some safari guides

At 20 years old and new to the guiding fraternity, I followed the lead of more experienced safari guides, quickly adopting the conduct status quo of the time. For years there was an attitude of “almost anything goes” when it came to finding and getting close to as many of the Big 5 as possible on every drive. Little to no consideration was given to consequences of this attitude of impulsively taking from nature, as and when the opportunity or desire arose. And no one asked questions…

At the time (28 years ago), as safari guides, our knowledge and communication skills were of primary concern and not once, at any of the numerous camps I worked at, was ecologically sensitive conduct a topic for discussion amongst guides (bar extraordinarily callous extremes). We did what was expected to get our job done. From suspending my Land Rover on shrub mopane trees in an attempt to access a pride of lions to the constant hounding of a female leopard just to witness her hunt an impala, this was all in a day’s work. Indignation, outrage, and disgust are all eagerly employed when condemning “others” from a self-proclaimed moral high ground. Yet, it was a far less comfortable retrospective awareness that forced my ignominious personal admission of ignorant complicity.

The gradual awakening from my ignorance was born of guiding burnout which led to a hiatus. For 12 months, I exchanged my Land Rover for a tractor and launched myself into “habitat management” on the reserve. This comprised of road relocation to combat accelerated erosion, alien-plant control, the creation of firebreaks, and encroachment control on artificial clearings.

Observing how the scars from indiscriminate off-road driving at a leopard sighting, months earlier, had eventually deteriorated into accelerated erosion and deep dongas made me think twice about the impact of vehicle traffic on various soils. Simultaneously, my new-found mindfulness prompted an awareness of the subtle (and occasionally not-so-subtle) body language cues of the animals being viewed or pursued by vehicles on a game drive. From the slight flattening of the ears towards a perceived threat (such as a vehicle following too closely) to the flicking of a tail or stern stare when annoyed at the unnecessary close proximity of a vehicle – these indications of unease became increasingly apparent until, eventually, I was unable to unsee or ignore them.

Though I did return to lodge guiding, these revelations had an indelible impact on my convictions and would eventually lead to a parting of ways with the private lodge industry. The following are examples of some of the experiences at camps, ranging from rustic bush camps to 5-star lodges, that prompted my somewhat abrupt departure.

During my induction drive with a head-guide at a new camp, a large elephant bull came into view. It was clear from his body language that he was entirely relaxed and could not have cared less about our presence. Slowly, we made our approach until we reached the point that I felt was the perfect spot to stop. But we didn’t – onwards we continued, ever closer. I was shocked as my legs involuntarily kicked against the floor in an attempt to stop the vehicle. I felt deeply uncomfortable with our imposition on the bull’s personal space. The realisation that many guests had previously suffered similarly under my own “guidance” left me embarrassed and disappointed…why had it taken so long for me to become sensitised to the consequences of my actions?

Eventually, we stopped a mere 15m from the bull, who was still feeding placidly. I started questioning my violent reaction to the proximity, given that the elephant was not bothered by it. What has changed within, I wondered, to render previously acceptable conduct suddenly so upsetting? An evolution was afoot, and it was becoming more about my relationship with my surroundings than just outright impact.

During that same drive, someone found a female cheetah with three sub-adult cubs. They were walking across a clearing only 15m from the road. Sticking to the road on the edge of the clearing would have given them the requisite space and avoided unnecessary off-road impact. Instead, the three vehicles went off-road onto the clearing, following so closely behind the cheetahs that they were walking with their ears turned back towards us. The herd of impala they were stalking way up ahead noticed the line of vehicles driving slowly and paid closer attention, saw the cheetahs, and darted off…

The next incident took place with another guide when we encountered three rhinos only 20m from us on a shrubby open area. As the guide saw the rhinos, he immediately turned the steering wheel without slowing down and veered straight towards them off-road. The crashing and twanging of whipping twigs on the suspension sent the cow and two calves scrambling… “Tsk…these rhinos are very skittish today,” is all the guide uttered before returning to the road and continuing.

Another incident occurred on a concession inside Kruger Park, where off-road driving is forbidden, and sensitive soils are prevalent. On a guide training drive during the rainy season, we noticed the stunning yellow flower of a mouse-whisker plant (Cleome angustifolia) about 5m off the road. The deputy-head guide stopped the vehicle, reversed, turned, and drove the 5m off-road on soggy soils to park next to the blossom. No one, not even the head guide sitting next to me on the rear seat, said anything. Disbelief and anger started welling up inside me like a brewing volcano. Then he leant over and plucked the flower, laid it on his camera bag next to him, snapped a photo, picked it up, said “wow, this is really stunning”, before chucking it overboard and driving off.

Recounting these details is not so much a criticism of the conduct of other guides as it is an indictment of my very own behaviour until then. I too, for many years, was asleep at the wheel. There are also untold accounts of disrespectful guests asking/demanding to get closer for that perfect picture or sensationalist experience. This induced pressure, especially on younger guides, is unjust and can manipulate their still pliable resolve.

However, we should never outsource accountability when it comes to ethical conduct, and it is incumbent on every person to take a respectful stand. In many lodges now, there is a strong ethos of ethical behaviour and ecological sensitivity, with guides responsible for holding themselves and each other to high standards. Pragmatically, mistakes happen, and lines of acceptable behaviour can be blurred. Still, open conversations are the only way to redefine what is appropriate and prompt an evolution in the approach taken by guides and guests.

If necessary, guests need to be able to speak up when they are uncomfortable with a situation and would prefer to adopt a more sensitive approach or leave the sighting altogether. Guides, in turn, need to be comfortable enough to declare that there is a line they are not willing to cross due to ethical considerations, where respect for wildlife is paramount to sustainable guiding as well as conservation as a whole. Guest experience and ethical guiding are not mutually exclusive, but finding the balance is everyone’s responsibility, and this cannot be done under a cloud of ignorant complicity.

Marius Swart

About Marius Swart

A passionate naturalist and consummate enthusiast, Marius has been sharing his wonder through guided adventures, since 1992. Spending the first decade working in the private lodge industry in the Timbavati and Sabi Sands (among others) provided a solid foundation which prompted personal growth, awakening and evolution. With a penchant for the visceral experiences afforded by on-foot explorations, he truly believes that being out in the wilds allows us to see rather than look, hear rather than listen and feel rather than think.

“If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you…you are surely lost” – Robert Wagoner.

“Please join me on a journey of discovery, not only of Nature’s treasure-chest…but of yourself!” – Marius Swart

Bee wise

On the south-western tip of Africa, a bee-conservation group has spent the last seven years discovering the wisdom of our wild honeybees.

I make it to Simon’s Town to meet Ujubee’s Jenny Cullinan and Karin Sternberg just before the Covid-19 lockdown is enforced in South Africa. The national parks are already closed and the wildlife in Cape Point, Ujubee’s primary research area, has the place all to itself and is probably giving a big sigh of relief.

As bottles of sanitiser fly off the shelves faster than they can be reordered and customers are sanitising hands as they enter and leave shops, the Ujubee pair tells me that wild honeybees have a similar cleanliness procedure which ensures the health of the colony. I have never thought of bees as having a similar lifestyle or behaviour pattern to human beings, but I am soon to learn otherwise. These small social creatures have been around for about 80 million years and apparently have quite a lot to teach us.

Jenny explains that because wild honeybees live in such close proximity to each other, hygiene is of utmost importance as viruses and bacteria are their biggest threat. “The foraging bees that exit the nest to engage with the outside world disinfect themselves regularly,” she says. The key is in the propolis, the dark resinous substance that often acts as an enclosing entrance wall in a wild honeybee nest. “The bees maintain the essential oils in the propolis, continually bringing back resins to add to it.” These antibacterial and antifungal essential oils are applied whenever they leave the nest or on their return when they can be seen wiping themselves down.

Bees pollinate about 85% of fynbos, playing an important role in the Cape’s floral kingdom, one of the most diverse and richest floral kingdoms in the world. A colourful sour fig (vygie) flower provides a shower of pollen for this wild Cape honeybee.

bee — Jenny sitting in the fynbos at Cape Point observing the small creatures around her that form part of this incredible ecosystem.

The wild Cape honeybee, Apis mellifera capensis, immediately has my attention. And as the dogs curl up in their baskets and the first of the winter rains shower down peacefully outside, I listen to Jenny and Karin’s fascinating story. Before they teamed up in 2013 and went for their first walk in SanParks’ Cape Point Nature Reserve, there was little information about wild honeybees. Although there was a lot of material about apiarists’ box-hives, the information about bees in the wild was virtually non-existent. When Karin did some research, the only information she could find was from a scientist by the name of Anderson done in the 1980s when Cape Point was being proclaimed as a sanctuary. “He maintained that there were very few colonies in Cape Point. He thought that there was possibly a maximum of five colonies of wild honeybees,” she tells me. “Seven years down the road we have found 94 nests, about 83 occupied. Back then, we had to start from scratch.”

While discovering the world of the wild honeybee, the Ujubee team has learnt about many other creatures that are at home on the Cape peninsula.

At the time Jenny, who had moved to Cape Town from Kwazulu-Natal, was eager to meet up with the Cape wild honeybee, a different subspecies to the wild honeybee, Apis mellifera scutellata, that she was accustomed to further north in the summer rainfall areas. She had grown up on a farm, respecting the wild bee colonies that had made their home in the shed, in an old drum outside and under the bath. “I remember the honey-waxy smell when I bathed,” she says, reminiscing about the comforting fragrance that is happily intertwined with her childhood memories. Her father kept several beehives, and when Jenny arrived in the Cape and started to learn about wild honeybees, she soon realised that she had to quickly discard all that she had learned as a beekeeper. She discovered that honeybees live a completely different life in the wild than when managed in hives. The team started to collect data from hours of observation in the field, learning to record it scientifically with the assistance of entomologist Geoff Tribe. Their findings would intrigue conservationists worldwide. And, as South Africa, thankfully, still has a healthy wild honeybee population, Ujubee (Uju meaning ‘honey’ in Zulu) focuses on collaborating with and giving presentations to conservation bodies around South Africa, increasing the resource of knowledge about our wild honeybees, an important part of our indigenous wildlife.

A male carpenter bee (*Xylocopa capitata*), which as its name suggests, lives in tunnels it excavates in dead wood.

Karin and Jenny, under the umbrella of the self-funded Ujubee project, have been absorbed for the last seven years locating the wild honeybee nests that are found in hollows, crevices and under boulders in the reserve and learning about the resident colonies, as well as the many solitary bees that reside in the area. Not using any protective gear, they get up close and personal with the bees, so it’s vital to tune into the bees’ world and to learn how they communicate and live. Several years ago when I first heard them give a talk about how the wild honeybee colonies survive the fires that sweep through Cape Point, I was amazed at the photos of them lying on the ground right next to a nest, a far cry from the heavy protective gear I had always associated with working with bees in boxes.

bee — Karin among a bevy of beautiful watsonia blooms that emerged after a fire.

“Because we’re unprotected in front of the bees, and we’re up close, the senses are heightened in the presence of a colony. You smell everything more intensely, you look more intensely at the behaviour, you listen so intensely,” Karin explains, transporting me to the place of their fieldwork on the often-windy Cape peninsula. Jenny adds, “Their language is so different to ours; it’s in vibrations, and it’s in chemicals, and it’s in dances – that’s how they communicate. We have to translate the bee language through ourselves into the human language – so humans can understand the bee world.”

Karin and Jenny have discovered on their journey of becoming wild-honeybee behaviour specialists that the bees co-exist harmoniously with other species. “By watching honeybees, it has opened the world to everything else around the colony,” Karin says. “Because you become a part of their world, you also look at how other species are interacting with the bees.”

A nest of wild honeybees (Apis mellifera capensis) under a boulder on the ground.

Karin in the Rooiberg, Klein Karoo, one of the Ujubee research sites.

They explain that although people think of bees as pollinators, they’re actually an essential part of the food web. What’s really interesting is that beekeepers always try and get rid of ants, wax moths and larvae, hive beetles etc., but in nature, they co-exist because they each have a function in the nest.

For example, I learn that the tiny pseudoscorpions – with their hairy pincers that enable them to pick up vibrations – sit on flowers and wait for the bees, catching rides on their legs to the different nests. There the bees feed the extraneous wax-moth eggs to them, thus managing the number of eggs that are allowed to hatch in the nest. The bees even ensure this happens in an organised manner by bringing the eggs out onto a feeding station and dropping them there for them to eat. The wax moths’ role in the nest is to eat the wax when it is damaged and old, cleaning out the nest so the bees can rebuild it, so each species benefits the other. The wax moth larvae eat the leaf litter, which collects under the colony, doing their bit to help maintain the environment and hygiene of the colony. Lizards play their part by eating the dead bees that are deposited outside the nest. All the various species survive the fires that routinely rage through the peninsula because they live with the bees.

Leafcutter solitary bees (*Family Megachilidae*) often nest in wood, lining their nests with small pieces of leaves.

The Ujubee women tell me how they are absorbed by this small, multi-layered and complexed world and the many interactions between the species. Jenny laughs, “When we come home, we watch ‘bee’ movies, quietly focusing on what’s going on between the species. They all need each other, and they all realise that – and function well together. And that’s something that our species needs to understand, that there’s strength in diversity.”

Unlike some countries in Europe, South Africa still has a healthy population of wild honeybees.

The discoveries that Ujubee has uncovered in their studies are mesmerising. The project has extended its range over the last few years, with research also being done in Scarborough, Noordhoek, on organic farms in the Klein Karoo, the area around Porterville (which has very few wild colonies left) and it is moving further afield into Limpopo to use the information it has gleaned over the years to aid conservation efforts. Their helpful team of Ujubee volunteers in the different areas provides valuable assistance with data collection and understanding bees in different biomes.

The humidity and climate inside the wild honeybee nest are maintained at a healthy constant by the bees.

Ujubee realises that an important part of their work is raising awareness about the wild honeybee and making the knowledge available for conservation purposes. The presentations they offer are intriguing, with their excellent photographs and the incredible footage of bee dynamics, as is the information about the synergy in the wild honeybee colonies – and dare I say – the intelligence of the bees.

Wild honeybees seem to be one up from us on quite a few other things as well. Karin and Jenny explain how they are always in sync with the natural environment, regulating the number of eggs they lay according to the plants that are flowering at that time. “They take all things into consideration before a new colony is created. This includes all the other pollinators – butterflies, bees, birds, rodents, moths – the food availability and the nest site availability. The solitary bees, like the honeybees, invest in the home they make for their young. They are future thinkers – they invest in their children.”

A tailless black girdled lizard investigates Ujubee’s gear as the Ujubee team becomes familiar with the lizards around the wild honeybee nests.

When I hear about life in the wild honeybee colony, I can’t help thinking that If these small creatures are aware of all this, can you imagine what we human beings can accomplish.

New comb under construction in a wild Cape honeybee nest.

Jenny sums up her years of experience with these small creatures that have changed her life immensely. “The wisdom that they have about living on this planet has profoundly influenced who I am and how I move around. It has changed an enormous number of things in my life, and I’m truly grateful to be around a species that’s much older than us and which understands what it means to live in the community of life. An evolved species that lives healthily on Earth, it has learnt to fit in with everyone else. And doesn’t damage or destroy. It has taken millions and millions of years of refinement to understand that you don’t live on this planet by taking too much or by taking more than what you need.”

Pseudoscorpions are one of the species that harmoniously co-exist with the wild honeybees.

Karin and Jenny at a wild honeybee nest in the tangled roots of a Namaqua fig growing on the cliffs along the Berg River.

Although I could stay and listen to them talk about the bees for hours, the light is dimming outside, the dog is asking for its supper, and there are arrangements to be made for the pending lockdown. As I drive off, looking down onto the Simon’s Town harbour below, I think of what they said in terms of what Covid-19 has to teach us, from what they have learned from the wild honeybees. “We have to go back to first principles. We have to go back to what we have done, what we are doing and look at how we can do it differently.”

Up close and personal. Without protective gear, Karin and Jenny rely on their senses to accurately read the signs and signals of the bees.

And many of the answers we can find by looking at this ancient species and gleaning the wisdom garnered over the centuries.

www.ujubee.com

Photos by Ujubee and supplied (Geoff Tribe & Fiona Anderson)

A wild Cape honeybee with a hefty pollen sac visits a flowering bietou or tick-berry bush on the Cape peninsula.

About the author

Freelance writer, Ron Swilling’s work is regularly featured in travel and outdoor magazines in South Africa and Namibia. Her work has also appeared in books Wild Horses in the Namib Desert: An equine biography, Road Tripping Namibia and the children’s story The World Famous Sunbeam Collector. Ron’s travels lead her off the beaten-track to discover diamonds in the dust, wild desert horses, unspoiled nature and freedom in never-ending landscapes. When at home in Scarborough, Cape Town, she delights in finding wonders in her very own back garden, like the Cape’s wild honeybees.

Tembe elephant bull relocated to community-owned reserve

In a historic translocation in 2016, Somkhanda Community Game Reserve welcomed a herd of 13 elephants donated by Nambiti Game Reserve – the first time two community-owned reserves had successfully worked together to extend elephant range and distribution. This illustrated the importance of community conservation, not only in fostering local economic development and social upliftment, but also in conserving iconic and endangered African wildlife.

Now, these elephants have been joined by a 20-year-old bull elephant from Tembe Elephant Park, owned by the Tembe Traditional Authority. The successful translocation to Somkhanda Game Reserve was a joint operation between WILDLANDS – a programme of the WILDTRUST, the Aspinall Foundation (in partnership with Albus Environmental), and Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife and Conservation Solutions.

Tembe Elephant Park was established in 1983 to protect some of the last remaining free-roaming herds of elephants in South Africa, including ‘tuskers’ (large elephant bulls, some of whose tusks touch the ground). Historically, these elephants would migrate between Mozambique and Maputaland in the extreme north of KwaZulu-Natal. During the Mozambican Civil War, those that escaped the rife poaching found sanctuary in Tembe and settled in the dense sand forests of the reserve. While the dream of reuniting the elephant population across the international border remains, until that is a viable option, management has to implement creative solutions for a growing elephant population in a relatively small reserve. Some of these solutions include the contraception of female elephants and the translocation of surplus elephant bulls.

Somkhanda Community Game Reserve, the new home of the large young bull elephant (yet to be named) is owned by the Emvokweni Community Trust (ECT), which was established in 2005 through formal land claims and declared a protected area in 2011.

Eco-tourism has been earmarked as an important vehicle for economic growth in the country, and the introduction of this new bull will strengthen the reserve’s offering. However, it will also strengthen the genetic diversity of the current elephant population in Somkhanda. According to Roelie Kloppers, the CEO of the WILDTRUST, “The Great Tuskers of Tembe are known all over the world as majestic giants. Bringing a Tembe elephant into Somkhanda’s herd will enable the continuation of the Tembe Tusker lineage in this reserve. This will not only be a massive boost for tourism here but also contribute to conservation efforts of Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife in Tembe Elephant Park. We are very proud to play a little role in support of this.”

As noted above, the introduction of this bull is seen as a strategy to contribute to the conservation of these giants. Elephant populations across Africa and Asia are under threat due to the illegal ivory trade driven by devastating effects of poaching, human-elephant conflict, and habitat destruction. It is up to collaborative efforts of these organisations that stand united behind conservation strategies that will end this crisis.

The translocation was facilitated and funded by the Aspinall Foundation, which is an internationally renowned animal conservation charity that is dedicated to protecting endangered animals around the globe. Dereck Milburn, Regional Director at Aspinall Foundation comments, ‘’I am absolutely thrilled to see this giant in his new home. I want to thank the Emvokweni Community Trust and WILDLANDS for their willingness to accept the responsibility of securing the life of this bull and the tusker genetics for the benefit our future generations’’. The Aspinall Foundation partnered with Albus Environmental in delivering this project.

Translocating big game requires a lot of patience, skill and technical support which was provided by Conservation Solutions. With 25 years’ worth of experience, Conservation Solutions has developed unique translocation systems to move elephants across Africa. “Community-driven conservation plays an essential role in the protection and restoration of flagship species such as elephant. A project like this highlights the potential for communities to collaborate towards the restoration of wildlife biodiversity. These species are ambassadors for the ecological systems in which they live – protecting them justifies the protection of their natural habitat, and all the thousands of other species which occupy the same space,” comments Founder Kester Vickery of Conservation Solutions.

The Somkhanda team on the ground have reported that this bull is settling in well in his new environment. Tembe is home to some of the biggest elephants in Africa, and the team are hopeful that he will soon interact with the Somkhanda herd to infuse the population with the genes of the ‘Tembe Giants’ for generations to come.

Etosha

Etosha offers that iconic image of Africa: a waterhole surrounded by animals, the very epitome of an oasis teeming with life beneath the merciless sun. Thousands of hooves of every shape and size scrabble over the rocky ground as their owners seek out the life-giving water, while opportunistic predators eye the crowds in anticipation. Long-limbed giraffes assume their awkward straddle, reflected in the shimmering pan, while the imposing figure of a statuesque white elephant looms large, dwarfing the slight springbok. It is a wildlife photographer’s dream – a scene shimmering in the heat where Africa’s quintessential creatures assemble in numbers that boggle the mind.

Namibia’s Etosha National Park offers this visual overload in abundance, a special kind of wildlife opulence where visitors are spoilt by the opportunity to wait for the animals to come to them.

The Park

Situated in northern Namibia, Etosha National Park is a fenced reserve that is one of the country’s most popular safari destinations, with the stark otherworldly scenery and spectacular wildlife viewing being the park’s two major drawcards. Proclaimed as a protected area in 1907, Etosha was once the largest game reserve in the world and is estimated to cover around 80,000km² (8 million hectares), four times the size of South Africa’s Kruger National Park. Significant boundary changes throughout the 20^th century eventually reduced the park to its current size of just over 22,000km² (2,2 million hectares). The enormous Etosha Pan dominates the park’s eastern side, while dolomite hills are the main geographical feature of the western half of the park. This western region has only recently been opened to all visitors – it was previously only accessible by local tour operators or guests at Dolomite Camp.

There are six main camps within the park:

Okaukuejo Camp – the oldest of the camps in Etosha, Okaukuejo (‘the woman who has a child every year’) is famous for spectacular sightings at the floodlit waterhole, particularly of black rhino. This is the busiest of all the camps, both as the park’s administrative centre and for attracting the most visitors.
Halali Camp – situated halfway between Okaukuejo and Namutoni, Halali offers both chalet accommodation and camping. The floodlit waterhole is the central feature of the camp.
Namutoni Camp – situated in the eastern half of Etosha, this camp offers chalet accommodation and camping, with a raised walkway around its waterhole. However, it is the white crenulations of Fort Namutoni that give the camp a unique and historical character. The Fort was constructed in 1897 as a German military outpost to help control the spread of rinderpest, foot-and-mouth, and other cattle-related diseases. The fort was razed to the ground by an attacking Ovambo force in 1904 but was later rebuilt.
Dolomite Camp – located in the western half of the park, this unfenced camp features chalets dotted among the dolomite hills. No camping is allowed.
Onkoshi Camp – along with Dolomite Camp, Onkoshi is the second of Etosha’s more luxurious accommodation options and is entirely solar-powered. The camp is situated on the edge of Etosha Pan itself, and there are no campsites or self-catered accommodation options.
Olifantsrus Camp – a dedicated campsite without chalet accommodation, Olifantsrus is the newest of all Etosha’s camps and is located in the north-western section of the park. The campsite features a double-story, glass-fronted hide that overlooks its man-made waterhole. The elephant information centre bears testament to its history as an elephant abattoir during the 1980s, when elephants were culled by managers concerned about the destruction of biodiversity. Hence, the name Olifantsrus translates as ‘elephant’s rest’.

Outside of the park, there are several private game reserves where visitors can enjoy a range of accommodation from luxury, fully catered lodges to budget self-catering and camping options.

The Pan

The park is named for Etosha Pan – an enormous 4,760km² salt pan – visible from space – which makes up nearly a quarter of the national park. The desiccated and bleached soils of the pan are dry for most, if not all, of the year. The word ‘Etosha’ is said to have originated from the Ndonga word for “great white place”, an accurate description of the chalky and desolate landscape.

The original human inhabitants of Etosha were the Hai//om Bushmen people, and they have their own legend as to the history of the pan. According to their mythology, there was once a small village at the centre of the pan that was raided by a rival tribe. All of the village inhabitants were slaughtered but for one woman, who was so grief-stricken that her tears created an enormous, salty lake. The lake dried eventually, but the salt of her tears remained. The likely scientific explanation for the formation of the endorheic basin is that tectonic shifts redirected the flow of the Kunene River, and the lake dried up over time – probably around the same time as the formation of the Okavango Delta.

A honey badger feasts on his scorpion meal

Now, only the Ekuma and Oshigambo Rivers feed the pan with seasonal water, and in years of high rainfall, parts of the pan fill to a depth of around 10cm. The pan becomes a breeding ground for thousands of flamingos, and great white pelicans – a spectacle of pink that varies depending on rainfall and reaches its zenith around January and February.

A huge elephant bull looms over this herd of dainty springbok

Magic pools and a fairy-tale forest

Life in arid Etosha revolves around the waterholes dotted throughout the park. Many of these are fed by natural artesian springs, but others are man-made, and it is for good reason that the park’s road network is centred around these pivotal features. Apart from the height of the rainy season during the summer months, these waterholes offer the only available water for the park’s multitudinous animal species. As a result, remarkable sightings at the water’s edge are inevitable. For eager photographers and predators alike, the waterholes guarantee a gathering of animals unlike any other.

Regular visitors to the park naturally develop a preference for certain waterholes, and each has something unique to recommend it – whether it is the surrounding scenery, positioning for the best morning or afternoon light, or even the repeated visits of a ‘resident’ leopard. It goes without saying that a good lens (and a familiarity with camera settings) will do wonders to enhance the experience. Still, it’s always important to set the camera aside for a brief period to soak up the atmosphere. It is also well worth investigating the etymology of the waterhole names, which offer fascinating insights into the area’s history. For example, Natukanaoka Pan translates roughly as “you need to take long strides to walk here”, or Gobaub, which comes from the Hai//om word for a loincloth, supposedly after a man who lost his while beating a hasty retreat from an angry elephant.

Sprokieswoud, meaning “fairy-tale forest”, is also appropriately named for its unearthly scenery. Here, thickset Moringa trees (Moringa ovalifolia), usually found on rocky hillsides, dot the landscape and their strange bulbous shapes in the otherwise barren scenery create a dreamlike and surreal atmosphere.

A white elephant

As is so often the case in Africa’s treasured protected areas, Etosha’s animals are a testament to natural resilience. By the late 19^th century, the region’s large mammal species, including elephant, rhino and lion had been all but exterminated. Still, mammal life has bounced back over the last century. There are two near-endemic antelope – the black-faced impala (a subspecies) and the minuscule Damara dik-dik with its piercing whistle alarm – not to mention an assortment of other antelope species. Black-backed jackals haunt the waterholes, exploding into action whenever the delicately coloured flocks of sandgrouse arrive to drink, while larger predators like lions and spotted hyena follow similar tactics with bigger prey in mind. Endangered mountain zebra can be found on the slopes of the dolomite hills of Ondundozonananandana (try saying that five times fast – or even once slowly).

The looming figures of the elephants at the waterholes look enormous, and this is not just due to a trick of perspective – Etosha is home to some of the largest elephants in the world. When covered in the white clay soils from around the waterholes, they look like giant grey ghosts, which only adds to their gravitas. While physically enormous, their tusks are generally far smaller than those of other elephants in different parts of Africa, which may be due to genetics or the mineral balance in their diet, or a combination of both.

Yet is the black rhino that truly steals the show in Etosha. Famously myopic and short-tempered, the park is a stronghold of the world’s black rhino population. Although no official numbers have been published, Namibia is home to about half of the world’s black rhinos, and many of them are found in Etosha. Their nocturnal social gatherings around certain waterholes have become almost legendary, turning the myth about black rhinos being cantankerous and solitary on its head.

Etosha waterholes are a treasure-trove of sightings for the patient

The experience

The Etosha National Park experience is unlike any other safari experience in the world – nothing quite compares to the vast abundance of animals of every shape and size, gathered together in one place at one time. For those for whom a trip will be a once-off treat, it is essential to visit during the dry season, when the waterholes are critical to the park and wildlife viewing is at its best. That said, this is also when the park is at its busiest, and it may well be worth seeking private accommodation in a private reserve outside of the park if large crowds are an unattractive prospect. For those fortunate to return regularly, the park offers something all year round, with the added advantage of quieter periods and lower rates during the rainy season.

Regardless, Etosha National Park is guaranteed to furnish its fortunate visitors with something spectacular – from prime wildlife viewing, to entirely unexpected animal behaviour or, simply, an insight into Africa’s inimitable seasons and how life adapts.

Further reading: ‘Exploring Etosha’ and ‘Etosha Through My Eyes’

The great elephant balancing act

By Gail Thomson

Originally published in Conservation Namibia

Elephants are amazing animals. Besides being the largest land animal on our planet, they have relatively complex societies and appear to have individual personalities. Watching elephants in their natural habitat is a joy for those of us who can do so at our leisure, from a safe distance or with a knowledgeable guide. For those who face the real danger of meeting an elephant on foot at night while walking home, elephants can be terrifying.

It is no wonder that the idea of hunting elephants is a sensitive one, and that the people who spend much of their time observing these ponderous, loveable beasts want to do everything in their power to protect them. There is also little wonder that people living with elephants want them to be more controlled – to stay away from their crop fields and houses. Yet, as with many things, how you see an elephant is a matter of perspective and managing this species must take vastly different perspectives into account, along with the relevant science.

The topic of elephant management requires a book (or several), and I am not an elephant expert, so I will leave that task to others. My primary interest lies in the field of human-wildlife conflict, which affects humans in every part of the world and a dizzying array of species, including elephants. So these observations are not limited to elephants, although popular opinions about elephants and the intense conflict among different interest groups over whether or not they should be hunted make this species a great case study.

There are two sides to human-elephant conflict, and both sides have been studied in Botswana and elsewhere. We will dive into some of the science of these two sides first, before considering how these two sides should inform the tricky business of elephant management.

The Elephant Dimension

Elephant hunting is the most controversial aspect of elephant management, particularly when it is for ‘sport’ or ‘trophies’, whereby hunting clients pay large amounts of money to hunt large male elephants. Elephants may also be hunted due to human-elephant conflict – whereby a particular individual is earmarked because it causes repeated damages to crops or infrastructure, or for killing people. Hunting an older male elephant for ‘sport’ is more controversial than hunting in response to conflict. Scientific studies of male elephants thus elicit popular attention and are frequently used in hunting debates.

A recent study by Allen et al. entitled Importance of old bulls: leaders and followers in collective movements of all‑male groups in African savannah elephants discovered that mature elephant bulls play a role in leading younger bulls, particularly when travelling to the Boteti River in central Botswana. They found that adolescent males (< 20 years old) rarely travelled to the river alone, but preferred accompanying mature bulls. Additionally, in groups of males, the older ones were most likely to take the lead. The oldest age category they used was over 26 years, which is really just the age of maturity, rather than an indication of particularly old individuals (elephants can live up to 60-65 years).

The authors conclude that older male elephants are therefore important for determining movement patterns for younger males in the landscape (they go further than that, to be discussed later). Other elephant biologists have noted that older males function as “disciplinarians” for younger ones – teaching them appropriate behaviour within elephant society and even towards other species. The latter observation is supported by the experience in Pilanesberg National Park, South Africa, where male elephants that were orphaned due to historical culling operations were released into the Park without older elephants. These traumatised young males caused havoc by killing rhinos and attacking tourist vehicles. The introduction of older males into this population caused the troublemakers to calm down.

Another line of scientific evidence that emphasises the importance of male elephants is from a paternity study in Amboseli National Park, Kenya. This study revealed that male elephants reach their breeding peak (i.e. number of calves they father) between 45-53 years old and they can still reproduce in their late 50’s, although their numbers of offspring decline sharply in these later years. The conclusion one can draw from these results is that male elephants should ideally not be hunted before or during their prime reproductive age of around 40-50 years old. Elephants older than this have already contributed a great deal to the population; their genes will therefore not be lost if they are hunted when they are past their prime (more about age-related hunting can be found here).

Allen et al. also point out that male elephant society differs from female society in a number of important ways. First, males will group together or split with others over time, while female breeding herds stay together and do not randomly split up and regroup. Second, the matriarch walks at the back of her herd and to keep a watchful eye on those in front of her, thus actively caring for her group. Meanwhile old males walk at the front and seem unconcerned about whether or not they are being followed by younger males. Finally, adolescent females do not travel large distances anywhere on their own (unless something is seriously wrong), while adolescent males do, even though they prefer the company of older males.

In terms of their function in elephant society, then, it is reasonable to say that older females (matriarchs or soon-to-be matriarchs) are more important than older males, although it is certainly not advisable to remove all older males from the population. The scientific evidence showing that older male elephants have a role to play is important, and should certainly be incorporated in elephant management plans – no subpopulation of elephants should be left without mature elephant bulls.

Yet Allen et al. do not stick to their scientific findings in the concluding remarks of their paper, as they state: “We argue mature bulls occupy a similar role in male elephant society as old female matriarchs in breeding herds and require equal protection” (emphasis mine). They further argue that the quota of 400 male elephants set by Botswana for 2020 “would not be sustainable”. With that, they stepped out of elephant biology and into the human realm of policy.

The Human Dimension

While the practice of science – creating and testing hypotheses, gathering and analysing data, drawing conclusions and suggesting real-world applications, and finally submitting it all for peer review – is designed to reduce our inherent bias as much as possible, the fact remains that scientists are humans too. People who study animals, particularly animal behaviour (which requires many hours of watching them) naturally become attached to their study species. Indeed, they probably had a natural affinity for those species before they even started their studies, which was why they became biologists in the first place.

I can empathise with this – the reason why I chose to study carnivore conservation biology is because I have always loved cats of every kind. Yet I have an issue with the conclusions reached in this paper. First, the conclusion that male elephants should have equal protection to matriarchs is an over-reach, as even in the paper itself they describe how older males are less important to younger males than matriarchs are to younger females.

Second, the elephants they are concerned about (>26 years old) represent 19% of the males in their sample of 1,097. If one considers that there are 130,000 elephants in Botswana, let’s say half of which are male (65,000), then we have roughly 12,000 mature males in the country (this is a rough estimate, based only on their reported demographics and a 50:50 sex ratio – quota setting is a much more complicated business in reality). A quota of 400 adult male elephants thus equates to about 3% of the available males (note that 400 is a maximum, actual numbers hunted are likely to be lower). If only 3% of the older males are removed from the population, will male elephant society break down such that younger males start behaving badly like those in Pilanesberg where no older males were present? Or will young males have no older males to follow to the river, as they did in this study? The numbers just don’t add up, revealing that their conclusions stem from an understandable desire to protect the elephants that they have spent so much time studying, rather than the results of their study.

While the results of good biological research such as those summarised above must be incorporated into animal management, the views of animal researchers must be considered alongside the views of other stakeholders. The conclusions regarding elephant hunting (but not the results or other conclusions based on their data) of Allen et al. are clearly personal views, and should be considered as such. Furthermore, biological science is not the only scientific discipline that should inform animal management policies. After reading the article by Allen et al. on male elephants near the Boteti River, I looked for an article on people living near the same river to get the other side of the story. Interestingly, both studies included one author (a different person in each one) from the non-governmental organisation Elephants for Africa, which is working to reduce human-elephant conflict in this area and clearly understands both the elephant and human dimensions of this situation.

The study by Mayberry et al. is entitled Well-being impacts of human-elephant conflict in Khumaga, Botswana: Exploring visible and hidden dimensions. Khumaga is a village located on the Boteti River, which is associated with several smaller farming settlements that stretch either side of the village along the riverfront. The Boteti River is also the boundary between farming areas and the Makgadikgadi Pans National Park, which supports over 2,000 elephants (most of them male, for as yet unknown reasons). At the time of this study, the boundary fence of the Park was in severe disrepair so the elephants regularly crossed the river into the farming areas and back into the Park.

The researchers wanted to know how the presence of elephants impacted the people living along the Boteti River. They went deeper than the usual tallying up of elephant damages (e.g. destroying crops or breaking fences) and also asked their 61 respondents about the impact of elephants on their personal security and freedom, physical and mental health, and relations with their families and the government.

They found that 72% of their respondents felt unsafe around elephants and that the presence of the elephants limited their freedom of movement, especially at night. Even more worryingly, 90% reported that the damages caused by elephants to crops threatened their food security. Food is expensive Botswana relative to the earning power of rural people, so not having a good yield from their crops means that these subsistence farmers may not have enough to eat, as their sources of cash income are limited. Nearly two-thirds (63%) of interviewees said that their access to water was hampered by the presence of elephants at the Boteti River. While limiting their access to food and water was a clear physical health concern, a quarter of the interviewees also reported an intense fear of elephants – thus affecting their mental health. Also read Life with Elephants, in which Africa Geographic Simon Espley spent time in two known human-elephant conflict zones and interviewed community members.

Balancing the dimensions – the tricky issue of management

Unsurprisingly, the people living near the Boteti are frustrated; their main request was that the Park fence be reinforced. Given that the river is the boundary and people also need access to the river, they want the fence to be reinforced on the Park’s side of the Boteti River. Yet, as the elephant study showed, this river is a critical resource for elephants, so any fence blocking their access to the river is likely to be broken down by elephants desperate to quench their thirst. The government suggested moving the boundary of the Park such that the Boteti is within the Park and human communities are fenced out and therefore safe from elephants. Yet the river is a key source of water for these farming communities, so they were unwilling to give up their land and this critical resource to the Park.

Considering this local situation gives us an idea of the complexity involved in managing elephants, and all other animal species that conflict with humans. While the area around the Boteti is a hotspot for human-elephant conflict, it is certainly not the only one in the country. If trying to please its citizens while simultaneously conserving its large elephant population was the only struggle the Botswana government had to deal with, that would be difficult enough. Recent media furores over their decision to allow elephant hunting and some mysterious (likely natural) elephant deaths, however, reveal that Botswana is being watched and judged internationally. Namibia has experienced its share of international judgement over its wildlife management policies, so we can commiserate with our neighbour.

Both countries allow elephants to be hunted (along with several other African countries), much to the dismay of people who love elephants, yet don’t have to compete with them for food and water. Hunting permits are invariably granted for male elephants, particularly older ones that bear larger tusks. The quota in Botswana is set at 400 adult male elephants. “Yet scientists say that older male elephants are critically important, so we cannot allow this!” Cry the activists from afar. Very rarely does anyone stop to critically assess the differences between what scientists actually found and what they recommend, as I did above.

Studies like the one by Allen et al. are used as a club by international media to batter Botswana and other elephant hunting countries into submission. This article was popularised by no less than the New York Times and the BBC, among numerous others. Yet the findings of Mayberry et al. – that 90% of people living alongside the Boteti River are food insecure as a result of elephants, not to mention the other impacts – remain tucked away in a scientific journal article, to be read only by scientists interested in the topic of human-elephant conflict. The next time someone says that elephants should be managed based on science, ask them what science – just the science focusing on the elephant dimension, or all of the science?

What are we trying to achieve?

Besides using science to guide management, one also needs to ask a critical (but often overlooked) question – what is the ultimate objective for management in this particular area? The answer to this question then guides how the science should be used. The objectives for National Parks are usually to conserve plant and animal species, although they may also include generating income for Park management and the country. Yet on the edges of Parks and outside them, either in buffer zones or on farmlands, the objective may be different. Particularly in areas where people are present, the objectives have to include their needs – ignoring them is both a violation of their rights and a recipe for disaster.

Around the world, in nearly every human-wildlife conflict situation, whenever people feel that the authorities tasked with managing wildlife are ignoring them or trampling their rights, conflict intensifies. Anger and frustration generated by such intense conflict can reveal itself in a multitude of ways, including public protests, increased poaching, and a distrust of conservation officials generally. More often than not, the animals are used as a pawn in a greater conflict between different groups of people, with sometimes devastating results.

I hope we can all agree that no one wants human-wildlife conflict to escalate to the point of no return. If so, some compromises between the different human interest groups must be made. Within strictly protected National Parks, elephants and other animals should be allowed to continue their lives as unimpeded by human activities as possible (tourism can, and does, cause some issues but this should be minimised by managing the humans, rather than the animals). Outside the Parks, we need to be more flexible.

The existence of wildlife in human farmlands relies directly on the level of tolerance farmers have for it. Our efforts should therefore focus on maximising tolerance, which is achieved primarily through listening carefully to the concerns raised by the people in question and genuinely making an effort to address these. As a rule of thumb, we should aim to reduce the costs people experience and increase the benefits they derive from the presence of wildlife.

Achieving either or both of these goals may require the sacrifice of a few individual animals – e.g. killing or translocating particular individuals that habitually cause conflict (reducing the cost), or allowing a few older males to be hunted by foreigners and thereby generate income and meat for the affected community (increasing the benefit). There is much scope for further research into the long-term impacts of removing individual elephants (either as ‘problem-causing’ or for income generation) on the level of human-elephant conflict, and we hope to pose some of these pertinent research questions in a future article.

This is not to say that non-lethal efforts should not be attempted – they are needed just as much. Around the Boteti, education regarding how to behave when seeing elephants will reduce fear, better fencing around crops will reduce damages, and providing piped water near settlements can reduce direct competition for water. Elephants for Africa is heavily involved in helping this community live with elephants using an array of non-lethal methods – this article in no way criticises their efforts. In terms of income generation, finding different sources of revenue to incentivise tolerance for elephants and other wildlife that do not rely on foreign visitors (with cameras or guns) would increase the resilience of African conservation and is therefore a welcome endeavour.

The various different actions one can take to reduce human-wildlife conflict are often likened to a ‘toolbox’, with each tool being needed for a different task and under different circumstances. Precluding the use of lethal methods reduces the size of the toolbox and may even render our non-lethal tools less effective. If people ask for a particular elephant to be removed, yet conservation authorities respond with an educational talk on the importance of elephants without explicitly addressing their request or trying to understand their point of view, the effort may be seen as patronising – at best! In practice, government conservation authorities need to implement policies regarding elephant management (either in terms of identifying and removing individual ‘problem animals’ and/or granting quotas for hunting elephants) that include the needs and perspectives of their citizens who live alongside elephants.

Striking the balance

Elephant behaviour and society are complicated things that will no doubt continue to attract the attention and fascination of many scientists. Yet understanding and mitigating human-elephant conflict is more complicated still. Countries that must find the delicate balance between the rights of their citizens and their responsibility for conserving biodiversity should be supported, particularly by providing sound scientific evidence on both the elephant and human dimensions of the problem.

Scientific findings should not be used as a club to beat countries into making policy changes, and scientists must realise that their perspectives on elephants are not the only ones that matter. Constructive engagement between policymakers, affected communities and scientists cannot happen if we ignore each other’s perspectives and real concerns. While the international media is partly to blame for making a difficult situation worse, each party can choose to either stoke the fires of conflict or douse the flames by trying to understand the other side’s point of view. Perhaps the proverbial question should not be “how do you eat an elephant?” but “how do you see an elephant?”

Nyungwe NP in Rwanda under African Parks management

African Parks has announced the signing of a 20-year agreement with the Government of Rwanda to manage Nyungwe National Park in Rwanda. The national park is home to the largest expanse of forest in the country, and the agreement is intended to preserve the park’s biodiversity to secure last benefits for Rwanda’s people and wildlife. It comes after a successful 10-year partnership which resulted in the ecological and economic revival of Akagera National Park.

Nyungwe National Park is located in the south-west of Rwanda on the border with Burundi and covers a total area of 1, 019km² (over 100, 000 hectares) including large tracts of montane forest interspersed with marshland. As part of the Albertine Rift, the park is home to 13 species of primate including chimpanzees and Hamlyn’s and L’Hoest’s monkeys. Among the more than 1,000 plants, over 90 mammals and 300 bird species recorded, many are endemic and found only within Nyungwe. The park is a critical catchment area that feeds both the Congo Basin to the west and the Nile Basin to the east, as well as providing 70% of Rwanda’s water.

African Parks will work with the Rwanda Development Board (RDB) to secure the sustainability of the park through improving law enforcement; investing in and stimulating local enterprise, and optimizing Nyungwe’s potential for conservation-based tourism. Commenting on the partnership, Clare Akamanzi, the RDB Chief Executive Officer, said that the agreement with African Parks “is testament to the good partnership we have built with African Parks over the last ten years. We look forward to making Nyungwe National Park an even more spectacular place to visit”.

In turn, Peter Fearnhead, CEO of African Parks added that “by investing in the long-term protection of Nyungwe National Park, one of Africa’s biodiversity hotspots, the Government of Rwanda has continued to demonstrate global leadership in taking action to preserve ecosystems which sustain human health, local livelihoods and economies”.

DID YOU KNOW that African Parks offers safari camps (lodges and campsites) where 100% of tourism revenue goes to conservation and local communities? Find out more and book your African Parks safari.

Nyungwe National Park is the 19th park to join the African Parks portfolio, made possible thanks to the support of the Rwanda Development Board, The Wyss Foundation, Rob and Melani Walton Foundation, the players of the People’s Postcode Lottery and Fondation Segré. African Parks now manages 19 national parks and protected areas covering over 14.2 million hectares in 11 countries: Angola, Benin, Central African Republic, Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Republic of Congo, Malawi, Mozambique, Rwanda, Zimbabwe and Zambia.

Lion farming – Lord Ashcroft submission to South African High Level Panel

Presentation by Lord Ashcroft KCMG PC to the High-Level Panel examining the policies, legislation and practices related to the management of elephant, leopard, rhino and lion in South Africa. Delivered on Wednesday, 07 October 2020.

Earlier this year, I sent each of you a copy of my book, Unfair Game, in which I expose the appalling truth about South Africa’s captive lion industry.

I have no doubt that you are all busy people, but I sincerely hope that you found some time to look at it.

If you did, you’d know that lion farming is a four-stage process. As cubs, these animals are taken from their mothers and used as tourist magnets. When older, they entertain tourists on “lion walking” excursions. Later, they’re shot in a “canned hunt” – a hunt in an enclosed space from which a lion cannot escape. Either that or they’re slaughtered for their bones and then stripped for their parts much as a thief might plunder a car. These bones are then sold for large sums of money in Asian wildlife markets.

Between being born and dying, some of these creatures are drugged and beaten to make them behave. They exist on a very limited diet. They carry diseases. They’re emotionally damaged. The abuse they suffer is unimaginable.

But it’s not just the appalling cruelty to the lions themselves that is harming South Africa’s reputation around the rest of the world.

The business of lion farming surely ranks as a prime example of how quickly profound wickedness can take root and then wreak havoc on a thing of beauty in a civilised country – a country that I love, by the way.

My research suggests there are now about 12,000 of these animals now being held in pens around South Africa. They outnumber wild lions by four to one.

These animals are bred in the name of profit. A lot of the money generated by these lions is the product of illegal activity, making these gains truly ill-gotten. In my opinion, this puts all of the beneficiaries of the captive-bred lion industry on a par with drug dealers.

In a world whose animal population is diminishing, and whose human population is growing, the problems associated with the lion industry are complex.

And yet, as my lengthy studies of this trade demonstrate, it really does seem that South Africa’s authorities have so far had no interest in tackling this hateful situation in earnest.

Arguably, the authorities have become the enablers of all of this, overseeing lion hunting regulations and awarding licences for the export of lion bones with what appears to be the lightest of touches and wilfully ignoring wrongdoing when they learn of it.

At the moment, this is largely restricted to South Africa. But once the international criminal syndicates have worked out how to create greater demand for the body parts of lions, wild lions right around Africa will become increasingly heavily poached – just like rhinos and elephants.

Then there is the health aspect to consider.

As my book shows, thousands of lion bones are smuggled out of South Africa each year to feed the Asian market for big cat products and so-called “traditional” medicines. Experts quoted in the book say a major public health incident will occur in Asia as a result of its people’s rampant consumption of lion bones – bones which are harvested in South Africa. It could be a serious infectious disease or a new disease we’ve never heard of, just like Covid-19. Lions also carry TB, which killed 1.5 million people in 2018. Any sense that South Africa failed to act when it had due warning would be disastrous for your people and their livelihoods.

So what can be done to solve this problem? I would urge you to recommend that the South African government bans captive-bred lion farming.

I would ask that you ensure airlines, shipping firms and freight companies operating in South Africa are heavily penalised if they are caught transporting the trophies or bones of captive-bred lions.

And ‘voluntourism’ holidays, lion cub petting and ‘walking with lions’ experiences must also be outlawed. Editorial note: Lord Ashcroft subsequently clarified that he was referring to voluntourism associated only with the lion-breeding industry, and NOT other forms of voluntourism.

One of the most shocking aspects of the recent investigation into lion farming that I launched was that when it ended, my team took their findings to a senior police officer in Pretoria who specialises in wildlife issues. Not only did he not read the evidence file they gave him, but having rejected it, he also threatened to put them in prison.

I don’t believe that the members of this panel hold this unsympathetic attitude. I am certain you know right from wrong.

I wrote Unfair Game because I wanted to help end lion farming in South Africa for once and for all.

I hope that you will all share this aim. I will help you in any way I can to bring about its demise.

Thank you very much.

LORD ASHCROFT, KCMG PC

Kruger waterhole problems

Editorial note: Kruger National Park management has embarked on a long-term management plan that includes closing certain human-made waterholes (some permanently and some seasonally) to ensure more natural movement of wildlife, in particular elephants and other large herbivores. One regular Kruger visitor endured a rather stressful and confusing time as she encountered waterholes that appeared open and yet not functioning. Our attempts to obtain clarity from SANParks, detailed at the end of this story, did not yield the hoped-for results and our hope is that this story sparks better communications between SANParks and interested parties.

Kruger waterhole problems- by Shirli J Carswell

Late afternoon and the elephants are arriving from all directions, the zebras and wildebeest have scattered and are standing to the side, waiting patiently. A small herd of buffalo move in and try to find a space between the giants spraying the water. Warthog families criss-cross, looking for a spot to get a drink. Dust devils move across the landscape in the background, sending the dust into the air as more bull elephants saunter in with their askaris – for a photographer, this is magic unfolding.

The Middelvlei waterhole is in full swing when there is water available; a steady parade of wildlife.

Middelvlei is one of my prime waterholes in Kruger. I have sat there for hours, in the early morning and late afternoons when I know there will always be something to see. The landscape is open to the horizon with stunted Mopani bush in the background. For years, northern Kruger has been my pilgrimage, once or twice a year.

In October 2018, I spent two weeks there. The park had no rain yet, and already the temperatures were reaching over 37 °C. I had spent some blissful time driving around the park, always ending up at Middelvlei or the next waterhole at Malopenyana, which is about 23 kilometres from Tsendze camp. Every day was a hive of activity, on one occasion there was a civet lying in the shade across the road, perhaps waiting for a quieter hour.

The demeanour of elephants changes when they close-in on the water; they start running and kicking up more dust in the afternoon light.

Two days before leaving, I realised that there was something wrong at Middelvlei – the animals were arriving and departing without drinking. The two troughs seemed to have very little water, and some of the animals were climbing right into it. The bigger elephant bulls, who would typically ignore the troughs and stand at the cement reservoir using their trunks to splash and suck up the water, were coming up with nothing but puffs of dust, no matter how they stretched.

I am no expert on windmills, but the process seems pretty simple: the blades catch the wind, turning the rotor which drives the pump rod up and down. Although the windmill was rotating, the rest was motionless. Every day the weather seemed to be getting hotter and drier. Before leaving, I drove to Mopani to report it. The reception ladies were as helpful as possible, getting the sector ranger on the phone for me. I described the problem, and he assured me that the following day his team would see to it. I could go home with the knowledge that the wildlife would have water in their troughs.

A dagga boy is tired of waiting and challenges the giants by pushing in—the water in the trough is low.

Two months later, I was back in Kruger. I left early morning for Middelvlei to get the golden light. There was nothing. The water troughs were empty and catching dust, and the mid-December temperatures were over soaring over 40 °C. It was clear that it had been dry since October. Again I reported it to the section ranger, and he promised he would see to it the following day. Still, nothing the next morning. So began a relentless campaign, driving back and forth on my holiday to get the waterhole operational again.

I lost faith in the assurances of a sector ranger who seemed irritated by my calls for help. Eventually, I insisted on a time to meet the maintenance people at the waterhole. We met early morning, and I watched the team fixing the problem for over two hours until they announced that the water would be full by that afternoon. Was the water pumping? Yes. I need to be patient; the reservoir would fill first then start filling the troughs. Finally, over a week of my holiday had already passed. My victory dance was short-lived. There was no water in the afternoon, nor the following morning. There was some blockage in the pipes.

Once again, with feeling, back to Mopani camp to speak to the section ranger, who I now found out had gone on ‘long leave’. The hospitality and duty manager I met was concerned but said, in all honesty, he had no idea who to contact and would investigate and call me at Tsendze. True to his word, he got back to me, and the next day I met the team at Middelvlei. With the blockage cleared, the water was now flowing, and in a couple of hours, the troughs were full again.

At Malopenyana the bulls congregate around the reservoir, drinking and splashing.

The midday temperatures were insane, climbing to over 46 °C. Driving around the northern area, I noticed a number of the waterholes had problems. At Mooiplaas there was a swampy area of mud. I watched as some elephants used the clay for their skin then run to the water troughs and reservoir only to find them empty. It was heartbreaking. During one conversation, a section ranger had advised me to go to the Tihongonyeni waterhole for photography. It was a dust bowl with the same conditions; mud but no water. Animals can’t drink mud. I began to wonder when last anyone checked this waterhole.

The report of 20 roan antelope dying of dehydration in northern Kruger came as no surprise to me. Instead, it angered and motivated me to write about my scenario, which seems to follow a repeating script. Comically, some visitors even asked me if I worked for SANParks; they’d seen me drive up and down, talking and watching crews fix windmills. Who looks after the waterholes? Who inspects them to see they are in working order? Why is there no standard route of reporting a problem at a camp, where it can get the responsive traction it deserves without a visitor having to go to these measures?

The Tihongonyeni waterhole is a virtual dust bowl, the windmill scrunched up, and some of the blades were lying below.

The Biodiversity department determines which waterholes are dismantled or remain active, but I doubt they are the people who carry out maintenance. I stand to be corrected. The sector ranger had gone on leave, and nobody seemed to know who to contact, which seemed absurd.

I asked a SANParks ranger what a ‘sector rangers’’ job description entails. “He is the ‘senior farm manager’ in charge of all the field rangers that patrol and carry out conservation work in each of Kruger’s 22 sections. It takes 15 years of field ranger experience before consideration as a sector ranger position,” was the response. Certainly one of the essential tasks is to appoint field rangers to inspect the waterholes regularly where there is no natural water source, given that they are a lifeline for wildlife.

That roan antelope perished through thirst was undoubtedly criminal. In my opinion, the stated ‘action plan’ should include the entire Kruger because it seems to be occurring throughout the national park. There seems to be complacency rot in high and long-held positions, without accountability.

Kruger National Park belongs to the people of South Africa, and we have layers of histories and memories through generations. Every one of us is a custodian. As a visitor if you see a waterhole not working, use your voice for those that can’t; it is your right.

[AG Editorial note: We reached out repeatedly to relevant SANParks officials to request a response to Shirli’s article submission. The initial response, from a senior member of the Communications and Marketing team, was that “there are millions of visitors to KNP who request information from the source and don’t run off to sympathetic media for attention”.

When we pointed out that this was precisely what Shirli had done, he responded by saying that “four years ago SANParks embarked on the decommissioning of artificial water points. This was informed by research undertaken by the Conservation Management team. We did release a statement on the subject matter.”

Again we questioned why, if this were the case, it had no been communicated at the time and why maintenance teams were sent to repair the waterhole pumps. When we received no response to this line of questioning, we approached other contacts within SANParks, reiterating our initial questions and requesting a list of decommissioned waterholes or perhaps a rotational schedule. The only response that we have received to date was that our “queries around the decisions informing the water policy, concerns around the maintenance of the KNP waterholes, and concerns around communication, is noted”.]

SUGGESTION: SANParks to place an information sign at each waterhole – explaining the closure strategy and the status of each particular waterhole. Also a phone number/email address for reporting problems.

About Shirli Jade Carswell

Born in South Africa, Shirli’s career and passion revolve around the African continent and its wildlife and cultures. She cut her teeth on advertising after art school and eventually moved into photography. She periodically packs her 2004 Defender, known affectionately as Tintin, and heads out to some remote location to capture a library of images for her fine art portfolio. Recognized for her wildlife and landscape photography, Shirli is a passionate conservationist and steward of Africa. She co-authored the book, Africa’s Ultimate Safaris, an extraordinary photo journey through the continent showcasing some of its most beautiful and wild destinations. She is currently working on a series of books which will take her into Africa once again.

KHWAI

Visitors to Khwai in northern Botswana enjoy the luxury of game drives, bushwalking and gliding down water channels in a mokoro – the best of everything in one of the most scenic reaches of the Okavango Delta.

Make no mistake, experiencing a safari by vehicle is an extraordinary experience. As Africa’s wild animals have come to accept these peculiar moving parts of their everyday landscape, excited passengers have the opportunity to view them at close proximity. Which is perfect. That said, there is nothing that quite compares to the silent glide of a mokoro through the thick reed beds of Botswana’s pristine waterways.

Surrounded by lilies and with only the gentle splash of the expertly guided pole, these traditional dugout “canoes” follow ancient elephant and hippo paths through the reeds and grasses at a sedate pace that makes the experience even more absorbing. Brief flashes of colour draw the eye to tiny, flamboyant malachite kingfishers and dancing dragonflies hovering over the surface. And the occasional elephant could loom large from a neighbouring bank or wade through the shallow floodplains in front of view. Exhilarating. As the mokoro cuts through the water, its motion is almost hypnotic, yet the soothing effect is undercut by a profound sense of excitement as to what lies around the next bend in the watery pathways. Video: Mokoro magic in the early evening.

This languid pace contrasts beautifully against the heart-pounding adrenaline of viewing a buffalo herd or lion on foot, or perhaps the frenzied excitement of following (at a discreet distance) a hunting pack of painted wolves (African wild dogs) in a game-drive vehicle. This is Khwai – a Botswana safari gem.

Basic facts

The 200,000 ha (2,000 km²) Khwai area consists of the small Khwai Community Concession (NG19) and the larger Khwai Private Reserve (NG18). The tourism core of this area lies along the banks of the Khwai River and its tributaries with associated floodplains and woodlands – much of the area north of the rivers is remote and dominated by mopane woodlands and open floodplains.

Khwai comprises the north-east fingers of the Okavango Delta and lies between two of northern Botswana’s world-famous parks: Chobe National Park and Moremi Game Reserve. There are no fences restricting animal movements between these protected areas, so the wildlife viewing experience in Khwai is equal to the spectacular standards of anywhere in northern Botswana; possibly even more so due to its ideal geographic positioning.

Botswana, and particularly the Okavango Delta, can be a seasonal safari experience for those seeking big cats – based not just on the rains themselves but also the rise and fall of Delta water levels. The dry (no rain) season in Botswana runs from about April until October, which coincides perfectly with the arrival of the Angolan floodwaters to the Delta’s many waterways and swamps, and to Khwai. As a result, many herbivores that spend the rainy summer months in search of nutritious green grass deep in Chobe/Savute move towards Moremi and the Delta during the dry season, in search of a more reliable source of water and nutritious food. There are no fences to restrict animal movements, and Khwai lies directly along this seasonal migratory route. As the annual flood arrives during the dry (no rain) season, the Khwai River levels rise in turn, and mokoro safaris are once again possible in the many channels.

Visitors to Khwai are guaranteed the full Botswana wildlife viewing experience – resident lions, leopards, cheetahs and hyenas revel in the opportunities afforded by a rich abundance of prey, herds of hundreds of buffalo regularly stream through the waters on their way to fresh grazing grounds and naturally, given northern Botswana is the population stronghold, there is an elephant around every corner. Hippos eye passing mekoros with a degree of suspicion by day and wander the camps at night, and massive crocodiles silently slice through the permanent waterways. Khwai is renowned for its wild dog sightings, and these lithe, athletic canines regularly give birth in known den sites in the area during the dry winter months. Naturally, herds of ubiquitous waterbuck and red lechwe dot the floodplains and healthy populations of rare roan and sable antelope regularly leave the surrounding mopane forests to quench their thirst. Despite the seasonal fluctuations described above this smorgasbord of wildlife is viewable all year round, though naturally, the dry season offers better sightings due to the lack of dense vegetation.

The diversity of habitats found in Khwai automatically translates into impressive birding opportunities, with over 500 different species recorded in the area. An added advantage for keen birders is that the best time for birding is during the summer months when visiting migrants have arrived in full force, which also happens to be the low tourism season in Botswana, which means fewer visitors and cheaper rates.

Unlike the (unfenced) neighbouring national parks and reserves, the Khwai concessions allow night drives, meaning that guided visitors to Khwai have the opportunity to search for leopard, serval, porcupine and honey badger, as well as the elusive and mysterious aardwolf. This flexibility also allows off-road driving (with rules) and guided walking safaris.

Most of the Khwai Community Concession is open to the public and to mobile tented safari operators, and so wildlife sightings can be crowded during the prime safari season of July to September. This concession hosts numerous lodges and campsites, and prices range from budget to luxury. On the other hand, the larger Khwai Private Reserve has a few mid and upmarket lodges, and access is restricted to guests.

Community benefits

Most importantly, Khwai Community Concession – which receives the majority of visitors – is owned and run by the local community, with camps and lodges renting the privilege of operating in this exquisite space. For visitors, that means knowing that the proceeds from their trip directly benefit local people, which, in turn, is vital to the survival of any conservation area. A visit to Khwai village, situated within the concession, also offers the opportunity to meet some of Botswana’s charismatic citizens and to appreciate their history and culture, which are so intricately entwined with the wilderness around them. Khwai Private Reserve also pays concession fees, which benefit the local community.

Further enjoyment:

Kwaai Khwai – a travel diary

Khwai, photographer’s paradise – Our 2021 Photographer of the Year winners’ safari

Human-lion conflict in a key lion population area

By Gail Thomson, with input from Lise Hanssen, director of Kwando Carnivore Project.

Originally published in Conservation Namibia.

Human-lion conflict is a major issue for the conservation of wild lions. The Zambezi Region (formerly the Caprivi) is a small strip of land that fits like a Namibian key in a lock made of four other countries – Angola, Botswana, Zambia and Zimbabwe. This strip of land is near the centre of the Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (KAZA).

The KAZA landscape comprises fully protected National Parks, community conservation areas and mixed-use areas around towns and villages in all five countries. The Namibian component of KAZA has all of the same features of the broader landscape, only on a smaller scale. Most of the large carnivores and herbivores inhabiting this strip of Namibia don’t stay here their whole lives, or even for a year at a time. These animals move from country to country unencumbered by border controls that restrict human movements.

The Zambezi Region of Namibia (highlighted) sits at the heart of the Kavango Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (KAZA TFCA, blue outline) that spans five countries in southern Africa. © Rob Thomson

While small, the slender Zambezi Region (called the Zambezi here) is critical for conserving wildlife in KAZA – for a number of reasons.

The Zambezi provides an important connection for animals moving north to south (e.g. Zambia to Botswana) or east to west (e.g. Zimbabwe to Angola) and vice versa;
If wildlife populations decline in this area, it will create a “sink” or vacuum that will affect wildlife in all of the neighbouring countries;
Lessons learned from conservation actions within the Zambezi, which is a microcosm of KAZA itself in many ways, can be useful for neighbouring countries.

Land use zones in the Zambezi Region are a heady mix of three National Parks, one State Forest, seven community forests, 15 communal conservancies (the community forests and conservancies often overlap), numerous villages and one major town – Katima Mulilo. With over 90,000 inhabitants in 2011, the Zambezi is one of the more densely populated parts of Namibia. Nearly 70% of the human population here is rural. While conservancies generate income from wildlife-based activities to spend mainly on community development projects, the average household relies heavily on farming activities like planting crops and raising livestock for their livelihood.

Human-lion conflict — The Kwando Carnivore Project works with several different communal conservancies in the Zambezi Region. Note the frequency of conflict with lions is particularly high in the west where conservancies lie between National Parks. © Kwando Carnivore Project

Into this milieu walks the lion; particularly the dispersing young male lion who is trying to find a pride in one of the five KAZA countries and pass his genes onto the next generation. Within a few days, a young male lion can move from Botswana to Zambia, walking right through Namibia. Young males tend to avoid the best lion habitat found in protected areas, because dominant pride males and their prides reside in these areas and will chase young interlopers out. This means they spend much of their time in farming areas and marginal habitats during their wandering adolescence. Then there are the established prides that spend most of their time in the National Parks, yet still make occasional forays into livestock farming areas nearby.

These movements inevitably bring conflict, as lions and cattle come into contact frequently and losses are suffered on both sides. According to conservancy Event Book records, 196 cattle were lost during 2012-14 leading local farmers to kill 20 lions in retaliation. One particular pride of 15 lions in 2012 had only three left by the end of 2014. Given the importance of this region within KAZA and the global importance of the KAZA lion population (one of the largest remaining strongholds for the species in Africa), the escalating human-lion conflict could not be left unchecked.

The Kwando Carnivore Project therefore established a human-lion conflict mitigation project in 2013, focusing initially on conservancies near Nkasa Rupara National Park (NP) that experienced the highest level of conflict. Given their initial success, they expanded their efforts to conservancies north of Mudumu NP in 2016. In 2017, they expanded yet again to include Namibian conservancies near the Chobe River floodplains lying to the north of Chobe NP in Botswana.

Given that lions usually attacked cattle at night while they were in makeshift traditional enclosures (“kraals”), the first order of business was to upgrade kraals in conflict hotspots to make them predator-proof. The conservancy Event Books were particularly useful in identifying where these hotspots were and the Project staff work closely with the conservancies to plan where to put kraals and then monitor the results. A total of 170 kraals have been upgraded to predator-proof status since the project began, resulting in cattle losses from kraals declining by 90% and lion killings being reduced from 20 in 2013/14 to one or two per year for the period 2015-19.

These are excellent results, but the work is far from over. Protecting cattle at night is just one part of the solution that needs to adapt with the lions’ response to cattle protection. If cattle are more difficult to prey on in one area that used to be a conflict hotspot, the lions may just move on to another area where the kraals have not been upgraded yet. If cattle are only protected at night and allowed to roam unattended during the day, then the lions adapt to target cattle during daylight. Lion behaviour changes with the seasons, as their natural prey gets easier (dry season) or harder (wet season) to find, thus making cattle more or less attractive for lions at different times of year.

The seasons also affect how people farm their livestock, which in turn affects losses to lions. Farmers allow their cattle to graze on harvested fields during the mid-dry season to help them survive until the rains come, often leaving them out there at night. Crop farmers in the Zambezi are especially busy during ploughing season, so they leave their cattle unattended more often in these times. Cattle on the Chobe floodplains are more vulnerable in the late dry season when the Chobe River almost dries up, thus allowing crocodile-free passage for lions coming from Chobe NP in Botswana. Finally, kraals that are filled with cattle dung become muddy havens for disease in the late wet season, so farmers prefer to let them roam outside to protect their health. All of these factors make cattle more vulnerable to attack by lions at certain times of year.

Due to the complexities of lion and human behaviour in response to climatic and ecological conditions, building predator-proof kraals is only part of the solution. While the project has reduced lion attacks on cattle, the issues of cattle not being brought into the kraal at night during certain times of year and not being herded during the day led to 67 cattle losses to lions during 2019.

In the coming year, the Kwando Carnivore Project will continue building kraals where they are needed but will add a few more tools to its conflict mitigation toolbox by collaborating with other conservation organisations. With Integrated Rural Development and Nature Conservation (IRDNC) and WWF-Namibia, they want to investigate employing “Lion Guards” to protect cattle during the day. Meanwhile, the Namibia Nature Foundation (NNF) and IRDNC have ideas for introducing conservation agriculture and better rangeland management practices.

Besides suffering fewer livestock losses to lions, it is important that people living with lions see a real benefit to their presence. In this way, a species currently seen as a liability can become a valued asset. The project thus assists with a Wildlife Credits scheme in Wuparo Conservancy that links lion sightings by guests at Nkasa Lupala Lodge to direct payments to the conservancy. These collaborative efforts will provide more holistic solutions to a complicated problem in a complex landscape.

How much water should lodges be using?

Picture the typical lodge scene: a sparkling pool surrounded by lush gardens, overlooking a dry riverbed. Behind the scenes, the housekeeping staff are working their way through the laundry, cleaning linen and towels for a fresh contingent of guests, while the trackers and guides are hard at work cleaning the dust and dirt from the safari vehicles. Lodges are entirely dependent on a constant supply of water, which, given their rural locations, is usually sourced from rivers, dams and boreholes that tap into the underground water supply.

The wildlife tourism industry is a significant income generator in southern Africa and supports the livelihoods of many individuals in rural communities. Yet in an area where water resources are scarce, how much water are the lodges in southern Africa using, how much should they be using and how does this compare to the consumption of surrounding communities? These are the questions that researchers from the Department of Environmental Sciences at the University of South Africa set out to answer in a new study that analyses the water quantity used at 31 wildlife lodges in South Africa, Botswana and Namibia and provides a baseline and water usage benchmark for the wildlife lodge industry in southern Africa.

There are existing international guidelines for sustainable water use and consumptive quantities in the tourism industry, but these cannot be applied to the wildlife lodge industry for one fundamental reason: most employees at a lodge reside on the premises, rather than returning home every day. Creating a baseline for lodges would need to consider daily staff water usage as well.

The researchers partnered with andBeyond and Wilderness Safaris, two companies with multiple lodges across South Africa, Namibia, and Botswana, for assistance in their research. Lodges with a variety of locations and geography (from desert to permanent swampland) were selected, and these were allocated codes to ensure anonymity. The majority of the lodges had complete water consumption records, and the study utilizes data from March 2015 until February 2017.

The researchers focussed on direct water usage, which includes all water used for bathing, gardening, laundry, cleaning, wash bays, kitchens, swimming pools and staff quarters. They used the international standard of measurement – litres per guest per night – for measurement purposes. The average water consumption across the three countries was calculated at 2,073 litres per guest per night – an amount which is exceedingly large when compared to international 5-star hotels, in some cases up to three to four times higher than the average tourism water consumption in some countries. However, in modifying these calculations to include staff numbers and their water usage, this number dropped to 503 litres per bed per night, which compares more favourably to international averages*. The water consumption by lodges was significantly higher in Botswana, while Namibia typically showed the lowest consumption levels.

* Editorial note: A certain amount of water usage will be ‘fixed’ – in other words, not materially variable based on the number of beds or by how many guests visit the camp. These include water used by core staff, the swimming pool and garden. Comparing international 5-star hotels to lodges is therefore not practical because hotels usually have more available bednights and higher occupancies – with the fixed water usage quantity, therefore, being divided by a higher figure to get to a lower average.

The study concludes by proposing the use of these averages (2,073 litres per guest per night or 503 litres per bed per night) as a benchmark for how wildlife lodges in Southern Africa should plan to manage their water consumption. These proposed benchmarks would be the first of their kind in Southern Africa to aid lodges in setting targets for water usage, as well as assisting developers in planning future lodges, but the authors suggest that these numbers would need to be reviewed regularly in the future.

While at this stage there is no governmental oversight or regulation of water usage, it is incumbent on the wildlife lodge industry in southern Africa to ensure that the lodge water consumption is sustainable to avoid disadvantaging both surrounding wildlife and local communities. Most lodges are mindful of this fact and encourage both guests and staff to conserve water but investing in water-saving measures can be costly. However, for comparison purposes, the water consumption of surrounding local communities ranged from an average of 88 to 371 litres per person per day. In setting a standard which takes into account the unique southern African lodge circumstances, this study offers a realistic starting point for lodges looking to improve or maintain their approach to water consumption.

The full study can be accessed here: “Water management in the wildlife lodge industry: A southern African perspective”, Grobler, J., Mearns, K., (2020), Second Annual Conference of the International Geographical Union Commission on African Studies

Selous be dam(n)ed

This is a time of change for Tanzania’s Selous Game Reserve – some good, some terrible.

At the Mtemere gate of Selous lies an ancient husk of an old steam train, the joints and bolts hidden beneath over a century’s worth of rust and grime. Shining against the aged relic, the attached plaque reads “This steam engine was left behind in 1917 by the German troops under Lettow-Vorbeck near Madaba/Selous Game Reserve”.

Time has taken its toll on the old train, and yet, beyond the gate, the vast wilderness landscape lies almost unchanged – for now. In common with so many of Africa’s wild places, the Selous Game Reserve has always engendered a feeling of time standing still – its vital life forces untouched by the passage of the years. Yet nothing seems to escape the inexorable march of time or the mark of human progress forever…

The Selous Game Reserve becomes Nyerere National Park

The entire protected area, historically known as the Selous Game Reserve, and for now recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is 54,600km² (5,5 million hectares) and is one of Africa’s largest and oldest protected areas. It was named after Frederick Courteney Selous, a British explorer, officer, hunter, and conservationist, who was killed by a German sniper during World War I near the Beho Beho River in the western section of the reserve, where his remains are buried today.

The Beho Beho and Ruaha rivers are just two of the many tributaries of the mighty Rufiji River, the largest river in Tanzania, which fans out into an intricate network of channels, lakes and swamps across the riverine regions of Selous. During the wet season, the Rufiji becomes a swirling torrent of brown water before spreading across floodplains downstream, filling the swamps, clearing sediment build-up, and refreshing the oxbow lakes, effectively changing the face of the landscape every year. The crocodile-infested river divides the Selous Game Reserve into two and, up until very recently, the northern sector of Selous (around 8% of the total area) was set aside for photo tourism purposes. In contrast, the rest was divided into hunting “blocks” of around 1,000km² each.

In 2019, President John Magufuli announced that the Selous Game Reserve would be split in two. The larger portion (30,893km² – more than twice the size of the Serengeti National Park) becoming the Nyerere National Park, while the southern section will, presumably, remain the Selous Game Reserve. While the exact boundaries of this new national park have yet to be formally announced, it will be the largest national park in East Africa and is named after independent Tanzania’s first president, Julius Nyerere – an iconic figure in Tanzania’s history.

What does this mean?

National Parks are afforded the highest levels of legal control over human activity and habitation within the park and are managed by the Tanzanian National Parks Authority, TANAPA. Game Reserves are similarly protected but are managed by the Tanzania Department of Wildlife with regions set aside for trophy hunting.

Selous dam — **Selous scenes as captured your Photographer of the Year entrants: Clockwise from top left: 1)** A large elephant bull wandering the wooded hills of Selous. 2) Hippo pool 3) Languishing leopard 4) northern carmine bee-eaters.

President Magufuli has made clear that the intention is to increase the tourism revenue potential of the area. While the largest protected area by far, Selous Game Reserve has typically been overshadowed by the northern Tanzanian safari circuit, including Serengeti National Park, at least in terms of photo tourism. In reference to the hunting blocks of the old Selous Game Reserve and the creation of Nyerere National Park, President Magufuli stated that “tourists come here and kill our lions, but we don’t benefit a lot from these wildlife hunting activities”. Apparently, the park management intends to improve road network to be accessible for the majority of the year (most of the luxury camps in the reserve typically close from April to June at the height of the rainy season), and the government has called on investors to look into creating new camps.

Yet for all the protection afforded by “national park” status, the plan is for the newly formed Nyerere National Park to include one of the largest dams and hydroelectric power stations in Africa. This dam will forever change the natural ebb and flow cycles of the Rufiji River and its tributaries, oxbow lakes and swamps.

Progress be dam(n)ed

Along its journey through the Selous to the Indian ocean, the Rufiji River passes through Stiegler’s Gorge, once considered to be one of the main attractions in Selous, where the water plunges through a narrow ravine with walls 100 metres high. Stiegler was a German engineer who set out to measure and survey the gorge in the early 20^th century, where he met an unfortunate end after being charged by an elephant and falling off the edge of the ravine. While the gorge’s potential for infrastructure was recognized even then, both for hydropower and irrigation, various obstacles continued to preclude its development. When President Nyerere turned the newly independent country’s plans towards hydropower, donors chose to finance smaller hydropower dams at Kidatu, Mtera and Pangani.

After a series of extensive studies and investigations, the World Bank concluded that the construction of a large dam was simply not viable at Stiegler’s Gorge. Plans continued to fall through until current President Magufuli announced in 2017 that the dam would be a flagship development project of his government. Logging teams moved into the area at the beginning of 2019 and, as of June 2020, the project was declared to be close to 40% complete (though this seems highly unlikely for a construction project of this magnitude). According to a statement by the President Magufuli, only 10% of the Tanzanian population is connected to the national power grid, and the dam is expected to contribute some 2,115 megawatts in a country where regular load shedding causes enormous losses to the GDP.

While there is no question that Tanzania needs to increase its electricity production substantially, critics of the Stiegler’s Gorge dam project are far from convinced that a mega-dam is the answer. There are profound concerns surrounding the economic and technical viability of the project (a full and objective assessment of the costs can be found here), and many external experts suggest that alternative options such as smaller dams, natural gas or renewable energy sources such as wind and solar would have been less risky. Yet it is a risk the government of Tanzania appears to be determined to take, regardless of the consequences, be they financial or, perhaps even more concerning, ecological.

EIA? What EIA?

The controversial dam and Julius Nyerere Hydropower Station, to be built by Egyptian construction companies, are expected to cover around 1,350 km²(135,000 hectares) upon completion. This covered area equates to about 2,5% of the total protected area of the Selous but will destroy significant portions of forest and riverine habitat and impact the downstream ecosystems. The plans were met with resounding criticism from many conservation organizations, as well as the IUCN and UNESCO’s World Heritage Centre. They called for an immediate halt to logging and construction efforts.

The Environmental Impact Assessment submitted in 2018 by the University Consultancy Bureau of the University of Dar es Salaam has been slammed by critics (including this technical review by the IUCN) for a combination of factual errors, an oversimplified approach to an immensely complex project, and the omission of several significant environmental consequences. The EIA does not meet the required international standards on almost every level and goes so far as to suggest that the construction of the dam will result in increased biodiversity in the area and control salinity levels downstream. Dr Rolf Baldus, an economist and expert on the Selous, concluded that this “EIA does not deserve the name it carries, and its academic authors have lost all scientific credibility”.

The price of power

Before the 2018 EIA, the WWF released their assessment of the Stiegler’s Gorge Hydropower Dam, entitled “The True Cost of Power“. The report provides a far more substantive evaluation of the impact of the proposed dam, from disrupted connectivity of habitats and erosion to increased downstream sedimentation and the loss of downstream lakes. It also highlights the fact that the area downstream of the gorge is the richest habitat area in the Selous, with the largest concentration of fauna and flora. This area is almost entirely dependent on the seasonal pulse of the river. Even further downstream, though equally reliant on the seasonal flow of the river, the Rufiji River Delta is home to the largest mangrove stand in East Africa and is a designated RAMSAR site. The livelihoods of the populations reliant on the river for agriculture and small fishers are also of concern. The report concludes that “it is unprecedented to risk losing the integrity of not one, but two globally significant protected areas to a hydropower project”.

President Magufuli has dismissed environmental concerns. “Tanzania is among global leaders in conservation activities, having allocated over 32% of our country’s total land to conservation,” he said. “Nobody can teach us about conservation.”

A World Heritage Site in Danger

Somewhat unsurprisingly, the World Heritage Committee is expected to strip the Selous Game Reserve of its World Heritage status should these plans continue due to the significant and irreversible damage to the region’s Outstanding Universal Value. The Committee had already placed the Selous on the List of World Heritage in Danger in 2014. According to their report at the time, the number of elephants and rhinos in the reserve has dropped by almost 90% since 1982. While these numbers have stabilized in the last few years due to concerted conservation efforts, there are believed to be just over 15,000 elephants and a handful of black rhino remaining. To put this into perspective, there were over 100,000 elephants in the Selous Game Reserve in 1976.

To add insult to ecological injury, a uranium mine was established in the south-western corner of the Selous in the 1990s which required an extensive boundary modification to the World Heritage Site. By January 2017, there were 48 prospective mining concessions within the greater Selous ecosystem. While the Tanzanian Wildlife Authority has confirmed that none of these will be opened for exploration and no concession will be granted in the future, a 2018 Geological Survey of Tanzania confirmed the presence of copper, silver, cobalt, zinc, and gold in the Selous.

Conclusion

In general, internal criticisms of the Stiegler’s Dam project have been somewhat muted, which is perhaps unsurprising after Tanzania’s environment minister announced that “the government will go ahead with the implementation of the project whether you like it or not…those who are resisting the project will be jailed”. According to international experts, the chances are that the construction of Stiegler’s Gorge Dam will cost far more than anticipated and its completion will be delayed, probably by more than six years. In the process, conservationists estimate that close to 3 million trees will be cleared in the dam’s intended reservoir.

For now, however, life goes on in Nyerere National Park and Selous Game Reserve as it has for thousands of years, albeit largely at the mercy of human impact. Elephants wade through the swamps, dwarfed by enormous, towering borasis palms, and the park’s network of waterways continue to supply the vast abundance of life around them.

Africa’s Wild Dogs – A Survival Story

Africa’s Wild Dogs – A Survival Story is a photographic book celebrating these charismatic predators and telling their story. All royalties raised from the sale of the book and photographs will go to organisations at the frontline of African wild dog (painted wolf) conservation.

The story of the persecution of Africa’s wild dog is well known. In 1914, R C F Maugham, a prolific British writer, explorer and hunter, was so enraged and appalled when he witnessed a wild dog kill that he declared the dogs’ undesirable vermin’ and ‘an abomination’, calling for their extermination. Other ‘conservationists’ and farmers at the time shared this view and so began the systematic decimation of African wild dog (painted wolf) populations, leaving just a few scattered packs in southern Africa.

Times have changed, and the collective efforts of scientists and conservationists have seen great strides in improving the outlook for these fascinating predators. In putting together these images, I was driven by a strong desire to move the narrative forward and create a visual statement of these enigmatic and lively animals in a way that will reveal their extraordinary natures. Africa’s Wild Dogs – A Survival Story documents my adventure with the dogs, my insights into their lives and their future.

When I started on my wild dog adventure just five years ago, I was relatively new to photography. Naturally, I wanted to capture the typical iconic shots of them standing shoulder or dashing after each other in a game of chase, but my vision centred around creating portraits. I found myself lying in the dirt and lugging lenses while racing across the bushveld and trekking through thick bush, not to mention waking up before the dawn to spend hours searching for my subjects. It was then that I learned that you never find wild dogs – they find you.

An intense stare from an African wild dog

Through my time spent in the company of wild dogs, I have witnessed how they hold their own in the animal kingdom, playing a vital role in the ecological balance. They are equally deserving of the respect and awe generally attributed to larger, more fearsome predators.

Possibly the most successful hunters of all the larger predators, wild dogs work as a close-knit team to bring down their prey. They are athletic, long-limbed predators that seem to have boundless energy. They seldom sleep for long, and when it is time to move, they tend to run rather than walk.

In following this dream, I was able to team up with like-minded and passionate people. I am so grateful to have learnt from scientists who have sat for hours observing, checking and double-checking their facts to understand and explain wild dog behaviour. Each pack-family-member knows their role and sticks to it. They care for the pack’s puppies with dedication and do everything in their power to keep them safe and healthy.

I was privileged enough to witness tiny month-old pups being greeted by the rest of the pack for the very first time. The pack had been dancing merrily around the mouth of the den, calling and whooping until the alpha female deemed the timing appropriate. As the puppies crawled to the lip of the den, they were met with the adoring attentions of the older pack members – gently licked, sniffed, and examined from the tip of their tiny noses to their tails.

And there is good news. Under the careful guidance of Dr Harriet Davies-Mostert, her fellow scientists, researchers, rangers and all the hardworking volunteers at the Wild Dog Advisory Group (WAG) have been diligently sharing knowledge, research, and experience to nurture wild dog packs. And the numbers are growing. So much so that suitable and sustainable reserves and parks need to be found for these new families. Packs have been successfully translocated to Mozambique, Malawi and beyond. We now have approximately 6600 wild dogs in southern Africa.

All funds raised from the sale of my Wild Dog images and all royalties from the sale of Africa’s Wild Dogs – A Survival Story will go into the non-profit organisation: Africa’s Wild Dog Survival Fund and from there to the following organisations across southern Africa in appreciation of their participation in the book:

Dr Harriet Davies-Mostert, Head of Conservation – Endangered Wildlife Trust (EWT) South Africa and Chair of WAG – Wild Dog Advisory Group.

Dr Tico McNutt, Botswana Predator Conservation Trust.

Reena Walker University of Idaho – who conducted her Sneeze to Leave research together with the Botswana Predator Conservation Trust.

Prof Scott Creel, Zambian Carnivore Programme.

Dr Rosemary Groom, African Wildlife Conservation Fund (AWCF) – Zimbabwe.

Dr Dave Druce, KZN Wild Dog Management Group.

Nick Murray, Bushlife Conservancy: Painted Wolf Conservancy, Bushlife Support Unit Trust, Zimbabwe.

BUY THE BOOK HERE: Amazon or Random House (South Africa)

About the author

Jocelin Kagan’s passion for wildlife crystallised when she saw her first wild dog in 2010. ‘It was love at first sight’. Since then, Jocelin has been photographing and tracking wild dogs in Mana Pools in Zimbabwe, Botswana, the Timbavati in South Africa, and the Selous Game Reserve in Tanzania. Jocelin has embarked on an ambitious undertaking to make known the plight of this most successful strategist of all predators. She holds Higher Primary Teacher’s Diploma with specialization in Speech & Drama from the University of Cape Town, a Master Practitioner Certification in Neuro-Linguistic Programming and a Henley Management College MBA, and is the published author of four books, an educator, and a public speaker.

Elephants & cattle – restoring soil nutrient levels

Researchers working in the Kenya Long-term Enclosure Experiment have been monitoring the effects of the presence or absence of elephants and other wild herbivores and cattle on savanna ecosystems for 20 years, to understand the impact that each has on the critical processes of long-term functioning of the ecosystem itself.

As wild animal populations decrease throughout Africa, many populations have been replaced by livestock, particularly cattle. As would be expected, moderate to large densities of cattle have negative effects on the nutrient levels in the soils of these habitats, particularly the carbon and nitrogen pools and cycles. One of the main questions that the study set out to answer was whether or not land management strategies could be formulated to minimize the negative impact of the presence of cattle.

The study, funded by the National Science Foundation, showed that the presence of megaherbivores, particularly elephants, increased the total soil carbon and nitrogen pools and reversed the negative effects of cattle-related depletion. The researchers believe that there may be livestock management practices that could be compatible with the conservation of these habitats. Their results suggest that there may be ways for the negative impact of moderate densities of cattle to be mitigated by the presence of wild herbivores in “black cotton” savanna habitats, but crucially this wild herbivore mix must include larger species such as elephants.

Cattle and hippo © www.elephantsforafrica.org

“By experimentally manipulating both domestic and wild herbivores in combinations that occur in the real world, this research demonstrates the importance of megaherbivores to sustaining natural savanna ecosystems,” said Betsy von Holle, program director in NSF’s Division of Environmental Biology.

The full study can be found here: Negative effects of cattle on soil carbon and nutrient pools reversed by megaherbivores, Sitters, J. et al, (2020), Journal of Nature Sustainability.

Queen Elizabeth National Park

Queen Elizabeth National Park offers a classic safari with a few twists. The impressive variety of habitats includes acacia woodland, grass savannah, lakes, rivers, dense papyrus swamps, rainforest and extinct volcanic crater cones with lakes.

For some 3 million years, the impassive Rwenzori Mountains have born witness to the natural and human forces that have shaped equatorial Africa. Following the line of the Albertine Rift, the western branch of Africa’s Great Rift Valley, these jagged, snow-capped peaks are evidence of a time when enormous tectonic forces shaped the face of the African continent. One day, these mountains will mark the line where the African continent will split in two, the ocean rushing in to fill the space. But only in the next 10 million or so years.

For now, the Rwenzori Mountains, or the Mountains of the Moon, serve as the dramatic boundary between the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda and create the perfect backdrop for a unique and thriving wilderness.

The fantastic variety of scenery and safari experiences make it easy to understand why Queen Elizabeth National Park (QENP) is one of Uganda’s most popular safari destinations.

The basics

Situated in southwestern Uganda, QENP covers an estimated 1,978km2 (close to 200,000 hectares). The park is bookended by Lake George in the northeast and Lake Edward to the southwest, linked by a stretch of water known as the Kazinga Channel, and is contiguous with Virunga National Park in the DRC. The smaller Kibale National Park, Kigezi and Kyambura Game Reserves all border the park and serve as buffer zones for the ecosystem. Near the northern boundary of the park are four other major protected areas: Rwenzori Mountains National Park, Semliki National Park, Toro Game Reserve and Katonga Game Reserve. The gorilla-trekking Eden of Bwindi Impenetrable National Park lies about 150km to the south.

Formerly known as Kazinga National Park, QENP was renamed to commemorate a visit from Queen Elizabeth II in 1954, while Uganda was still under colonial rule. After independence and through the troubled decades that followed, the people of Uganda were to suffer terrible hardships and unimaginable cruelty, and, as is so often the case with human conflict, the wildlife paid a dreadful price as well. In so many ways, this is what makes QENPark such an extraordinary wilderness – it is a testament to the dedication of the local population’s determination to restore the country’s wildlife in the face of destruction wrought by war. This same dedication allowed Uganda’s elephant population to recover from 700 remaining individuals in the 1980s to more than 5,000 today – a revival of more than 600%.

Seismic scenery

To those who know and love Africa’s wild spaces, each one offers its own particular brand of unique beauty, and QENP is no exception. The land is pockmarked by explosion craters, magnificent calderas filled with either saltwater lakes or rich savannah, each capturing a feeling of a world within a world, a place where time seems to stand still. Seen from the air, it is easy to imagine the violent explosions of superheated gas that created the Katwe and Bunyaruguru crater fields.

A mosaic landscape of unique features and habitats, QENP’s fortunate visitors can go from exploring expansive savannahs dotted by euphorbia trees to the lush paths beneath the canopy of the Maramagambo Forest or drift down the Kazinga Channel on a boat, past one of the largest populations of hippos in Africa.

Tree-climbing lions

While Uganda’s diverse landscapes are always a drawcard, QENP offers first-rate wildlife viewing as well, with over 95 recorded mammal species including elephants, buffalos, hyenas, leopards, lions, giant forest hogs and chimpanzees as well as herds of Ugandan cob. It is also one of the few places where visitors are almost guaranteed to see tree-climbing lions, found only in the southern Ishasha region.

Unlike their leopard cousins, lions are not typically particularly skilful tree climbers. Their impressive bulk puts them at the top of the predator hierarchy and imparts the power to pull down powerful prey, but they are not well designed for nimble balance or agile leaps. While all lions can and occasionally do climb trees, it is very seldom that they make a habit of it. Yet, in QENP, the lions are famed for their arboreal tendencies. Not even a shared familial ability to look comfortable whatever the situation can bely the incongruity of 150kgs of lion draped over the spikey limbs of a giant euphorbia tree. The most likely explanation for their behaviour is that it helps them to escape from the tsetse flies that plague the area and perhaps capitalize on the cool breezes a few meters above ground level.

The chimpanzees of Kyambura Gorge

In the mystical forests of Kyambura Gorge (cover image) in the heart of QENP ecosystem, there is a small, isolated population of primates that have become known as the “Lost Chimpanzees”. These chimpanzees are isolated from the other populations in the larger forested areas of the park, lone survivors cut off by the historic deforestation of the area. Now protected in the Kyambura Game Reserve which was created as a buffer zone to the national park, these chimps are the only habituated individuals in the region. While finding them is not always guaranteed (chimpanzees can cover vast distances in a short space of time), the experience of tracking them down is a reward in itself and contributes immensely towards the empowerment of the local community and the slow but steady process of reforesting key areas.

A birder’s paradise

It is no exaggeration to suggest that Queen Elizabeth National Park offers some of the best birding in Africa, thanks mainly to its astonishing variety of different habitats. There are over 610 different bird species recorded, the second-highest of any park on the continent. A visit to Lake Kikorongo (an extension of Lake George) offers the chance to see the legendary shoebills, though the keen birders can also occupy themselves with the search for the papyrus gonolek in the reeds while en-route. Raptors of every shape and size scud across the skies, from the vast martial and crowned eagles to palm-nut vultures and the angular outlines of keen-eyed grey kestrels. The lakes and channels provide the ideal habitat for a plethora of water and swamp species including both species of pelicans, white-winged and gull-billed terns, African skimmers, and swamp flycatchers. Moving from Ishasha to Mweya you will do well keeping an eye out for African crake, blue-throated roller, sooty chat, black-and-white shrike-flycatcher, northern black flycatcher, black-headed gonolek, moustached grass warbler, red-chested sunbird, and slender-billed weaver. Read more about bird-watching in QENP here Uganda’s other best bird-watching spots.

The safari experience

With so much to offer both in terms of scenic diversity and the variety of available activities, a visit to QENP should be savoured by allowing adequate time to explore. Booking a stay at one of several luxury lodges will guarantee access to an experienced and knowledgeable guide to tie together the richness of the biodiversity and history of the region, and, naturally, to make the most of the wildlife viewing opportunities. The lodge will also be able to tailor the various activities to the interests of its guests. There are also several budget accommodation options, and it is relatively simple for a competent driver to travel through most areas of the park and the surrounding regions. That said, be prepared for what is euphemistically referred to as an “African massage”, particularly just after the rainy season when the roads have dried out but are rutted and uneven where many a vehicle has fallen foul of the cloying mud during the wet months. The highest rainfall levels are experienced in April and May and October to November in the south, which can mean closed roads and postponed experiences. Though the drier months offer the best wildlife viewing, the park is open year-round.

Want to go on safari to Queen Elizabeth National Park? To find lodges, search for our ready-made packages or get in touch with our travel team to arrange your safari, scroll down to after this story.

Donkey smugglers profit off wildlife trafficking routes

Cross-border donkey smugglers in Zimbabwe and Botswana are operating pipelines used for ivory, pangolins and Covid-19 contraband. Oscar Nkala investigates for Oxpeckers Investigative Environmental Journalism

*In rural villages on both sides of the border, donkeys are valued as draught animals. ©Oscar Nkala*

To new arrivals, “Dip 27” is no different from any other rural service centre in Madabe communal lands south of Plumtree in Zimbabwe. Yet locals know that the daytime semblance of law-abiding peace masks a vast cross-border crime enterprise that makes millions from running ivory, illegal immigrants, contraband cigarettes, marijuana and, of late, stolen donkeys in or out of Botswana.

With unhindered access to vast stretches of the unfenced border with Botswana 7km west and a highway link to Plumtree town 40 minutes to the north, Dip 27 is a citadel of smugglers seeking quick and hassle-free access to Botswana.

By day, trucks from Harare and Maputo deliver contraband cigarettes and liquor. From dusk to dawn, baggage carriers cart goods across the dry Ramogkwebana River into Botswana for fees ranging between P100 (R145) and P1,000 (R1,450) per crossing, depending on quantity and risk levels involved.

On the second day of posing as a stranded motorist at Dip 27 business centre, Oxpeckers met a rustler who asked not to be named. He said he had been a “money changer” [illegal foreign currency dealer] at Plumtree border post until it closed due to Covid-19 late in March.

“The closure of the border and subsequent ban on alcohol and cigarettes in Botswana created new money-spinning options as those products are available in Zimbabwe,” he said. “Minor smuggling springboards like Madabe started bustling with contraband goods.”

According to the rustler, Mozambicans use the pipeline to run elephant tusks to Chinese clients in Francistown, about 80km from the border in Botswana. Smuggling syndicates from Harare and Bulawayo also run marijuana, alcohol and cigarettes to Botswana and South Africa, he said.

Investigations by Oxpeckers established that these men who call themselves Mozambicans may be Zimbabweans working for a seemingly well-connected Harare-based syndicate that has for years kept a low profile while quietly running ivory and live pangolins to as yet unidentified Chinese buyers in Francistown.

Police sources stationed at the border post said the syndicate reaps most of its ivory from Matusadona National Park, about 680km away in Zimbabwe, and uses government vehicles to transport the tusks from Harare to Plumtree.

“We have arrested the runners before, but they only go for an initial appearance in court, get bail and disappear,” said a police detective who requested anonymity for fear of reprisals.

He cited the example of a smuggler who was arrested in February 2019 while allegedly trying to smuggle seven elephant tusks across the border stashed in several places including the engine compartment of a BMW vehicle. He had Mozambican papers, but on further investigation, he was found to be a Zimbabwean from Harare.

“On his phone, we found the contact details and several calls made to a Botswana landline, which later turned out to be a Chinese-owned shop at China Mall in Francistown,” the detective said.

“Just as we were preparing to collaborate with the Botswana police on a sting operation to arrest the alleged Chinese buyer, we were told to send our suspect to court, where he appeared only once and was let out on bail. He returned to Harare immediately and the next thing I got a call from one of my commanders saying I should hand over all case files and evidence, including the Zimbabwean identity document and Mozambican passport of the suspect and two cellphones I had confiscated, and to stop investigating the matter.

“She told me the matter would be handed over to Interpol since it now involved Botswana. I was shocked at how the case was being handed over to Interpol without the suspect, but I did as ordered. Within a week I saw the same man driving a different car into Zimbabwe from Botswana.

“Ivory smuggling is one of the biggest criminal enterprises of the Ramokgwebana border area, and the buyers operate various cover businesses at China Mall in Francistown,” the detective said.

Donkey smugglers

Donkey smugglers on the Botswana side of the border are mostly locals from nearby villages, but the masterminds of the smuggling syndicates are predominantly Zimbabwean. On both sides of the border, donkeys are used by communities for ploughing and transporting humans, water and essential goods.

Oxpeckers met the alleged kingpin of a prominent cross-border donkey rustling syndicate in Nxele, a Zimbabwean border village that shares water, shops and grazing pastures with the Botswana villages. He declined to be identified and photographed but agreed to discuss the Zimbabwean link to the cross-border donkey skin trade.

“In all border villages donkeys are most sought after because the Chinese abattoir in Francistown is failing to get its weekly requirement of 100 donkeys from Botswana,” he said. “Zimbabwean syndicates have stepped in to fill the gap with stolen stock.

“To reach their weekly targets, middlemen even hire thieves to steal donkeys from Batswana who refuse to sell. They bring those to Zimbabwe to swap with stolen stock for the abattoir.”

On the Zimbabwe side, donkeys sell for between US$20 (about R330) and US$30 (R500). Due to the scarcity of donkeys in Botswana, prices across the border have more than doubled from P200 (R290) in 2017 to P500 (R725).

Norman Mpofu, former Member of Parliament for the region, told Oxpeckers there was widespread trafficking of donkeys between Botswana and Zimbabwe, with most of the traffic going one-way in favour of Botswana.

“I am not sure if they are going to an abattoir or not, but far too many donkeys are disappearing into thin air in Botswana. Something with a big appetite is eating them in Botswana,” Mpofu said.

“Once in Botswana, the trail turns cold. Syndicates exploit loopholes ranging from collapsed border fences to lack of resources and corruption among border police.”

*Dead donkey on the smuggling route linking Madabe in Zimbabwe to Matope in Botswana. ©Oscar Nkala*

Image: Dead donkey on the smuggling route linking Madabe in Zimbabwe to Matope in Botswana. Photo: Oscar Nkala

Rustlers Gorge

Plumtree is not the only Zimbabwean cross-border donkey theft hotbed with links to the Bo Chang abattoir in Francistown. In Gwanda South, about 200km away, cattle- and donkey-rustling syndicates with tentacles reaching into Botswana are found in Kafusi, Rustlers Gorge and Shanyaugwe.

When Oxpeckers visited Rustlers Gorge, an age-old smugglers route dating back to the 1800s, members of the Neighbourhood Watch Committee were interrogating three suspects arrested while trying to drive 54 stolen donkeys into Botswana. The men were later handed over to the police and taken to the provincial capital, Gwanda, for trial. The outcome of the court proceedings could not be established at the time of publication.

Village head Keabetso Nare said the donkey thefts have escalated in recent months, with almost all being smuggled into Botswana, where they disappear without a trace.

“The trend is now alarming. They take entire herds in one raid and drive them across the border within hours. The border is just a river. No fence and no signposts. You can be in Botswana without even knowing it,” he said.

“Donkeys stolen from Rustlers Gorge and other Zimbabwean villages end up in Botswana for sale. Previously, we could recover animals in Botswana, but nowadays everything that goes in vanishes without a trace,” Nare said.

Efforts by Oxpeckers to get comment from the Zimbabwe Republic Police were fruitless.

Zimbabwe’s Department of Veterinary Services said their figures showed cross-border movements of donkeys due to theft and straying are rampant between the two countries. Veterinary disease control regulations introduced in 2006 empower the Botswana police to shoot and destroy the remains of all cloven-hoofed animals found to be in the country illegally – in July alone, 108 donkeys from Zimbabwe were shot dead in Botswana.

The Botswana government temporarily closed down the donkey trade in 2017 after hundreds of rotten carcasses were found at the Bo Chang abattoir in Francistown, with fluids seeping into the main river. ©Oscar Nkala

Bo Chang abattoir

Animal welfare organisations in Botswana believe the smuggled donkeys end up at the Bo Chang abattoir in Francistown.

The Bo Chang Group returned to Botswana in April 2018, a year after the government temporarily suspended all licences for the slaughter and export of donkeys and their products as a result of the inhumane treatment of donkeys at Bo Chang, which was also operating an industrial-scale facility without a waste disposal plant (See the Oxpeckers exposé “Inside Botswana’s illegal donkey trade”).

Bo Chang exports donkey meat and hides to China, where the skins are used to make ejiao, a traditional medicine marketed as having life-extending, anti-ageing and aphrodisiac qualities.

When Botswana re-opened the donkey skin trade in April 2018, Bo Chang Group was one of four applicants who obtained operating licences. Its abattoir re-opened in October 2019 and by March 2020 the facility was slaughtering an estimated 50 donkeys a week. The donkeys were primarily sourced from Gumare near Maun.

Mpho Kganyago, an animal welfare activist, affiliated with the Botswana Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, said the abattoir stopped buying donkeys in Maun in November 2019 and turned to villages along the border with Zimbabwe, where the communities refused to sell.

“In February they were down to the point of using a 2-tonne truck to deliver about four donkeys per week. In May they suddenly started receiving a double-decker 34-tonne truck with a capacity of 100 donkeys per week.

“Today, they slaughter up to 100 donkeys per week. We have tracked their truck movements to border villages, and when our village-based monitors reported no large-scale buying of donkeys, we realised they were not coming from Botswana. The cross-border donkey theft syndicates have now turned to smuggling animals from Zimbabwe to supply the Bo Chang Group abattoir,” she said.

Claire Mayers of the Bulawayo-based Matebeleland Animal Rescue and Equine Sanctuary said her organisation has been receiving reports of donkeys being stolen in Zimbabwe and trafficked to the abattoir in Botswana.

“We have heard reports of donkeys being stolen for illegal exports to Botswana from our community-based groups in and around Marula since last year,” Mayers said. “Unfortunately, we are unable to verify if indeed they are being taken to the abattoir. What we can confirm is that donkey theft is a huge problem for communities around the western border, and there are suggestions that they end up in the abattoir in Francistown.”

Oscar Nkala is an Associate of Oxpeckers Investigative Environmental Journalism. This investigation was supported by The Donkey Sanctuary and was published by The Standard in Zimbabwe here.

Find related investigations in the Oxpeckers Donkey Trade Files dossier

Cyanobacteria to blame for elephant deaths – Botswana officials

Tests have revealed cyanobacterial neurotoxins to be the cause of the deaths of hundreds of elephants in Botswana, according to an official announcement from the Principal Veterinary Officer of Botswana’s Department of Wildlife and National Parks, Mmadi Reuben. He also confirmed that the official number of elephant deaths had risen from 281 to 330 but that no further carcasses had been found since July.

The elephants died in the Seronga district of Botswana’s Okavango Delta between March and June this year. Many of the carcasses were found near water, but officials quickly ruled out poisoning or poaching, and further tests also eliminated the possibility of an anthrax or encephalomyocarditis virus outbreak.

Cyanotoxins remained as a possible cause. They are produced by cyanobacteria that occur in water and, under certain conditions, from blooms of blue-green algae which are often associated with the end of a drought. The bacteria produce potent neurotoxins, hepatotoxins, cytotoxins and endotoxins that have been known to cause the deaths of aquatic animals, birds, livestock and even humans.

Several samples were sent for testing in laboratories in South Africa, Canada, Zimbabwe, and the United States, but results were delayed due to the strain of Covid-19 on various testing centres.

There are still several unanswered questions, such why these toxins seemed to affect only elephants in that particular area, and Mmadi Reuben confirmed that officials are still investigating.

The cause of death of the 22 elephants in Zimbabwe is still being investigated, and while it may be due to cyanotoxins, this has yet to be confirmed.

Swimming blind – why critically endangered blind cave catfish needs research

by Clinton Hay of the Namibia Nature Foundation and University of Namibia

Originally published in Conservation Namibia

Clarias cavernicola or blind cave catfish, as it is called in English, is known only from one cave near Otavi in Namibia, where it lives in total darkness. It is classified as Critically Endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the global authority on the status of nature and its species. The total population of catfish in the cave is probably less than 200 individuals, which is the minimum genetically viable population size required for any species to survive over a longer period of time. This makes the blind cave catfish one of the rarest freshwater fish species in the world.

This little catfish species, which grows only up to 17 cm long, has lost its eyes. Additionally, it lacks the pigmentation that produces the normal dark skin colour of other catfish species, and is thus a beautiful golden-pink. In a dark cave, eyes and skin pigmentation are not necessary for survival, so it is likely that not producing these characteristics is part of the catfish’s survival strategy. Conserving energy is especially important for survival when food is scarce. It seems that this rare catfish feeds mainly on invertebrates or insects falling into the cave. Another possible item on the catfish’s menu is an isopod (a shrimp-like organism) that is also endemic to this cave and lacks colour and eyes. Our research team further speculates that the catfish uses guano from the bats in the cave to supplement its meagre invertebrate diet.

The cave catfish seems to be closely related to the snakehead catfish found in the Kunene, Kavango and Zambezi rivers. Since catfish species in these rivers need a flood to stimulate breeding, we assume that the cave catfish needs similar conditions to breed. During Namibia’s summertime thunderstorms, water rushes into the cave and may stimulate breeding. We found that females carry about 50 transparent, sticky eggs with a greenish yolk. On a recent research dive we found smaller individuals of around 5 cm in length, indicating successful breeding within the last couple of years although very little is known about the growth rates of this species.

The water in the cave is currently very clear, but if that were to change it might negatively affect reproduction, as the sticky eggs will be smothered by particles suspended in the water, thus limiting the oxygen supply to the eggs. The newly hatched larvae of this catfish are very small, meaning their food source must be even smaller. The larvae of other catfish species feed on large zooplankton, but we do not yet know what the cave catfish larvae feed on; this is one of our future research questions.

A team from Dantica Diving did a recent research dive in the cave, with kind permission from the owner of the property where the cave is located. Given their rarity and vulnerability, studying this fish species calls for the utmost care to avoid disturbance and harm to individuals. On a previous dive, one of our team went down to a depth of around 90 metres and still did not find the bottom of the cave. Despite the great depth of the cave, the catfish were only found at a maximum depth of 15 metres. It seems they prefer to live near the surface on ledges where food is readily available. Consequently, the catfish is very vulnerable to lowering the water table, as much of their food source accumulates in an area that may no longer be accessible to them if the water level drops.

What will the future bring for this unique and rare fish species? Current threats to its survival include: direct negative impacts on the cave and its water, future climate change resulting in less rainfall and subsequent lowering of the water table, a decline in their food source and illegal harvesting for the aquarium trade. The survival of the blind cave catfish depends on the integrity of the entire ecosystem. Anything that negatively affects the ecosystem around the cave may eventually affect the catfish. It is therefore very important to protect the ecosystem around the cave, although factors such as climate change require international conservation efforts.

On a positive note, there seem to be more openings to the cave that we have not yet been able to explore. It is therefore possible that there are more catfish near these openings, but this has not yet been confirmed. The Namibia Nature Foundation is supporting this research project with funding from the Namibian Chamber of Environment and the Norwegian Institute for Nature Research. We hope to better understand these incredible, unique fish and ensure that they continue to survive in this cave, their only habitat in the world.

Research team:

Clinton Hay (University of Namibia/Namibia Nature Foundation)
Francois Jacobs (Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources)
Tor Naesje (Norwegian Institute for Nature Resource)
Gerhard Jacobs (SLR Environmental Consulting)
Reuben Engels (Dantica Diving)
Chris Steenkamp (Dantica Diving)

FOSSA: 5 fascinating facts

The island of Madagascar has been isolated for the last 88 or so million years, giving the fauna and flora of the island ample time to evolve into an eclectic assortment of strange shapes and sizes, from cat-sized chameleons to hairy, long-fingered aye-ayes. For evolutionary biologists, it is a wonderment of ecological mysteries that have the potential to provide an unparalleled insight into the way life as we know it has developed. There is one peculiar creature that presents the archetypal Madagascan enigma: an animal that looks like a bizarre cross between a mongoose and a cat, and, quite possibly, a civet. Despite being the island’s largest predator and having a fundamental role in the Madagascan ecosystem, the fossa (also spelt fosa) has always lurked in the shadows cast by the more popular and better-researched lemurs.

1. What is it – a cat? A mongoose?

The simple answer is that the fossa belongs to its own family: the Eupleridae, but the riddle of their classification has kept biologists occupied for centuries. Edward Turner Bennet first described the fossa in 1833, identifying it as a kind of civet and, therefore, part of the viverrid family. To complicate matters, however, the fossa has several features in common with the felid (cat), herpestid (mongoose) and viverrid (civets and genets) families, including retractable claws, felid-like dentition, a viverrid-shaped skull and a herpestid body structure. As technology developed, biologists increased the tools in their species-classification process, but even then, no clear answer presented itself. A series of studies conducted in the 1990s still resulted in different conclusions – one DNA study grouped the fossa with the herpestids. In contrast, another morphological study concluded that they should be grouped with the felids.

Finally, in 2003, scientists conducted extensive nuclear and mitochondrial gene analysis to prove conclusively that all carnivores in Madagascar share a common ancestor that excludes all other known carnivores, though their closest relatives are Asian and African herpestids. Thus, the fossa and the 9 other endemic Malagasy carnivores were placed in their own family: the Eupleridae.

The relationships of the individual species within the Eupleridae are still poorly understood but, as it stands, the fossa’s closest relatives are the two falanouc species, the Malagasy civet, the ring-tailed vontsira and four Malagasy mongoose species.

2. Madagascar’s dominant (natural) predator

While the astounding predatory skills of members of the mongoose and civet families are often eclipsed by the dramatic larger carnivores, their hunting style is acrobatic and lightning-fast. The fossa’s hunting prowess is equally formidable – combining cat-like power with mongoose speed and agility. Equally at home on the ground or in trees, fossa are capable of adjusting their feet to either a plantigrade-like (walking on the souls of the feet like a human)or digitigrade-like (walking on its toes, and not touching the ground with its heels, like a dog) gait, and the ankle joints in their back legs are extremely flexible, allowing them to descend trees head-first.

An adult fossa can reach lengths of around 1.5m (including its long tail) and can weigh over 8kg. They are opportunistic hunters and will feed on rodents, birds, and reptiles, as well as invertebrates. Their main prey, however, is lemurs, some of which can reach almost the same weight as the fossa themselves. Interestingly, while fossa are primarily solitary in nature, Mia-Lana Lührs (one of the world’s few experts on the fossa) witnessed three males cooperatively hunting a sifaka. She believes that this may well be an evolutionary throwback to a time when giant lemurs existed on Madagascar.

3. Battle of the sexes

Even though males are slightly bigger than females, the mating process is dominated by the female by the simple expedient of conducting her dalliances in a tree. In a highly seasonal behaviour most similar to lekking (seen in some bird and antelope species), a female in oestrus ascends a tree judged to be sufficiently sturdy to accommodate energetic activity (often reusing the same tree year after year) and calls loudly to declare her status to the males in the area. For up to a week, would-be suitors gather at the mating site, competing for her attentions, and suitable males will be permitted to join her on the branch for a few hours at a time. The process is accompanied by cacophonous vocalizations and astounding displays of dexterity.

Mating is somewhat protracted due to the backwards facing barbs on the male’s penis (which itself can extend to between his front legs), and the formation of a copulatory tie. Penile spines are relatively common in the mammal kingdom and usually consist of small barbs of keratin which are believed to play a role in triggering ovulation or removing copulatory plugs. They are found in many members of the cat, rodent and primate families, though it appears, mercifully, that human ancestors lost theirs around 700,000 years ago.

4. Going through changes

Litters of up to six youngsters are born in a suitable den after a 90-day gestation period and stay with their mothers for the first year, only reaching sexual maturity at around 3-4 years of age. This relatively slow developmental process also translates into an extended life expectancy – fossa in captivity have been known to live over 20 years. Bizarrely, young females display what is known as transient masculinization: at around 1-2 years, the clitoris enlarges and develops spines similar to a male’s penis. This gradually diminishes in size as the female reaches sexual maturity, and it is possible that this mechanism reduces harassment by adult males and/or aggression from adult females. This transient masculinization is extremely rare in the mammal kingdom.

5. There may be fewer than 2,500 fossa left in the world.

And this may be an overestimate. The fossa population size is challenging to measure, but research suggests that only the Masoala-Makira and Zahamena-Mantadia-Vohidrazana forest ecosystems are of sufficient size to support a population of more than 500 adults. Despite their widespread distribution, fossa seem to occur at extremely low densities for a predator of their size, which in turn makes the fragmented and small protected areas available to them insufficient to support viable populations. While they are currently listed as ‘vulnerable’ by the IUCN Red List, the reality is that the fossa may be far more threatened than most realize.

Like all of Madagascar’s fascinating fauna, fossa are faced with the combined threats of habitat loss and fragmentation. Slash-and-burn agriculture is common, and forests are continually destroyed to increase grazing land for local cattle. When natural prey is scarce, fossa turn to surrounding villages in search of food, putting them in conflict with people and domestic animals and, while in certain parts of Madagascar it is considered taboo to consume the fossa, they are still regularly hunted for bushmeat.

Conclusion

The lemurs of Madagascar might steal most of the limelight, but the island’s largest carnivore should not be forgotten, underappreciated, or relegated to the status of the ‘antagonist’ of the forests. The evolutionary conundrum that is the fossa is one of nature’s works of art – powerful, agile, intelligent, and enthralling in its own right.

WATCH: Baby fossas run off with camera!

The importance of adult male elephants

There is a significant amount of research and knowledge surrounding the role that older female African savannah elephants play in decision-making and leading their herds, but little is understood about the contribution of older males. The assumption has generally been that these old bulls are largely redundant in terms of the overall survival of the population, but a new study conducted in Botswana has yielded results that challenge this conclusion. Instead, researchers argue that the selective harvesting of older males (through trophy hunting and illegal poaching) could have detrimental effects on wider elephant society.

The authors explain that when animals move as a coordinated group, specific individuals may consistently be observed to influence the decisions and routes taken – whether due to their hierarchical dominance, a bolder temperament or advanced age. In species with a relatively long life expectancy, such as elephants or killer whales, older individuals have been seen to respond more appropriately to a change in environment, as well as mobilising in response to potential threats. While research into this area has tended to be mostly female-focused, there is no reason why there should be a sex-based distinction in the accumulation of knowledge over time, nor is it necessarily the case that males do not have the potential to occupy socio-cognitive roles similar to the females of the species – acting as “repositories of ecological knowledge”.

In social animals, males are typically the dispersing sex and, therefore, are assumed to be replaceable. In elephants, the males tend to leave their natal herds between 10-20 years of age, roaming vast distances and often forming temporary associations with other males of various ages. In associating with older males, the study explains, adolescent bulls could benefit from decades’ worth of experience in utilising their environment effectively while negotiating potential risks such as conflict with people.

The study was conducted in the Makgadikgadi Pans National Park – where male elephants account for some 98% of the elephant sightings. The researchers focussed on all-male groups travelling on pathways to and from the Boteti River. The results indicate that young elephants show a significant preference for travelling in groups and that mature adult males were more likely to lead these group movements. These findings applied throughout the year in both the wet and dry seasons, suggesting that these mature bulls offer a significant contribution to elephant society, regardless of the season. The researchers found little evidence that size (particularly stride length) influenced the positioning of individual elephants in the group.

This observed pattern of movement is in direct contrast to that of a breeding herd, where the matriarch will initiate movement and direction but generally move to the back of the group where she can monitor the members of the herd. The process appears to be more passive in male leadership, with the older elephant making decisions and the younger members of the group choosing to follow them. It is, however, an essential role in the male society of elephants, particularly when leading young males between crucial resources such as water.

While they represent the minority in elephant populations, bull elephants are targeted by trophy hunters and poachers due to their larger body sizes and tusks. The researchers suggest that their findings regarding the leadership of older males during collective movement complements other research into the importance of mature bulls in all-male societies. The study expresses concern that targeting these old male animals in trophy hunting could disrupt these all male-societies, as well as the “inter-generational flow of information concerning decades of accumulated ecological knowledge, such as effective navigation and location of critical resources”. Instead, the authors suggest, the role of mature bulls should be recognised as similar in male groups as that of a matriarch in a breeding herd and, as such, they should be afforded equal protection.

The full study can be accessed here: “Importance of old bulls: leaders and followers in collective movements of all-male groups in African savannah elephants (Loxodonta Africana)”, Allen, C., Brent, L., et al (2020), Scientific Reports

Why are elephants dying in Zimbabwe and Botswana?

Originally published in Talking Humanities of the University of London, School of Advanced Study and Africa Sustainable Conservation News

Professor Keith Somerville investigates the mysterious deaths of more than 300 elephants in Zimbabwe and Botswana.

The discovery of the carcasses of 22 elephants near Hwange National Park in western Zimbabwe in early September has reactivated concern in the region and among those interested in elephant conservation that we still don’t know what killed 281 elephants in the Seronga district of Botswana’s Okavango Delta between March and June this year.

The Zimbabwe deaths occurred in a relatively restricted area in the Pandamasuwe Forest in western Zimbabwe, between Hwange NP (its largest fully protected conservation area) and Victoria Falls. All the dead elephants were young, under 18 years of age, according to the Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority (Zimparks). A spokesperson for Zimparks, Tinashe Farawo, told the media that all the elephants still had their tusks, ruling out poaching as a cause of death.

Zimbabwe has a recent history of the use of cyanide by poachers, who poison waterholes used by elephants. He added that there was no evidence that they had been killed by the disease anthrax, which is found in wild ungulates and livestock in southern Africa. Final tests are awaited to find a specific cause of death, though naturally occurring toxins in plants or contaminated water have not been ruled out, nor have so far unidentified bacterial infections.

Zimbabwe has between 80,000 and 86,000 elephants – about 55,000 of them in and around Hwange NP. They are part of the estimated 220,900–240,000 elephants to be found in the Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area, KAZA, which includes regions of Angola, Botswana, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

Botswana has the largest elephant population there and in Africa as a whole, with between 130,000 and 150,000, numbers fluctuating as elephants move across the KAZA region to find water and food. Herds move across the region throughout the year, and it is not possible to give a definitive population figure for any one country, as numbers change with the seasons.

The Zimbabwean deaths are worrying but not as extensive as the demise of hundreds of elephants in the northern Okavango Delta earlier this year. These were first reported in May, when the southern African media said that by early July, 400 carcasses of elephants that had died suddenly had been discovered around the Seronga region of the northern Delta. In what is known as the Panhandle – none had their tusks removed, and they did not appear to have died of starvation or thirst.

Poaching using poisons like cyanide and strychnine and anthrax were ruled out by laboratory tests early on. Tests also ruled out the nine most common pesticides and other agricultural chemicals used by farmers, and which have been used to poison wildlife. The environment ministry has also said that Encephalomyocarditis virus, which is an acute viral disease, another possible cause, also has been eliminated as the cause of deaths.

After initial testing in Botswana, samples from the elephants were sent to South Africa, Zimbabwe, the US and Britain for more extensive tests. These confirmed that poison, anthrax, dehydration and starvation could be ruled out. The Botswana Ministry of Environment, Natural Resources Conservation and Tourism (MENT) has said that the original estimates above 375 elephant deaths, reported by the NGO Elephants Without Borders (EWB) was incorrect. EWB and the government have a history of conflict over the conservation, elephant numbers and poaching levels in northern Botswana. It was now known that 281 had died from unexplained causes. Many were found dead on their knees, indicating sudden deaths rather than the long-drawn-out deaths that occur with starvation or lack of water.

The testing of samples outside the region has been slow. The Botswana environment ministry explained this as being a result of the strain placed on testing centres across the world by Covid-19 and its effects on international shipment of samples from the elephants, which has slowed the whole process.

No other carcasses suspected to be linked to the Okavango deaths have been found since July. However, those in Zimbabwe will cause renewed concern about the number of unexplained deaths in the KAZA area. Suspicion, according to the Botswana environment ministry, now centres on potentially lethal naturally-occurring toxins. But an experienced conservationist working in Botswana said a specific cause might not be identified as ‘the chances of definitive identification of a natural toxin are practically zero unless it is one of the known cyanotoxins, and even they are all challenging and expensive to analyse – even in good samples. Rotting elephant is not a good sample.’

Cyanotoxins include cyanobacteria (blue-green algae) which can occur in waterholes and especially after droughts – the region had a three-year drought which ended earlier this year. This toxin has been implicated in the deaths of livestock following droughts. Conservationists hope that these deaths are isolated and are not indicative of a virus that can be transmitted between elephants.

Professor Keith Somerville is a senior research fellow at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies (ICWS), part of the School of Advanced Study (SAS), University of London. He is a Member of the Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology at the University of Kent where he teaches at the Centre for Journalism and is editor of the Africa Sustainable Conservation News website. He is the author of Ivory. Power and Poaching in Africa.

Wild dogs facing increased persecution in Eastern Namibia

Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF) staff report that the ongoing persecution of African wild dogs (painted wolves) continues, as evidenced by the puppy carcass found on a road in Eastern Namibia – believed to be a victim of an intentional killing. As reported to the Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism (MEFT), the dog’s pack had killed a young breeding cow nearby, and the vehicle strike was in retaliation. Attempts to kill African wild dogs on the road intentionally are commonplace in Babwata National Park as well as South Africa and Zimbabwe. The critically endangered African wild dog belonged to a pack that is believed to consist of five adults and five or six pups of about three months of age. Staff from CCF’s – Carnivore Conflict Field Station in the Eastern Communal areas are monitoring the packs’ movements to help prevent additional problems.

A severe drought during the past couple of years has led to an increase in conflict with livestock and game farmers towards both cheetahs and African wild dogs, particularly in the Eastern Communal area. While cheetah and wild dog are both rare, this area is home to a few remaining packs of wild dogs, a critically endangered species. CCF says that unless more awareness is brought to the situation, this kind of conflict could drive the species into extinction.

“Since the retaliatory action, the pack has moved to a neighbouring rural/communal farm. They were sighted there yesterday. The farmer is helping us track them, as they will likely soon find another resting area. Cooperation from farmers has intensified since CCF deployed a ‘rapid response’ team and developed a communication network between farmers. Sharing conflict information and movement updates with each other serves as an early warning system, and it mobilises community members to take precautionary measures to protect vulnerable livestock calves”, said Nadja le Roux, CCF’s Community Coordinator. “The pack has moved the pups but could go back to the den from time to time. They will stay in tight areas within this zone, which we have been studying for the past few years. This is the most common behaviour”.

CCF has spent years working with MEFT in the communities in and around the Omaheke and Otjizondupa Regions to strengthen their conservancies, including the surrounding farms in the Otjinene and Okakarara communities. The areas border each other and consist of freehold, resettled and communal farms. To encourage coexistence and reduce conflict, CCF has conducted Future Farmers of Africa training courses in the region to teach the best rangeland, livestock and wildlife management techniques, including non-lethal predator control.

In 2017 and 2018, with the support of Nedbank’s Go Green Fund, a camera-trap survey revealed limited wildlife in these communal areas. To CCF, this means increased problems for farmers because this results in a limited wild prey base. African wild dogs prey on small antelope and have large home ranges, and more biodiversity is required to sustain them.

“We remind the public that CCF is here to help farmers manage problems with carnivores that share the landscape in Namibia. CCF’s Future Farmers of Africa trainings teach the best management of livestock, wildlife and grazing lands to help reduce conflict with predators”, said Dr Laurie Marker, CCF’s Founder and Executive Director.

“Other community initiatives, like our One Health project to vaccinate domestic animals against rabies, has helped us reach a lot of the population that experience conflict with African wild dogs, and we can share information about coexistence with wildlife. Increasing the wildlife base in this area will be critical to reducing conflict, a strategy we hope to develop with MEFT.”

Today fewer than 660 packs of African wild dogs remain in Africa, with less than 300 mature adults in Namibia, of which the majority are found outside protected areas. Because of this, CCF believes working directly with the farming community in areas with wild dog packs is critical for species survival. CCF coordinates with regional efforts to support the species, including the Range Wide Conservation Programme for Cheetah and African Wild Dogs, which works across Africa with all countries where these two species exist in the wild.

“The Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism is concerned with retaliatory killings of African Wild dogs considering they are a critically endangered species. We understand they are culprits in human-wildlife conflict incidents leading to livestock damages to farmers. However, we want to urge that such incidents must be reported to the Ministry for an amicable solution that should not involve the killing of such species in a cruel manner”, said Romeo Muyunda, spokesperson of the Namibia Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism.

Because CCF now has a Satellite Camp located in the Eastern Communal area providing consistent support, staff from CCF’s Carnivore Conflict Station monitors pack activity and can respond immediately when problems arise. CCF also operates a 24-hour farmer support hotline to offer advice on conflict issues around cheetah, African wild dog and other carnivores. CCF staff can provide access to a network of partner organisations within the Large Carnivore Management Association (LCMAN) to assist with HWC in different regions of Namibia with a variety of carnivore species. The public is encouraged to use this hotline service.

CCF Farmer Hotline: +264 81 227 5139

Nadja le Roux and Dr Hanlie Winterbach are CCF’s staff members coordinating the programming at CCF’s – Carnivore Conflict Field Station.

Cheetah Conservation Fund

Conservation Fund (CCF) is the global leader in research and conservation of cheetahs and dedicated to saving the cheetah in the wild. Founded in 1990, CCF is an international non-profit organisation headquartered in Namibia. CCF is celebrating its 30th anniversary in 2020, making it the longest-running and most successful cheetah conservation organisation. For more information, please visit www.cheetah.org.

Trophy hunting quotas for South Africa in 2020: leopards, elephants and lion bone exports

Trophy hunting quotas for South Africa in 2020: leopards, elephants and lion bone exports

South Africa’s Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment, Barbara Creecy, replied as follows to questions posed to her during sessions in the country’s National Assembly:

LEOPARDS

Concerning how many leopards will be hunted in 2020, she replied that 11 trophy hunting quotas would be issued for male leopards over the age of seven in South Africa.

Zero quotas were issued for 2016 and 2017 after the country’s Scientific Authority expressed concern that the number of leopards in South Africa was unknown and that trophy hunting posed a high risk to the remaining population. After an effective two-year moratorium on leopard hunting, the Department of Environmental Affairs issued a quota of seven male leopards in 2018, based on findings by the Scientific Authority that the leopard populations in certain areas would be able to sustain a limited quota.

While in theory, South Africa has a CITES-approved leopard export quota of 150 per year, the country has adopted an adaptive management framework that adjusts quotas annually based on available population data.

In 2019, the government once again did not issue any leopard hunting quotas for the year but convened a stakeholder consultation meeting in June 2019. The Department confirmed that the written submissions of various stakeholders expressed a range of divergent views and that these were taken into consideration before a decision was made to issue a quote for 11 leopards for 2020.

ELEPHANTS

In answer to a question regarding the elephant trophy hunting quota for 2020, the Minister did not give an exact answer but instead referred to South Africa’s existing CITES-approved export quota of 300 tusks (150 animals). This quota is allocated based on requests from provinces, which on average equates to about 50 elephants per year in total, limited to solitary male animals or “damage-causing animals”.

LION BONE EXPORT

The Minister was also asked whether an export quota for lion bone is being considered for 2020. The response to that question was that the judgement of National Council of the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals v Minister of Environmental Affairs and Others requires the Minister to consider welfare issues relating to lions in captivity when determining the quota. As a result, the Department was not able to determine the 2019 lion bone export quota, and the process would be deferred.

“Lost” species of elephant shrew alive and well

In 2017, the Somali Sengi was identified by the Global Wildlife Conservation as one of the Top 25 Most Wanted taxon in their Search for Lost Species initiative. Now researchers have discovered a seemingly thriving population of this elephant shrew in Djibouti, nearly 50 years after the last scientific record.

Elephant shrews, or sengis, are insectivores found only in Africa and are most closely related to tenrecs, golden moles, and aardvarks. There are at least twenty recognized species, the smallest weighing just 50 grams. The original specimen of the Somali sengi is currently held by the National Museum of Natural History in Paris and was collected by Georges Révoil in the late 19^th century. The species epithet, revoilii, is a reference in his honour. Several other specimens were collected throughout the following century, the last known hypodigm (a specimen used to identify the characteristics of a species) comes from 1973. They were believed to be endemic to Somalia.

An expedition set out to investigate reports of sighting of the missing elephant shrew in Djibouti and joined forces with Houssein Rayaleh, a Djiboutian ecologist. The team set out 80-90 traps every evening, which were then checked first thing in the morning. In total, the team set out 1,259 traps in 12 locations, baited with rolled oats, peanut butter, and yeast. The vast majority of the species recovered from the traps were spiny mice (263), as well as 17 gerbils, one gundi and eight Somali sengis – five males and three females.

Some of the identifying characteristics of the Somali sengi include:

A pale ring surrounding the eye, with a dark brown mark extending from the corner of the eye
The presence of hair growth on the skin surrounding the nostrils
Second upper incisors equal in size to both first and third upper incisors
Absence of lower third molars
Lower first premolars with only one root
A pectoral gland fringed with short white hairs
A hairy tail with a small tuft
The tail is on average 19% longer than the head-body length
A head-body length between 122-148mm

Through genetic analysis, the research also indicated that the Somali sengi is a descendent of the Macroscelidini lineage of elephant shrews, making it more closely related to species found as far away as Morocco and South Africa and only distantly related to the rufous sengi – its closest geographic neighbour. As such, the genus name of the Somali sengi has been changed from Elephantulus to Galegeeska, within which it is currently the only recognized species. Its known distribution range was also revised. The genus name was chosen as a reference to the broader than expected geographic range of the small animals, as “geeska” in Somali translates as “corner” or “horn” (a reference to the horn of Africa).

The name “gale” was also chosen to honour Dr Galen B. Rathbun, a member of the expedition that rediscovered the Somali sengi, one of the co-authors of the paper, and one of the foremost experts in elephant shrew ecology. He died shortly after the expedition in 2019.

The good news is that, while the researchers have not attempted to estimate the population size, they believe that the Somali sengis are thriving and, happily (and somewhat unusually), the habitat they seem to prefer is not under any imminent threat from human development and agriculture.

The full study can be accessed here: “New records of a lost species and geographic range expansion for sengis in the Horn of Africa”, Heritage, S., et al (2020), PeerJ

Tsavo – Land of legends

Each of Africa’s national parks and protected areas has its own rich, vibrant history, and some, like Tsavo, have had a more challenging road than others. Shaped by the country’s history, a fair share of luck, and often the blood, sweat, and hard work of passionate conservationists, Africa’s protected wild spaces are treasure chests of our natural resources.

Often, due to their complex histories, some of these wild spaces engender a kind of mystique, especially true for Tsavo East and West National Parks. As part of the broader Amboseli-Tsavo ecosystem, Tsavo is captivating – a feeling of vast space and the ancient magic of the truly wild. Thick red soils stain the leathery skins of its sizeable elephant population, and the sight of a herd of red elephants crossing the Tsavo River beneath lush palm fronds is one not easily forgotten. The sometimes-harsh beauty of the landscape captured the heart of Denys Finch Hatton (‘Out of Africa’ – Karen Blixen’s lover) in a way no other wild space (or woman) ever had, and it was there that he was killed when the plane he was piloting crashed.

Clockwise, from top left: fringe-eared oryx herd, lesser kudu, maneless (almost) male lion and leopard

From untimely deaths to man-eaters and poaching wars, Tsavo has not had the easiest road, but now, combined, Tsavo East and West account for the largest of Kenya’s protected spaces by a comfortable margin, over 23,000km² (2,300,000 hectares), and one of the world’s largest protected wilderness areas. Named for the Tsavo River, which flows through Tsavo West before joining the Athi River to form the Galana River, this massive Big 5 ecosystem lies directly between Nairobi, Kenya’s capital, and Mombasa, the country’s main port city. This location is the reason behind the division of Tsavo East and West – they are split by both railways and the Nairobi-Mombasa Road, which sees the movement of around 50% of goods traded in East Africa. The enormous size of Tsavo makes it one of the most biodiverse ecosystems in Kenya, from the red semi-desert of parts of the East to the rainforests of the Chyulu Hills and everything in between.

Tsavo East

Tsavo East National Park is the larger of the twin parks, covering 13,700km² (1,370,000 hectares), and is also the more arid of the two. Apart from some crags around Voi and gorges along the Galana River, Tsavo East consists mostly of grasslands and savannas that stretch as far as the eye can see. The park receives fewer visitors than Tsavo West, and it is easily possible to spend a day exploring without encountering another soul. The reopening of the “forbidden zone” (closed off during the poaching wars) has added yet another spectacular aspect to an already striking reserve, particularly for those keen to spot African wild dogs (painted wolves).

Geologically fascinating, Tsavo East is home to the Yatta Plateau (the longest lava flow in the world, which begins near Nairobi and stretches for over 300km) and Mudanda Rock, which serves as a water catchment and offers visitors a perfect view of animals arriving to drink. Wildlife enthusiasts are guaranteed a glimpse or two of the long-necked gerenuks, one of the most peculiar-looking antelopes in Africa, and should keep their eyes peeled for the lesser kudu and fringe-eared oryx as well. Apart from the Kenyan-Somali border, Tsavo East is also the only place in Kenya to see the critically endangered hirola antelope, which were introduced there to help save the species. Sightings of black rhino are rare but rewarding, as are sightings of striped hyena. The bird variety is equally diverse, with over 500 bird species recorded in Tsavo East, including the golden-breasted starling, African orange-bellied (red-bellied) parrot, vulturine guineafowl and Somali ostrich.

Tsavo West

Tsavo West is more developed than Tsavo East, particularly the area accessible along the Tsavo River and the Mombasa highway. Close to the Tanzanian border and Mount Kilimanjaro, Tsavo West is topographically fascinating, and its dramatic mountains, inselbergs and sheer cliff faces are courtesy of ancient (and relatively recent) tectonic shifts and volcanic eruptions. As a result of fertile volcanic soils and higher rainfall, the vegetation in Tsavo West can be dense in places, which in turn can make wildlife viewing slightly more challenging, but the scenery is even more spectacular.

The Mzima Springs are a significant attraction for visitors to Tsavo West. Below the volcanic Chyulu Hills, a natural water reservoir percolates through porous rock before eventually emerging, filtered, as Mzima Springs. Here, people can enter a glass viewing chamber to watch life beneath the surface of a crystal-clear pool, including schools of fish, crocodiles, and the resident hippos. The dense date and raffia palms, along with an assortment of other fruiting trees, attract a variety of birds and primates, making the springs a veritable oasis, especially during the drier months.

Hippos in the crystal-clear waters of Mzima Springs.

Not far from the Chyulu Gate, the Shetani lava flow is a vast expanse of folded black lava from an eruption believed to have occurred only 200 years ago, now inhabited by nimble klipspringers and ubiquitous hyraxes, and (for the fortunate few), a lounging leopard unfazed by the sharp rocks. The nearby caves, formed by the same volcanic activity, can be freely explored by those brave enough to do so! The name “Shetani” translates to “devil” in Swahili, which offers insight into how the original residents felt as they watched the lava flow across the earth.

The Ghost and The Darkness

No description of Tsavo would be complete without mention of possibly the most famous man-eaters in history. During the construction of the Ugandan Railway and bridge over the Tsavo River, a pair of male lions, nicknamed The Ghost and The Darkness, stalked and killed many labourers. Despite efforts to keep the lions away from the camps by building large fires and bomas, the lions regularly found a way in and seemed to have no fear of people. Hundreds of workers fled, and construction was halted while Lieutenant-Colonel John Henry Patterson spent his evenings in a platform in a tree, attempting to bait and trap the lions before finally killing both. The number of people killed by the man-eaters of Tsavo is disputed – it seems likely that Patterson’s claim that they killed 135 people was exaggerated. Analysis of their fur suggests a number closer to 34 people, but it could not account for victims killed but not eaten by the lions.

There is no single accepted reason why those lions behaved as they did, and it was most likely due to a combination of factors and opportunism born of a different age. Certainly, at that point in history, the rinderpest outbreak of the late 19^th century would have decimated their available prey, and one was shown to have a severe infection in the root of its canine tooth.

The experience

Visitors to Tsavo, particularly Tsavo East, should be aware that temperatures can be searing at times, particularly during the dry months between January and February and June to October. These consistently high temperatures are among the theories proposed to explain why all male lions in Tsavo have extremely undeveloped manes, though there is considerable scientific disagreement about the exact explanation. Either way, the baking days should be taken into account by anyone considering a visit to Tsavo.

Many of Tsavo’s lodges are famous for their colonial-style luxury, and experienced guides are on hand to ensure guests experience the best of these remarkable national parks. Tsavo is enormous, and tourist density tends to be relatively low, so this is not a national park for novice safari-goers looking to be self-sufficient without adequate preparation. Those adventurous souls who do venture out should ensure that they are fully prepared, especially during the rainy season, when driving can be technical. Appropriate supplies of drinking water are a must!

Tsavo is famous for its herds of red elephants, including some of Africa’s last big tuskers, a testament to both nature’s resilience and the enormous effort that went into protecting them. Historically, Tsavo’s incidental proximity to the main transport route to the coast spelt disaster for its elephant and rhino populations during Kenya’s poaching wars of the 1970s/80s. Populations dropped to 5,300 elephants in 1988, but thanks to concerted conservation efforts, have since risen to around 12,000 today – one of the largest elephant populations in Kenya. For elephant enthusiasts, a visit to Tsavo is a must.

Those who have visited Tsavo can bear testimony to its unique feel and, without being too melodramatic, its profound and indelible impact on the soul. It is difficult to fully capture the Tsavo experience in words – the boundless skies and vast spaces combine with a rich sense of history to create a wilderness experience from a bygone era. For those who seek wilderness and enjoy elephants and bushwalking, try this exclusive safari option: Walking with giants in Tsavo

Walk with Giants in Tsavo – 13 days. Join us on an epic, extended safari from a bygone era that explores the breadth of this vast wilderness and ends in the warm waters of the Indian Ocean. This sojourn will most certainly recharge your batteries and put sand in your shoes.

Coal mining in Hwange: gov bans mining in national parks

UPDATE to our recent report on Chinese coal mining in Hwange National Park, Zimbabwe: “Mining on areas held by national parks is banned with immediate effect. Steps are being undertaken to immediately cancel all mining title held in national parks,” stated information minister Monica Mutsvangwa during a news media briefing on Tuesday after a weekly cabinet meeting.

Mines Minister Winston Chitando said state mining arm Zimbabwe Mining Development Corporation holds the Hwange concessions and had partnered with two Chinese firms, Afrochine Energy and Zimbabwe Zhongxin Coal Mining Group to utilise the concessions.

This about-turn follows on pressure from tourism bodies, conservationists and a threat of legal action by the Zimbabwe Environmental Law Association who filed an urgent high court application. The application was based on mining prospecting being undertaken without an environmental impact assessment certificate having been issued and therefore in violation of the Environmental Management Act. Additionally, mining in a national park is in breach of the constitutional duty to prevent ecological degradation and promote conservation in terms of section 73(b) of Zimbabwe’s constitution.

Zimbabwe is entirely reliant on coal for energy, and a substantial portion of the country’s coal reserves are found in the Hwange district, with the Hwange Colliery Company operating as the oldest coal mine. In recent months, the Zimbabwean government has been pushing for increased coal and energy production in the country. It has issued several special grants to prospective coal miners as well as increasing the capacity of power stations and smelters. While there have been concerns around pollution and health risks to neighbouring communities, most of the new developments have taken place outside the protected areas.

Hwange National Park is Zimbabwe’s largest national park at 15,000km² and is home to the second-largest elephant population in Africa.

Domestic cat predation on wild animals in Cape Town

by Rob Simmons, Colleen Seymour, Justin O’Riain

Cats touch all our lives in many ways… one may be curled up on your lap as you read this, providing you with invaluable comfort. Or they may be silently hunting through your neighbour’s garden, sight-unseen. Yet these cuddly, charming felids are honed killing machines whose impact on biodiversity in South Africa is only now being fully revealed.

Domestic and feral cats have been studied on every continent on the planet except Antarctica (where they don’t occur) and Africa (where they are more numerous than you probably realise). In fact, they may be the world’s most abundant and wide-spread carnivore, surviving on freezing sub-Antarctic islands to the hot, fire-ravaged deserts and forests of Australia.

On every continent, research has found that cats kill a wide diversity of wildlife, often in staggering numbers. For example, in the USA, a 2013 study estimated that domestic cats kill between 1.3–4.0 billion birds and 6.3–22.3 billion mammals annually. As we show below these are likely to be under-estimates for reasons uncovered in a study done in the south-eastern USA and confirmed in our own research programme here in Cape Town.

Our research investigated the impact that these ubiquitous agile predators have on the biodiversity around us. Three student projects (undertaken by Sharon George, Koebraa Peter and Frances Morling) explored the hunting habits of domestic cats in the spring, summer, and winter seasons across 22 Cape Town suburbs. Some of the cats lived in homes bordering Table Mountain National Park – so-called “urban-edge” cats, while others were more than 500m from the edge, termed “deep-urban” cats.

These studies found that cats in Cape Town suburbs occur at average densities between about 150 and 300 cats per square kilometre. This is on the low side compared to many countries, but similar to those found in Australia and New Zealand. However, these densities are more than 300 times that of their wild felid counterparts (e.g. Caracal (Caracal caracal) and African Wild Cat (Felis silvestris lybica), and this implies they may be having a rather large impact on wildlife around us.

To understand predation rates, we used the global protocol of asking cat-owners to serve as citizen data collectors – and they responded wonderfully, systematically recording prey returned home over 6 to 10 weeks. Cat owners also bagged prey for later identification.

In our sample of over 130 cats ranging in age from 6 months to 18 years old, we were surprised at just how many cats seldom returned prey home. What if, the students asked, the cats were eating or abandoning prey as they caught it? So, we turned to some nifty technology in the form of lightweight video cameras, dubbed “KittyCams” (a kind of “GoPro” for moggies), that the cats wore on break-away collars.

Cat owners’ records of prey returned home indicated that Cape Town’s cats killed an average of 16 prey per year, most of which were mammals. But those numbers all changed when the startling footage from the KittyCams came in.

Based initially in Newlands and then expanded to eight other suburbs, we first tested whether KittyCams affected the cats’ hunting behaviour, by comparing the number of prey returned by individuals with and without KittyCams. There was no difference.

The night-vision KittyCam showed that cats killed over 90% of their prey at night and over 80% of it was eaten on the spot or abandoned in the field. That meant that prey returns to the home were seriously under-estimating cat predation rates over five-fold.

The only other study using KittyCams in the USA found a similar under-estimation of 4.5-fold. The underestimation was not the only bias. Cats preferred to bring home birds or mammals they caught, but often ate or abandoned reptiles, amphibians, and insects where they caught them.

These biases have two implications. First, it explains why predation estimates from Cape Town cats and cats in other countries are likely to be under-estimates because to date, most studies have relied on questionnaire surveys of prey returns. Such studies would have to be multiplied by 4.5 to 5.6 to reflect the actual numbers of wildlife taken annually. As such, the average Cape Town cat’s annual impact is revised from 16 to 90 prey per year.

Since there are at least 300 000 domestic cats in Cape Town, the total kill rate is about 27.5 million animals per year. About 14 million of those are estimated to be reptiles, and a particularly favoured prey is the Marbled Leaf-toed Gecko, which is caught and consumed in seconds, and seldom returned home. For the bird lover, it is sobering to know that “only” about 450 000 birds are taken by Cape Town’s cats every year.

The second implication of this KittyCam study and the one conducted in the south-eastern USA is that until now, mammals and birds headed the lists on domestic cat predation to date because cats have more of a predilection for bringing these animals home. Our study shows that cats do indeed kill more mammals and birds than previously thought, but they are killing far more reptiles, amphibians and invertebrates than has ever been realised.

Of conservation concern is that at least 2200 cats live within 150 m of the edge of Table Mountain National Park, consuming an estimated 200 000 prey many of which are likely to be taken from within the Park itself or have wandered into gardens bordering the Park.

Of equal concern is that, if there are 2.4 million domestic cats as estimated by the pet food industry in South Africa, then at the rates computed for Cape Town’s cats we estimate that 216 million prey are likely to be taken across South Africa every year. This does not include feral cats which require a study all on their own.

Conservation authorities such as the South African National Parks (SANParks) have responded positively to the study, acknowledging the negative impacts of domestic cats on fauna in the Park and looking into the potential for buffer zones that might reduce these impacts.

We suggest that cat owners can help reduce the negative impacts of their pets with two simple interventions: (i) keep them in at night when predation peaks and the risk to cats of being run over by vehicles is highest and (ii) add bells to their collars which may reduce hunting success in catching birds and mammals, although this will not reduce impacts on reptiles (reptiles don’t hear the bells). Cats may, of course, switch their behaviour to hunting during the day, but that is research for another day. We stress that these will not stop predation, only reduce it, so longer-term measures are critical.

Concerned owners can consider catios, (enclosed patios) that allow a cat access into the garden but not further afield. They are already in use in North America as are lightweight (neoprene) bibs, that impede pouncing, but don’t impede the cat from drinking and eating. Both are effective in reducing predation.

An intervention to be explored with Table Mountain National park is the establishment of a stewardship programme for citizens whose properties border the Park. Having porcupines, Verreaux’s Eagles, spotted eagle owls, mongooses, genets and sugarbirds as neighbours comes with the responsibility to limit adverse urban effects such as pesticides, herbicides, invasive plants and exotic animals. A buffer of ‘biodiversity stewards’ would be a boon to the biodiversity of this World Heritage site and living in the ‘green zone’ a badge of honour in the fight against the global loss of biodiversity.

A montage of the kittycam footage captured by Frances Morling during one year of our study can be seen here:

A graphic of the main results of our study as it appeared in the published paper

Rob Simmons, is an Honourary Research Associate with the FitzPatrick Institute and runs his own environmental consultancy, Birds & Bats Unlimited
Colleen Seymour, is a Principal Scientist with the South African National Biodiversity Institute, and a Research Associate of the University of Cape Town
Justin O’Riain is Professor and Head of the Institute of Communities and Wildlife in Africa (iCWILD) at the University of Cape Town

The original paper is accessible here: “Caught on camera: The impacts of urban domestic cats on wild prey in an African city and neighbouring protected areas”, Seymour, C., Simmons, R., Morling, F., George, S., Peters, K., O’Riain, J., (2020), Global Ecology and Conservation

Counting lions: new study shows the importance of good counts for lion conservation

By Alex Braczkowski, Mustafa Nsubuga, Arjun Gopalaswamy and Duan Biggs

It’s 35 degrees Celsius and the black dust from the recent bushfires stings our nostrils as we speed along a stretch of the Ishasha road in Uganda’s Queen Elizabeth National Park. We’re searching for a pride of lions that were spotted by tourists near the Congolese border just hours earlier. Sam Isoke, a longstanding field technician with the Wildlife Conservation Society suddenly slams on the breaks, before shouting, “`You see, in that fig tree over there?”. Yes, you read that last part right… as one of the rarest in all of Africa, this population of lions can be found regularly hanging from the branches of 40-foot-tall trees. In fact, the lions in this part of Africa spend about half of their lives in large sycamore fig trees and cactus-like euphorbias. We count four individuals, a large male affectionately known to local field rangers as Jacob, his two sisters Julia and Jessica, and their mother Jacqueline. This is the 89^th day of such daily searching and our small team is exhausted from the relentless equatorial heat. We’ve been doing this because we are carrying out the first rigorous survey of lions in QENP, Uganda.

We started this research not only because there was uncertainty on how lion populations were faring in this part of the country, but also because there was broader evidence that the majority of historic surveys of African lions were missing the mark. The lack of good data on how many lions are left in Africa relates to a longstanding challenge in conservation, namely, to understand if management actions and conservation initiatives actually stop animal populations from declining (or even help them bounce back from human or natural pressures). This can be as simple as building a fence on the border of a national park to stop elephants stealing oranges, or paying farmers the market value of sheep eaten by bears, so they don’t retaliate and kill the bears. This is a dilemma faced by conservationists globally, across a wide strata of developing and affluent nations. If these interventions are applied without having a solid reference of how many animals a national park has to begin with, and how these change over time, the effectiveness of such interventions is questionable, maybe even futile. It may be argued that if conservationists and scientists spent more time in getting the numbers of threatened animal populations (including lions) right, we would be in a much stronger position to know how well our parks and conservation initiatives were doing, where to allocate resources and make sure the charismatic species the world enjoys didn’t silently go extinct.

The reality is that the three most seminal scientific studies (on fences, lion declines and a wide scale mapping exercise) published in the last ten years reporting on the number of lions in major African protected areas used questionable field methods like track counts, call up surveys or sometimes even direct observations in order to estimate lion numbers. A track or spoor count is literally what the name infers; a count of lion footprints that are related back to an estimate of true lion abundance (through a linear equation). A call up survey is a little better, and this entails blurting out the moans and groans of a dying buffalo or better yet, the whooping calls of a spotted hyena clan over a speaker system. These sound like a dinner bell for any lions in the area, which run towards the vehicle and can easily be counted by observers.

The problem with the direct application of call up surveys and track counts is that they make big assumptions about how lions (or their tracks) are detected in the landscape. These include how the footprints look on sand or mud, how they age, and eventually deteriorate, or even disappear in the baking hot sun or pelting rain. Just because you don’t see a lion footprint doesn’t necessarily mean a lion has not walked there. In fact, during our work in QENP, we followed a pride of lions and then looked at the substrate over which they walked. This soil was hard and not even one set of tracks was visible. With the call-ups you can’t even guarantee that the same lion isn’t being counted twice. The bigger problem yet is that these counts produce what scientists call wide confidence intervals which is a measure of precision. So, in theory a call up or track survey might estimate that there are 75 lions living in an area, but the lower estimate could be 15 lions, the upper 235. This wide uncertainty makes tracking how lions are faring nearly impossible in real time.

Taking a break at dusk on day 89 of our 93-day survey of lions in Queen Elizabeth National Park, southwestern Uganda. On this day, we found eight of the same individuals we had detected in previous weeks. The repeat detection of lions over three months meant we could estimate how many there were and how they moved in the landscape. Photo: Steve Winter.

To attempt to solve some of these problems, we wanted to test a recently developed lion counting technique from a study in Kenya’s Maasai Mara on the rare tree-climbing lions of Uganda. This study used the so called “search-encounter” technique (which was originally applied on mountain lions) implying, as the name suggests, a procedure of driving a vehicle and looking for lions. By keeping a small GPS logger, which takes a location point every few seconds, a tracking log is created and this means that one can account for where search effort has been dedicated in the landscape, and the relative proportion of distance travelled in an area. Once lions are located, their GPS location is taken, as are high-quality photographs of their faces. Like housecats, lions have distinctive whisker patterns and other distinguishing features, which are akin to human fingerprints.

Three separate images of a male lion (Jacob) in the Ishasha sector of Queen Elizabeth National Park show whisker spot patterns and nose patterning which can be used as identification cues for African lions. The method of whisker identification dates back to the early 1970s and was described by C.J Pennycuik and Judith Rudnai.

The location data, individual identity of lions and GPS tracking log are then entered into what scientists call a spatial capture-recapture matrix. This estimates the number of lions in an area statistically. With the advent of super computers and Bayesian statistical models we can get not only tighter estimates around the numbers of lions in a region, but examine how they move, and even ascertain their sex ratios, which are classical indicators of population health.

Our recently published study in Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution suggests that the majority of 169 scientific studies that used lion numbers were either made through direct observations, track counts, call ups or mixed methods.

When we applied the search-encounter technique in Uganda we could draw on the information of how lions move in the landscape (based on their sex) and also examine their sex ratios. In our study we could actually compare how lions had changed their movements over a ten-year period. From 2006-2010 a team of Ugandan scientists, led by Mr Tutilo Mudumba radio collared nine adult lions in the south of Queen Elizabeth National Park (5 males and 4 females). They found that lion home ranges in this area were amongst the smallest recorded in East Africa (just 40 and 46 km² for males and females respectively). Because our lion count featured information on where individual lions were located in the reserve, we could generate approximate minimum estimates of their range size in 2018 (a decade later). Our count of African lions showed that numbers in the park were quite low at only 2.7 lions/100 km², totaling ~71 lions across the ~2500 km² Queen Elizabeth Conservation Area. However, it was the movement patterns that were fascinating, with minimum home ranges expanding by some 400% for males and 100% for females respectively. The change in movement may be a reflection of depletion in the preferred prey that lions depend upon (topi, kob, waterbuck and buffalo) or human pressure on lions by snaring and retaliatory killings for livestock losses.

The unique situation in Queen Elizabeth National Park is that the tree-climbing behaviour of lions makes them easily detectable by rangers and tourists and thereby lions are frequently spotted. Had we not conducted our formal search-encounter survey of lions and performed a full-fledged statistical analysis from these data, we may have also not been able to detect the concerning trend of increased movement of lions.

The results of this lion survey have important ramifications not only for lions in this part of Uganda, but more broadly for other locations where lion numbers are shaky at best. Our review of historic lion surveys and numbers suggests there are large gaps in our knowledge of the status of the species. We argue that with the advances in mathematical models, supercomputing and easy to use field methods available to the lion conservation community we could fill these gaps rapidly. Indeed, the Kenya Wildlife Service and partners, took up an ambitious project of using the search-encounter approach combined with spatial capture-recapture analysis to survey the important source populations of lions and other large carnivores in Kenya. This project serves as proof that such reliable counting techniques can be scaled up to country-wide and region-wide scales.

With the current COVID-19 crisis and the collapse of the tourism sector, tracking how lion populations have fared when the world reopens will be essential in the continent-wide recovery effort for this much-loved icon of Africa.

We are grateful to the Uganda Wildlife Authority and WCS for their assistance in helping us use this method to determine the status of lions in western Uganda.

Dr Alexander Braczkowski is a scientist and wildlife filmmaker working at the Resilient Conservation Group, Griffith University. He has spent the last decade studying and filming large felids across three continents. His research has included understanding the ecology of a leopard population in South Africa’s Cape Fold mountains, counting lions and other carnivores in Uganda’s Albertine Rift, an expose of illegal jaguar trafficking in Iquitos, Peru, and explorations of ecosystem services of leopards in Mumbai India. The tree climbing lions of and the lion survey in this article formed the central part of Alex’ PhD thesis which he recently completed at the University of Queensland, Australia.

Dr Duan Biggs is the founder and lead of Resilient Conservation, a group of applied conservation researchers working actively at the interface of science, policy, and practice to enable innovative conservation outcomes in a multi-cultural world. Duan, has diverse experience and expertise on many socio-economic aspects of conservation. He has developed and supported community-based tourism and conservation initiatives, and investigated how they could be made more resilient to crises and change. Duan has also played a leading role in developing a community-based response to the illegal wildlife trade working in partnership with WWF, the IUCN, and International Institute for Environment and Development. His current focus is on how to rebuild conservation and human wildlife co-existence amidst COVID 19 to be more equitable, sustainable and resilient.

Dr. Arjun Gopalaswamy is an independent wildlife and statistical ecologist and is currently the Science Advisor, Global Programs, Wildlife Conservation Society. He has spent over two decades in developing and implementing rigorous population monitoring methodologies on large felids and large mammals in several important wildlife landscapes in Asia and Africa. He has wide experience in connecting, and making relevant, novel scientific ideas to on-ground research and conservation problems. And his work has focussed largely on charismatic species, such as tigers, lions and elephants.

Mr Mustafa Nsubuga is the large carnivore program manager at the Uganda Conservation Foundation in Uganda. He has worked in lion conservation and research for over 15 years and was born in the Queen Elizabeth National Park where this lion survey took place. Mustafa has run long term studies on African lion ecology examining home range size, densities and conflict with human communities and is currently involved in restoration efforts for the species across three National Parks in Uganda.

Cited literature

Braczkowski, A., Gopalaswamy, A. M., Elliot, N. B., Possingham, H. P., Bezzina, A., Maron, M., … & Allan, J. R. (2020). Restoring Africa’s Lions: Start with good counts. Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, 8, 138.

Braczkowski, A., Gopalaswamy, A. M., Nsubuga, M., Allan, J., Biggs, D., & Maron, M. (2020). Detecting early warnings of pressure on an African lion (Panthera leo) population in the Queen Elizabeth Conservation Area, Uganda. Ecological Solutions and Evidence, 1(1), e12015.

Elliot, N. B., & Gopalaswamy, A. M. (2017). Toward accurate and precise estimates of lion density. Conservation Biology, 31(4), 934-943.

Karanth, K. U., Nichols, J. D., Kumar, N. S., & Hines, J. E. (2006). Assessing tiger population dynamics using photographic capture–recapture sampling. Ecology, 87(11), 2925-2937.

Nichols, J. D., & Williams, B. K. (2006). Monitoring for conservation. Trends in ecology & evolution, 21(12), 668-673.

Russell, R. E., Royle, J. A., Desimone, R., Schwartz, M. K., Edwards, V. L., Pilgrim, K. P., & Mckelvey, K. S. (2012). Estimating abundance of mountain lions from unstructured spatial sampling. The Journal of Wildlife Management, 76(8), 1551-1561.

Karanth and Nichols (2017). Monitoring Methods for Tigers and ther Prey.

Duangchantrasiri et al. (2016). Dynamics of a low-density tiger population in Southeast Asia in the context of improved law enforcement. Conservation Biology.

Elliot et al. (2020). The importance for reliable monitoring methods for the management of small, isolated populations. Conservation Science and Practice 2020;e217.

National Lion and Predator Survey (2020). Africa’s first ever rigorous lion survey of key source populations. https://www.kenyawildlifetrust.org/portfolio-item/national-lion-predator-survey/

Zebra

With their dazzling black and white stripes and familiar horse body language, zebras are a firm favourite among safari-goers, especially when seen in their thousands during migratory events.

As the dust settles on the first zebra sighting, someone is bound to ask “So, are they white with black stripes or black with white stripes?”, at which point their guide usually forces a laugh and thinks seriously about their father’s advice to pursue a financial career in a big city.

The word “zebra” is borrowed from either Italian or Portuguese, where the first vowel is pronounced as a long vowel. And locally, guides have been heard referring to them as “stripy ponies, “horses in pyjamas” or, in the words of one safari guide in Tanzania, “disco donkeys”.

What follows is a celebration of one of the most unique, iconic and fascinating African animals. By the way, they are technically grey-skinned with black and white stripes.

The three species

There are three recognized species of zebra: the plains zebra (Equus quagga), the mountain zebra (Equus zebra) and the Grévy’s zebra (Equus grevyi), all belonging to the Equus genus, along with horses, donkeys and asses.

The mountain zebra: There are two recognized subspecies of mountain zebra – the Cape mountain zebra and the Hartmann’s mountain zebra, both of which are listed as vulnerable on the IUCN Red List. Both subspecies have a distinctive dewlap and bold strip patters that extend down the lower leg to the hoof but not around the middle of the belly. The Cape mountain zebras were very nearly extinct, with numbers recovering from 80 individuals in the 1950s to the estimated 4,790 individuals alive today, found mainly in the Mountain Zebra National Park. The vast majority of Africa’s Hartmann’s mountain zebras are found in Namibia, and there are believed to be around 33,000 of them left in the wild.

The Grévy’s zebra: The largest of the zebra subspecies is also the most threatened of the three and their populations are currently isolated to central and northern Kenya, with a minimal number in Ethiopia. Currently classified as endangered on the IUCN Red List, there are fewer than 3,000 mature individuals left in the wild. Their ears are larger than those of the other two species, and their stripes are narrow and close-set, without extending to the belly.

Plains zebra: The plains zebra is by far the most populous of these species and is the most likely to be encountered on safari. The easiest way to distinguish them from the other two species is the stripes on the stomach – in plains zebras, these reach to the centre, but in the other two species, they don’t extend that far, and their bellies are white. The stripes of plains zebras also tend to fade towards the lower leg. At present, while there is some disagreement, there are six different subspecies, and some (but not all) have “shadow stripes”, pale, thin stripes in between their bold black stripes on the rump and sides. As the most populous of the three species, the below information will deal mostly with plains zebra, though there are numerous shared similarities between the three species.

Plains zebra quick facts:

Social structure: a harem with a dominant stallion, around 2-8 mares and associated offspring, or bachelor herd.
Mass: 175-320kg
Shoulder height: 127-140cm
Gestation period: 12 months
Number of young: 1 foal (2 have never been recorded)
Average life expectancy: Over 20 years in the wild, up to 40 years in captivity

Currently classified as ‘near threatened’, there are believed to be around 600,000 plains zebra in Africa, all in sub-Saharan Africa. They are water-dependent and tend to prefer grasslands and sparse woodlands and are generally not found in deserts or rainforests. As bulk grazers, they tend to be less fussy about the grass species or parts of the grass they eat, and they consume approximately double the amount of food as a ruminant of comparable weight (such as a wildebeest), which they process twice as fast. For this reason, they are known as “pioneer” feeders, hence why they tend to be the forerunners during the Serengeti/Maasai Mara ecosystem Great Migration.

Taxonomy and the quagga

Up until relatively recently, the scientific name of the plains zebra was Equus burchelli, but this was changed to Equus quagga when genetic studies revealed that the extinct quagga was, in fact, a subspecies of the plains zebra. The quagga, hunted to extinction towards the end of the 19^th century, had zebra-like colouration on the front half of its body but uniform brown colouring towards the rump and legs. “Quagga” comes from the Khoikhoi name for zebra and is an onomatopoeic name resembling the sound that all zebras make, described as “kwa-ha-ha”. The Quagga Project based in Cape Town is currently attempting to selectively breed plains zebra to “recreate” the quagga.

Herd mentality

The harem structure follows a basic formula of a dominant stallion along with several mares and their most recent offspring. When a young female reaches sexual maturity at around 2.5 years old, she attracts the attentions of other stallions who may compete with the dominant stallion and, ultimately, steal her away to add to, or even begin, their own harem. Zebra skirmishes are frequent, and a serious zebra fight can be deadly. Their kicks are tremendously powerful, and the males have erupted canine teeth that they use to bite their opponents – broken skin and bones are not uncommon, and many a zebra have lost their tail as a result of a fight. Occasionally, a stallion that has taken over an entire herd may kill the foals sired by the previous male.

There is a set dominance hierarchy within the females of the harem, starting with the mare that has been with the stallion the longest. Initially, a new mare to a harem is tormented by the other females, who take time to accept her presence, and the stallion often has to intervene on her behalf. Young males generally leave their herds and join bachelor groups with other young males. These herds also have their own dominance hierarchy, and it here that the young male can practice the fighting skills necessary to one day compete for a female once he reaches sexual maturity at around 5-6 years old.

Naturally, zebras are often seen in much larger groups than the ones described above, especially those that are migratory – such as in Tanzania, Kenya and Botswana. These harems and bachelor groups regularly associate with other groups, often interacting with each other with limited amounts of acrimony unless competition over a female arises.

A striped mystery

There is considerable debate around the reasons for the zebras’ unique striped coat. The predominant theory at present is that the striped pattern interferes with the vision of tsetse flies and other biting insects, preventing most from landing on a zebra’s coat. There are, however, other theories that have been put forward as to why zebras have stripes. Some zoologists favour the thermoregulation argument; the idea being that the black stripes heat up more than the white areas on the zebra which in turn creates microcurrents of air movement which cool the sweating zebras more rapidly. Others suggest that the unique stripe patterns may be a way for zebras to recognize other zebras.

The idea that zebras are striped as a kind of camouflage or anti-predation mechanism still holds some sway with certain biologists, who are seeking ways to test how lions respond to striped vs unstriped prey. The explanation behind this is not just that the stripes disrupt the outline of the zebras but that when multiple zebras are moving together, the stripes create an optical illusion that distorts the perception of the direction of movement. Given that most predators have exceptional hearing and that many a hunting lion has been observed picking out a specific zebra as a target without any undue difficulty, there are strong arguments against this particular line of thinking.

There is also, naturally, no reason why it might not be a combination of factors that led the zebras’ ancestors to develop a striped coat.

No discussion of zebra stripes would be complete without mentioning Tira, the zebra foal that caused an internet sensation after it was photographed in the Maasai Mara in 2019. Tira exhibits a kind of pseudomelanism that has resulted in an almost entirely black coat with white polka dots. This foal is not the first of its kind, however; dark-coloured zebra foals have been photographed in Botswana. There are also cases of leucistic zebra in the wild, though these are more commonly seen in captivity.

Final word

While the black and white stripes set zebras apart from other large mammals, their striking beauty belies their hardiness and resilience, characteristics that define the true essence of a wild zebra. They are capable of bearing the pain of horrific injuries, broken bones and torn skin with a profound survival instinct and, if unfortunate enough to be on the receiving end of a predator’s attention, will fight until their very last breath. The stallions are fierce defenders of their small families and often risk their own lives in defence of their foals.

Like many of their equid cousins, they do occasionally demonstrate a propensity for irascible temperaments but, given the harsh realities of living wild, this stubborn streak serves them well.

Coal mining in Hwange National Park

UPDATE 09 Sep2020: Coal mining in Hwange cancelled

Conservationists are incensed over a decision by the Zimbabwean government to allocate two coal mining concessions in the middle of Hwange National Park and the surrounding Deka Safari Area.

Bhejane Trust, a non-profit conservation organization that works with Zimbabwe’s National Parks and Wildlife Management Authority, broke the news on Facebook with the following statement:

“Our Rhino Monitoring team recently found some Chinese (people) in Hwange Park – we managed to ascertain they were drilling core samples for coal. Parks arrested them and turned them over to the Police. However, they soon reappeared with a permit giving them the right to carry on in the Park with exploratory drilling. They did this without any consultation with the Area Manager and seem to feel they have a right to go wherever they like to.

We followed up on this and discovered the Government has allocated two coal mining concessions in the middle of Sinamatella and Robins! The mining concessions are Special Grants which apparently can only be issued by the President, and both been granted to Chinese companies.”

The two concessions are in the northern section of the national park, and it appears that they have been granted to Afrochine Energy (concession SG7263 – incorporating Deteema Dam and Masuma Dam) and Zhongxin Coal Mining Group (concession SG5756). The Bhejane Trust was subsequently sent an undated Stakeholders Questionnaire by SustiGlobal, a company contracted to conduct the standard Environmental Impact Assessments (EIA) for both companies. These questionnaires should have been sent before exploratory drilling.

Hwange National Park is Zimbabwe’s largest national park at 15,000km² and is home to the second-largest elephant population in Africa.

A different safari – photographic hides

It was a chilly (by Lowveld standards) and breathlessly still winter morning as the three of us headed north from our Hoedspruit hometown for the 50-minute drive to our adventure for the day – two underground photographic hides. We wanted to be in the first hide before the rising sun, in pursuit of the ‘golden light’, so it was pitch dark as we headed out. The francolins and scrub-robins had not even begun to herald another spectacular bushveld day.

‘You have to spend a full day in the Indlovu River Lodge hides Simon, the experience will blow your mind’, was the raison d’etre proffered by Villiers Steyn, good friend, photographer, and safari guru of note. Also roped in was Owen Grobler, keen amateur photographer, and volunteer leopard monitor on the wildlife estate that the three of us call home. And so, we headed out to Karongwe Private Game Reserve with packed food and refreshments to last the day. I don’t own an SLR camera, having decided many years ago to use my moments on safari absorbing every second and living the moment. My iPhone is perfect for my photographic needs, as was the Samsung Galaxy before that. Yes, my photographer friends do snigger behind my back. Villiers and Owen came armed with enough big equipment to go to war.

Twelve hours later, I was elated, exhausted and ready to rest my eyes.

Regular visitors to the hides include tree squirrels, vervet monkeys, giraffes, warthogs, baboons, zebras and nyala.

The underground photographic hide experience is for two kinds of people. First, of course, are the photographers that are after that ideal shot – be they pro or amateur, novice or experienced. Second, me, is the type who enjoy hour after hour of quietly observing nature do her thing, be it dainty blue waxbills risking a splashy bath or skittish zebras farting and kicking up dust as they scrap for the best drinking position. We enjoyed plentiful waterside to-and-fro that day, from a constant stream of impala, zebra, nyala and warthog to a furtive slender mongoose viewing us with suspicion from a few meters away before settling down to slake his thirst. For me, the highlight was the avian candy on offer – from flocks of fidgety bronze mannikins and common waxbills to dapper green-winged pytilias and a plump green pigeon that helicoptered in for a thirsty gulp before heading back to the nearby riverine trees.

Photographic hides — A flock of bronze mannikins, green-winged pytilia pair with blue waxbill, emerald-spotted wood-dove, Cape glossy starling and golden-breasted buntings

Karongwe is Big 5 country, and other visitors to the hides have captured herds of elephant and buffalo, lion prides and solitary leopards as they come in to drink. As usual, what you see is governed by the time of year and by how much water there is on the reserve.

I also enjoyed watching Owen and Villiers in action, as they set up their cameras for specific shots, made mistakes (avec exotic expletives) and celebrated some epic shots. Particularly amusing for me was watching Owen try again and again for that perfect bird ‘take-off shot’. Both gentlemen endeavoured (in vain) to capture the split-second a resident brown-hooded kingfisher hit the water to snatch a quick drink and dunking – which he did several times that morning.

There is something innately satisfying about that first cup of steaming coffee and dunked rusks, as you settle in to watch the awakening day, and tucking into your packed lunch after a morning of wall-to-wall action. And then, as the early evening shadows lengthen, those snacks accompanied by something a bit stronger adds to what is an epic African safari experience that is vastly different to the usual game drive or bush walk, offering a unique perspective on off-the-grid and deeply immersive experiences. Does life get any better than spending the day with friends enjoying what nature has to offer?

THE HIDES

There are two underground hides on offer at Indlovu River Lodge. Hoseng Hide faces west and is, therefore, ideally positioned for early-morning photography. The distance to where most wildlife drinks is a mere six meters – perfect for bird and up-close photography. Thapama Hide faces east and so is ideal for later afternoon photography, and the distance to the subject matter is 12 meters.

Both hides comfortably accommodate up to five guests and are equipped with comfortable wheeled high-backed director’s chairs, carpets to minimize noise and moveable gimbals. There is an iron bar to mount the gimbal and for bean bags. Mobile phone reception at the hides was non-existent, allowing for total immersion in the hide experience without distraction. The eye-level underground aspect enables you to shoot from ground level, across the water. Watch this video about the two hides at Indlovu River Lodge.

THE LODGE AND GAME RESERVE

Indlovu River Lodge is located in the 9,000 ha Big 5 Karongwe Private Game Reserve, a short drive from the town on Hoedspruit. The lodge can accommodate up to 20 guests via seven villas and suites in a beautiful garden setting under huge jackalberry trees.

WATCH: Villiers Steyn, aka ‘The Safari Expert’ made this video about our day in the hides at Indlovu River Lodge.

Keep the passion.

Simon Espley – CEO, Africa Geographic

Keeping an eye on predators

Anyone who has watched ambush predators like lions and leopards in action knows that their movements are almost invariably governed by the gaze of the animals they are hunting, particularly during the day. Unless there are exceptional circumstances (the crush of a river crossing during the great migration in Kenya and Tanzania, for example), predators have to wait for the opportunity to strike, and if they are spotted by their prey, the hunt is almost always over. Now scientists have found a way to use this instinctive behaviour to deter predators from attacking livestock – a practical application of ethology with the potential to reduce human-wildlife conflict in some of the most impoverished areas of Africa. And all it requires is a lick of paint in the right place – a cow’s rear end.

Attacks on livestock by wild predators are common in rural regions surrounding protected wilderness areas. This has an enormous impact on impoverished households that depend on their livestock to survive and often results in the tragic retaliatory killing of a predator and even mass-poisoning events. Scientists and conservationists are continually seeking ways of mitigating this conflict, and while there is no single solution, something as simple as painting eye markings on cows has now been scientifically proven to deter predators.

Eyespots in nature are relatively common, with moths and butterflies being the most obvious example, and while there is some disagreement as to how these eye-markings work to deter predators, it is clearly an approach that has been evolutionarily selected for. Researchers used this knowledge to test whether or not this could be applied in deterring large mammalian predators by painting eyes on either side of cows’ tails on non-commercial farms on the fringes of the Okavango Delta. In conjunction with Botswana Predator Conservation and the local herders of the region, the researchers studied 2,061 cattle over four years.

They selected herds which had experienced high levels of predation and painted artificial eyespots in black and white or yellow on random cattle. To determine whether or not the effects could be attributed to the “eye”-shape of the markings, some cattle were only marked with simple X-shapes, and others were left unmarked. The cattle were also fitted with GPS-loggers to ensure that the results of the study could not be attributed to the movements of the cattle while left unattended during the day.

During the study period, of the 19 cattle killed by ambush predators, 15 of these were unmarked and the remaining 4 were marked with Xs. Not one of the 683 cows with eyespots was killed during the study. The predators (almost invariably lions) were clearly deterred by the eyespots painted on the cattle but, surprisingly, the X-markings also seemed to have an effect in deterring predation. From an academic perspective, this result is relevant to how eyespot markings actually work, and while it does seem to provide evidence to support the ‘detection hypothesis’, it still does not offer any conclusive answers.

The positive results of this study suggest that painting eyespots on cattle could provide a low-cost method for reducing the risks of wild predation on livestock; however, the researchers do have some cautionary points in this respect. The first of these is that the method is as yet untested when all the cows in a herd have been marked. The second is that the marks may lose their effectiveness over time, as the lions become more accustomed to them. As such, the authors suggest that this approach is just one tool one which needs to be used in conjunction with others in the ongoing battle against human-wildlife conflict.

The full study can be accessed here: “Artificial eyespots on cattle reduce predation by large carnivores”, Radford C., et al (2020), Communications Biology

A Black and White Photo Safari

Contributor

LAURENT BAHEUX is a French photographer known for high contrast black and white photographs of nature and wildlife. Tight shots or misaligned, noise or grain, he explores every technique with the ultimate aim of honouring the subjects that he photographs. Baheux’s work on African wildlife has been featured in art galleries worldwide and in awareness campaigns for conservation and environmental organisations including World Wildlife Fund (WWF), GoodPlanet Foundation, and United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). He is a UNEP Goodwill Ambassador for the anti-poaching initiative with images being featured in the Wild and Precious international exhibition. View more of Laurent’s work on http://www.laurentbaheux.com.

Are Namibia’s carnivores at risk? Calling on citizen scientists

By Namibian Chamber of Environment, originally published in Conservation Namibia

The world is facing an extinction crisis, and Namibia’s carnivores are also at risk. According to the Living Planet Index, wildlife populations have declined by 60% in the last 40 years. Although species go extinct naturally, humankind’s impact has accelerated the rate of extinction to up to 1,000 times faster than the estimated natural rate.

Our world’s plants and animals are of incalculable value as they provide ecosystem services that are essential to life on earth. Besides their direct worth, wildlife is valuable to us in many ways that cannot be expressed in dollars and cents – the majesty of an elephant in a savannah, the hard stare of a lion when you make eye contact, our sense of serenity and wellbeing in natural spaces. These are things that money cannot buy, but we could lose them if our conservation efforts fail.

The first step to addressing a problem is to understand its extent, severity and causes. Without this information, it would be impossible to find effective solutions. To address this need, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) established the Red List, which since 1964 has grown to become the largest and most comprehensive database of extinction risks to plants and animals.

By combining hard data with expert knowledge in a standardised and globally recognised format, the IUCN Red List has become the go-to resource for conservationists and the general public. It is an especially useful guide for setting conservation priorities by identifying which species need the most urgent help, and what we can do to reduce the threats they face. You can search this database to find out more about plants or animals that interest you at www.iucnredlist.org.

When assessing a species, experts consider more than just the total number of animals left on earth. They take into account whether or not these numbers have declined in the last ten years, and if so, by how much; the extent and quality of the area they now occupy, and if that area is smaller or more fragmented than it used to be; current population estimates; and ultimately their probability of extinction in future. Once these factors have been taken into account, experts assign the species to one of the IUCN categories of threat – known as the species’ status.

Besides species that are now extinct in the wild, or those we know too little about to assess, all others fall into one of the following categories (from worst to best status): Critically Endangered, Endangered, Vulnerable, Near Threatened, and Least Concern. Conservationists are most concerned about species falling in the first three of these categories, which face high to extremely high risks of extinction in the wild. Near Threatened species still warrant monitoring, as these species could decline into one of the worse categories in future if we fail to address the threats they face today.

The Red List is concerned with global extinction risks, but this is not always useful for governments and conservation organisations working in specific countries – species that are doing well globally may be declining within a country, or vice versa. If an increased national extinction risk is not identified and addressed, individual countries may lose these species before they are aware of the problem. Consequently, the IUCN has created a system for assessing extinction risks at national and regional scales. The information produced from collecting data and drawing on local expert knowledge is then published as a Red Data Book. These books are available to the public and can assist national governments in setting their conservation agendas. A good example is Namibia’s Red Data Book for Birds, entitled Birds to Watch in Namibia – Red, Rare and Endemic Species, which can be sourced here Namibia’s Environmental Information Service.

Namibia has not yet produced a Red Data Book for any of its mammals, but the Namibian Chamber of Environment (NCE), together with the Large Carnivore Management Association of Namibia (LCMAN) and the Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism (MEFT), is looking to change this. On 8-10 November 2017, NCE facilitated a meeting sponsored by B2Gold Namibia at the Otjikoto Environmental Centre to look at creating a Red Data Book for Namibia’s carnivores. The experts who attended the meeting are affiliated with LCMAN, NCE and (MEFT) – organisations that are ideally placed to undertake collaborative tasks such as this one.

During the conference, the experts on carnivores presented their current knowledge on everything from lions to mongooses. Large carnivores, like the big cats, hyenas, and African wild dogs, are generally better-studied and understood than small carnivores, and they are under much greater threat due to human pressures. During the conference, the experts gave preliminary Namibian statuses to all of the carnivores, which will be revised once all available data have been collated and analysed for each species. These preliminary statuses indicate that of the carnivores, African wild dogs, cheetah, and spotted hyena have higher extinction risks in Namibia than they have globally (see Table 1).

Table 1. The Global and preliminary Namibian statuses for carnivores. Species not listed here are classified as Least Concern globally and in Namibia.

One of the reasons for the large carnivore status differences between Namibia and the rest of Africa is that Namibia’s dry climate naturally limits their range and population densities. For example, spotted hyenas are more common in high rainfall areas and are not as well adapted to desert life as brown hyenas. Namibia’s spotted hyenas, therefore, occur at relatively low densities, which increases their risk of extinction when compared to other spotted hyena populations.

Painted wolves (African wild dogs) are also confined to the wetter parts of the country (the northeast) and are more susceptible to being killed by farmers than hyenas. They are more visible as they hunt in packs and can be active during daylight hours, while their use of communal dens makes them vulnerable to farmer retaliation. Painted wolves are perceived to be incompatible with livestock farming, which means that some farmers may eliminate a whole pack if they encounter them. Changing the perceptions and subsequent tolerance by farmers of painted wolves is thus a conservation priority.

Cheetahs are also under threat in Namibia, mainly due to their conflict with livestock and wildlife farmers. Despite Namibia hosting the largest population of cheetahs in the world, the vast majority of these cats occur on farmland that has no official protection status. There have been two recent calls (see here and here) to up-list the cheetah to Endangered on a global basis, which will match their status in Namibia. Currently, cheetahs and livestock farmers coexist to some extent in Namibia, particularly in areas with healthy wild prey populations. Wildlife/game farmers tend to be less tolerant of cheetahs, as these cats are efficient predators of their preferred prey species – e.g. springbok, blesbok and the young of larger, often high-value antelope.

The cheetah range (left, shaded grey) compared to the lion range (right, shaded grey) in Namibia. Note how much of the cheetah range occurs outside protected areas (pink) compared to lions.

In stark contrast to cheetahs, Namibia’s lions are almost entirely reliant on protected areas like Etosha, and farmers rarely tolerate them. The main exception to this rule is the desert-adapted population in the far northwest, where lions occur at naturally low densities due to the harsh desert environment. Farmers in these regions come into conflict with the lions, but several concerted conservation efforts from government, non-governmental organisations and local conservancies have contributed to keeping this unique population alive.

Leopards are more broadly distributed within Namibia than either cheetahs or lions, but their Vulnerable status indicates that they remain a conservation concern – perhaps more so at the global level than in Namibia. The smallest cat in Namibia – the black-footed cat – shares its status with leopards, and poses even greater challenges to scientists trying to study it. Leopards are difficult to count due to their secretive, nocturnal nature, and black-footed cats are even worse! Both cats are secretive and nocturnal, but whereas leopards can be counted using heat and motion-sensitive camera traps, black-footed cats are rarely caught on camera.

While writing the Red Data Book, carnivore experts in Namibia will access as many sources of reliable information as possible. Carnivore researchers conduct intensive surveys using camera traps and other methods, but these efforts are usually limited to specific study areas and periods. Furthermore, small carnivore species (e.g. mongoose species, honey badgers and weasels) are rarely surveyed so intensively. While intensive studies provide the cornerstone of data collection efforts, more data over a larger area of Namibia and over longer periods are required to improve the accuracy of the extinction risk assessments.

The good news is that anyone who lives in or visits Namibia can contribute by collecting data for scientific purposes, as a ‘citizen scientist’. This can be done easily by downloading a free app (details below) for smartphones. This app contributes to the Namibian Environmental Information System, an online database that hosts a mind-boggling amount of information about the country.

After downloading the Atlasing app, you can report any sightings of carnivores and a range of other animals and plants in a matter of seconds. The app uses your smartphone’s built-in GPS unit to provide an accurate location for your sighting, and you can even submit photos if you are unsure of the species’ identification. If you are not online when you record the sighting, the app will save your records and upload them when you choose to do so. Once you have entered and uploaded your sightings, you can visit www.the-eis.com/atlas to find your own and others’ contributions to the database on a map of Namibia.

The global extinction crisis is real. Nonetheless, you can help dedicated wildlife researchers collect accurate information on species that are under threat. This knowledge is power, which will be used to guide our conservation actions and prevent further human-caused extinctions. Get the Atlasing app and be part of the solution.

With input from the Large Carnivore Management Association of Namibia and the Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism who attended the Namibian Red Data Book workshop hosted by the Namibian Chamber of Environment. Maps generated from Namibia’s Environmental Information System.

Bwindi

Bwindi Impenetrable National Park is the fairy-tale forest we dreamed about as children; it is also primaeval – one of Africa’s oldest ecosystems. This is a landscape wrapped in a blanket of mist; verdant, muddy, and bursting with the secret sounds of hidden life. Precipitous slopes descend to deep valleys cut into the landscape by tumbling, mountainous streams and the air is filled with the clamorous calls of forest birds unseen in the canopy. From ancient hardwood trees interspersed with bamboo thickets to delicate fern fronds, dangling vines and vicious nettles, the word “Bwindi” literally translates to “impenetrable” in the local Runyakitara language of Uganda.

Bwindi is a UNESCO World Heritage Site that is home to more than 480 mountain gorillas; an island of biodiversity surrounded by rural Ugandan farmlands.

The basics

Situated in southwest Uganda, Bwindi Impenetrable National Park is just over 330km² (33,000 hectares). To the north lies Queen Elizabeth National Park (famous for its tree-climbing lions), to the south the Virunga Mountains of Rwanda, and the Democratic Republic of Congo lies along the western edge of the park. As part of East Africa’s Albertine Rift and with altitudes ranging from 1,160 to 2,607 meters, Bwindi’s ancient rainforests have some of the highest levels of biodiversity in Uganda, including over 160 tree species, 120 mammals and 350 documented bird species.

The park is divided into four sections, named after the surrounding villages:

1. Buhoma (northern Bwindi)

The most visited area of the park, Buhoma is the largest of the four sectors and has the highest density of luxury accommodation options. As the first section of the park to open to visitors, this is where gorilla trekking first started in Bwindi, when the Mubare gorilla group was habituated in 1992. Apart from the Mubare family, the Habinyanja, Katwe and Rushegura groups also call Buhoma home. Visitors can also tour the neighbouring communities, bird watch and hike some of the most spectacular forest trails in Africa.

2. Ruhija (eastern Bwindi)

Ruhija is less-frequented than Buhoma, and home to the Kyaguriro, Oruzogo and Bitukura gorilla families. Aside from gorilla trekking, avid hikers can aim for the top of Rwamunyonyi Peak (“the hill of many birds”) – the highest point in the park that offers extraordinary views. As the name suggests, the forests around Rwamunyonyi offer some of the best birding in Bwindi (more on that later). Many lodges and tour guides also offer trips into the surrounding areas to meet some of the Batwa people – the park’s original inhabitants. On offer are demonstrations of the use of medicinal plants found in the forest and other ancient survival skills practised by their people for thousands of years. While elephant sightings in Bwindi are infrequent, Ruhija offers the best chance of spotting one of these shy grey ghosts.

3. Rushaga sector (southern Bwindi)

The Rushaga region of Bwindi is famed for its gorilla trekking, with multiple habituated gorilla families in the region, including the Bikingi, Bweza, Busingye, Kahungye, Mucunguzi, Rwigi, Mishaya groups and the Nshongi group – the largest of all the gorilla families in Bwindi. The major drawcard of this region is that a gorilla habituation experience is offered for 2 of these gorilla families, which allows tourists to spend up to 4 hours with the group, rather than the standard 1 hour. The Rushaga sector includes Lake Mutanda, so visitors can set out on a boat cruise for an entirely different perspective of the spectacular scenery.

4. Nkuringo (western Bwindi)

Home to the Nkuringo, Bushaho, Christmas, Nkuringo and Posho gorilla families, the Nkuringo sector is said to be the most scenic area to visit in Bwindi. The dramatic topography and break-taking views of the Virunga volcanoes do come at a physical cost; this particular region is better suited to more physically active visitors.

Gorilla trekking

While there are many aspects to your Bwindi safari, the vast number of tourists that visit every year come to spend time with mountain gorillas – one of Africa’s most famous animals. For many, this is a once-in-a-lifetime, spiritual experience with these sentient great apes. Once on the verge of extinction, mountain gorilla numbers have been steadily increasing in the last decade, with the most recent estimate putting the number of wild mountain gorillas at over 1,000 individuals. Over 450 of these individuals are found in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, making it one of the population’s strongholds.

Gorilla trekking tourism has been a major contributing factor in the conservation of these magnificent creatures and will remain essential to their future survival. Gorilla trekking is carefully and consistently controlled, to ensure that no harm comes to the gorillas, and every tourist undergoes an induction session before commencing the trek. No more than eight individuals (less for certain gorilla families) are allowed at any one time with a gorilla family group, for a maximum of one hour. Gorillas are particularly sensitive to human-carried pathogens and what might just be a cold for an unsuspecting tourist could mean disaster for the local gorilla population. As such, visitors will not be allowed to participate in a gorilla trek if they are showing any symptoms of illness.

READ MORE about gorilla trekking here and see our trekking safaris

Primates and other things

Apart from the mountain gorillas that have made the region famous, Bwindi is also home to another nine species of non-human primates. There are tool-wielding chimpanzees in the forest (Bwindi is the only place where mountain gorillas and chimpanzees are found together). Still, at this stage, none are habituated to the presence of humans, so sightings tend to be rare and relatively brief. The remaining primate species are black-and-white colobus, Ugandan red colobus, red-tailed and blue monkeys, golden monkeys, grey-cheeked mangabeys, vervets and vulnerable L’Hoest’s monkeys.

In addition to the smaller primates that swing their way through the treetops, other mammals roam the forest paths of Bwindi, including forest elephants, though they are very seldom seen. ‘Impenetrable’ though the forest may seem to humans, duikers, forest hogs, bush pigs, golden cats, jackals, civets and numerous other small mammals have all found ways to adapt to the rugged terrain.

The birds and the butterflies

Uganda is one of the most exceptional birding destinations in Africa and home to half of all of Africa’s bird species, with a count of about 1,065 species. The Bwindi Impenetrable Forest ecosystem alone offers a chance to spot 350 species, including 23 of the 24 Albertine Rift endemics. While forest birding can be particularly challenging, the opportunity to explore silvan paths and happen upon tumbling waterfalls, all the while listening and scanning for a flutter of movement, has all the makings of a birdwatching treasure hunt. Chapin’s flycatcher, short-tailed warblers, green tinkerbirds and, of course, the spectacular turacos are all rewards for a day’s birding in Bwindi. There may even come a chance to become the first person to take a photo of Shelley’s crimsonwing in the wild. As mentioned, Ruhija’s highlands offer particularly diverse birding, and here keen birders can search the Mubwindi Swamp trail for the mysterious African green broadbill. For a more thorough description of Bwindi’s avian delights read Uganda Birding – 10 Best Spots.

As if the colourful flashes of blue-headed sunbirds and black bee-eaters were not dazzling enough, Bwindi’s 310 montane butterfly species put on their own display, adding to the other-worldly feeling of the dappled green light.

The experience

A trip to Bwindi Impenetrable Forest is a physical and sensory extravaganza, combined with the fantastic opportunity to spend time with gentle mountain gorillas. The accommodation options range from budge community lodges to the more luxurious selections, but the cost of the guided gorilla trek and permits come standard regardless of your choice of abode. Porters will be on hand to help carry equipment and food, as it can take up to 8 hours to find the gorilla families, depending on how far they decide to move from one day to the next. Hiring porters for a relatively small payment will not only free you up to enjoy every moment of this bucket-list experience, but it will also provide gainful employment to the very people who ensure the ongoing survival of these great apes.

Your gorilla trek safari is not the opportunity to break in a brand-new pair of boots; otherwise exploring the forests becomes an exercise in blister control and pain management. A reliable pair of worn-in waterproof boots that support your ankles is essential, as is waterproofing for your camera, money, passport and other valuables. Though there are drier periods around January and February, as well as from June until September, it rains all year round in Bwindi, and the damp at high altitudes can make it quite cold after a shower. Conversely, its proximity to the equator makes sunscreen an essential item, as it can be hot and humid when not raining. Visitors will be advised as to what to wear and pack, as being well-prepared is essential to making the most of a visit to one of Africa’s most fascinating regions.

Bwindi Impenetrable Forest is indeed a fairy-tale forest; an undeniably mystical experience beneath the towering canopy. The residents of the park and surrounding areas, human and gorilla alike, are survivors in a dramatic landscape with a complicated history, which makes visiting Bwindi a genuinely humbling experience.

Want to go on safari to Bwindi? To find lodges, search for our ready-made packages or get in touch with our travel team to arrange your safari, scroll down to after this story.

Further reading: The Mountain Gorilla: Gentle Giants of the Forests

“Living dead” – elephants in Kruger NP are sterilizing palm trees, says research

Elephant feeding patterns are preventing fan palms (Hyphaene petersiana) from reaching full size and reproductive potential, says a new study.

Many plant species that are subject to elephant feeding are capable of resprouting, which makes evaluating the effects of elephant feeding more difficult because, while the height of plants may be reduced, they will still be present, often in high densities. While previous studies into the impact of elephant feeding have focussed on the presence, height or stem density of savanna plants, the authors of this study suggest that it is also essential to evaluate the reproductive condition of plants.

The management of elephant numbers in the Kruger National Park in South Africa, where the population has demonstrated a consistent increase in the last two decades, is a controversial subject. High numbers of elephants can result in the widespread conversion of woodlands to grasslands. Some species of plants, such as the baobab (Adansonia digitata) and several Acacia species are intolerant of consistent elephant feeding. Yet, other plant species rely on the presence of elephants for seed dispersal. The tolerance of many savanna plants in the face of elephant disturbance and their capacity to resprout from the base, stem or roots further complicates the debate, as conservation managers work to determine what constitutes ideal savanna vegetation. As a result, determining the carrying capacity of the KNP for elephants is extremely complex.

The researchers, in this case, chose to focus on the H. petersiana palm species because they are both browsed by elephants and their seeds are dispersed in this manner. The plant demonstrates prolific production of new stems in response to feeding damage and was previously believed to be resistant to elephant feeding damage because the stem densities of browsed plants were wider than those protected from elephant herbivory.

However, most plants need to reach a minimum size to be able to reproduce. Researchers compared palms within the Nwaxitshumbe enclosure (one of the rare antelope breeding camps where the plants have been protected from elephant feeding for several decades) with palm trees outside the enclosure, which had evidence of extensive elephant feeding damage. Of the 65 trees in the enclosure, 92% had reached maturity at heights of between 4-5.3m. In contrast, of the 75 palms surveyed outside the enclosure, not one had reached the necessary height for reproductive maturity, with most being over 2.5m short of the minimum. No seedlings were found either within or outside the enclosure. Outside the enclosure, this can be explained by the lack of reproductively mature trees. In contrast, the lack of seedlings inside the enclosure can be explained by the absence of elephants to aid in the dispersal and germination of the seeds.

The researchers point to three significant impacts of this mass sterilization. The first is that sterile plants cannot disperse seeds to shift their distribution range with moving climate zones, which is particularly serious in the face of climate change. The second is that without new young plants, the plant will eventually go extinct (though this particular palm species can live for over a century). The final concern is that the fact that immature plants do not produce flowers or fruits could have biodiversity implications for several animals such as vervet monkeys and pompilid wasps. The palm swifts were observed to be nesting only within the tall palms in the enclosure.

While acknowledging that their findings were limited to one plant species in one location, the authors believe that this consequence of elephant feeding is likely to be widespread and affecting other woody tree species, a conclusion supported by an extensive Google Earth survey. A previous study which compared the palms inside the same enclosure to those outside missed this negative impact on reproductive status, and the authors of the present study suggest that this is because reproductive condition is not part of a routine assessment of the impacts of herbivory. As such, they suggest that managers need to consider this impact when evaluating the impact of elephant feeding patterns, even in species that appear prima facie to be unaffected or which increases in stem density. Due to the loss of their reproductive capacity, the authors describe these palms as “the living dead” of the Kruger National Park.

The full report can be accessed here: “Mass sterilization of a common palm species by elephants in Kruger National Park, South Africa“, Midgley, J., Coetzee, B., Tye, D., and Kruger, L., (2020), Scientific Reports

Lion trophy hunting – we interview Craig Packer

Dr Craig Packer is an American biologist, zoologist, and ecologist chiefly known for his research on lions in Tanzania. He worked hard to convince the trophy hunting industry and government departments to adopt a transparent, scientifically-based strategy in order to ensure the sustainability of lion populations and of the industry. Although his research and efforts resulted in a greater understanding of the impact of trophy hunting on lion populations, he was ultimately exiled from the country after rattling too many cages.

We interview Dr Packer:

Numbers: Current estimates put the African lion population at 20,000 to 30,000 – a 96% reduction from 450,000 in the 1940s. They occupy 8% of their historical range, and populations declined by 60% during 1994-2014 in all but four African countries. Is the current lion population stable?

C.P.: I’ve never been comfortable with the estimated percentage-lost-since-whatever-date people use; there were no reasonable estimates until recently. However, if we just talk about habitat loss, yes, there has been an enormous reduction in lion habitat since, say, the 1890s.

Factors: The primary causes of lion population reductions are widely believed to be the loss of habitat, loss of prey base and human-lion conflict. To that trio of causes, US Fish and Wildlife Services adds trophy hunting when it is not managed correctly. Although your book does cover the three primary causes mentioned above, the main focus is on the impact of trophy hunting and your engagement with that industry. Does that focus reflect a personal belief that trophy hunting is a significant factor contributing to lion population reductions?

C.P.: We published a paper in 2011 showing that trophy hunting had been poorly managed in Tanzania, and, thus, had likely contributed to an overall reduction in lion numbers in the country up to that point. The Tanzanian government had vigorously encouraged hunters to shoot as many lions as possible in their respective hunting blocks, and most of the blocks were clearly overhunted. These were in areas that were not dramatically affected by habitat loss, and, if human-lion conflict was also a factor, the hunting operators had patently failed to provide the necessary incentives for people to “live with lions.”

Trophy hunting then and now: In your book ‘Lions in the Balance‘ you refer to trophy hunting quotas in Tanzania and offtakes that were too high and of the shooting of young (three-year-old) males as contributing to the significant drop in Tanzania lion populations. Could you provide information supporting the above statement and do you believe that much has changed in that country in the last several years?

C.P.: For many years, Tanzanian hunting operators routinely posted photographs of their “trophy” lions, so it was clear that many companies filled their quotas by allowing clients to shoot males as young as two years of age. Male lions in Tanzania don’t reach maturity until they are about four, and they then need two years residency in a pride of females to be able to produce a surviving cohort of offspring — younger animals are either killed or forced to leave home by replacement males. However, even if hunters shoot immature animals, their impacts won’t necessarily affect the entire population unless they have shot out too manyof the older males. Given the absence of any sort of age minimum, we looked at the impacts of differing levels of offtake, and we found that hunting was harmful wherever more than one lion was shot per thousand square kilometres in the Selous Game Reserve (which holds one of the richest lion habitats in all of Africa) or more than one lion per 2,000 km2 in the rest of Tanzania’s hunting blocks. We had previously developed simulation models that mimicked the impacts of trophy hunting on lion populations and found that a quota wouldn’t be necessary if hunters only removed males that were at least 6 yrs of age. Tanzania claims to have adopted the recommended 6-yr minimum, but they have not been transparent in showing evidence of compliance. They point to the very low number of lion trophies that have been exported the past years, but these numbers are pretty much what we would have expected from the long-term trends since the 1980s. Unless they were to provide concrete evidence that they are no longer allowing the shooting of under-aged males, I would suspect they have largely been conducting business as usual.

By the way, later work has suggested that an 8-year minimum might be more appropriate in Zambia where the lions are additionally subject to high levels of poaching via wire snares and in South Africa where males take longer to reach maturity (6 yrs instead of the 4 yrs in East Africa).

Why did you leave Tanzania? The evolution of your journey as a lion conservationist in Tanzania is well mapped in your book. You started out as being very supportive of the notion that well-managed trophy hunting of lions could help maintain stable lion populations, and your engagement of the Tanzanian authorities and the trophy hunting industry was through that lens. And yet, the book chronicles your conversion over the years to a somewhat sceptical critic of the industry – based mainly on continued non-sustainable offtakes and practises, refusal to change based on scientific input, lack of transparency, rampant corruption and the bullying tactics by some members of the industry. It is clear that your continued presence in Tanzania became less secure, but the book did not go into detail about why you left Tanzania. Was there a deciding moment or factor that caused you to move back to the United States?

C.P.: The Tanzanian Government revoked my research clearance, so I was unable to continue working in the country. I was also informed that I was no longer allowed to enter the country even as a tourist. I was exiled because I attempted to reform the Tanzanian hunting industry.

Cecil: The exposé about the killing of Cecil the Lion near Hwange (Zimbabwe) by American dentist and trophy hunter Walter Palmer galvanised discussion, albeit heated and ideological, about the trophy hunting of wild free-roaming lions. Many ‘sustainable use’ protagonists claim that this particular discussion is not conducive to constructive debate about lion conservation, whereas others argue that shining a spotlight into the secretive trophy hunting industry is precisely what is needed. Did any good come of this watershed moment in the conversation about lion conservation?

C.P.: The Cecil controversy certainly galvanised public opinion to the extent that US Fisheries & Wildlife banned imports of lion trophies from Zimbabwe and Tanzania. I don’t think this would have happened otherwise. In their ruling, USFWS also set out a new policy requiring range states to provide evidence that sport hunting is a net positive for conservation. I have yet to see any clear evidence on this point from either country. Under the current administration, imports are being decided on a “case by case basis” – I haven’t heard how many lion trophies have been imported from Tanzania or Zimbabwe in the past two years.

Success stories: Can you state unequivocally that trophy hunting of wild, free-roaming (unfenced) lions has ever helped to maintain or increase lion populations in any area/region? If so, please provide examples.

C.P.: Bubye Valley Conservancy and Save Valley Conservancy in Zimbabwe both exist thanks to the funding generated by sport hunting. In both conservancies, lion numbers grew rapidly after they were adequately gazetted, and numbers remained close to the potential carrying capacity for lions in those habitats. It’s possible that a few other conservancies/hunting blocks have been similarly successful in other countries, but I haven’t seen clear evidence outside of these two sites.

One-product industry: It seems as if the trophy hunting industry in Tanzania has modelled and priced itself primarily based on the killing of wild lions and that the extirpation of their main commodity is leading to the collapse of the industry. Is that a fair reflection of the industry?

C.P.: Lion hunting offtakes don’t have to be so excessive as we found in Tanzania. With a well-enforced age minimum, the lions would be OK; Bubye and Save both show that it’s possible. The problem is one of economics. Most African governments have only received in the order of $10,000 per dead lion. This is ridiculously low. In the US, hunters may pay $100,000 to shoot a bighorn sheep. One would have thought that a lion would be worth at least ten times as much as a sheep. If hunters were to pay closer to a million dollars per lion, the industry would generate the funding necessary to protect lion habitat – which various other authors and I have estimated to be roughly $1,000/km2/year. A lion pride needs a lot of land, and the current pricing structure is far too low. The question, of course, then arises as to why lion trophies are so cheap — especially now that there may be fewer lions left in Africa than rhinos.

Fences: In your book, you touch on the need for fences in Tanzania, even in the greater Serengeti ecosystem, to keep humans and their livelihoods safe from animals, and vice versa. In South Africa, this is old news, of course, and the topic would not meet with much resistance. But in East Africa the concept of fencing in animals is controversial. Could you elaborate on that sensitive subject?

C.P.: Suffice it to say that fencing is now being used in far more countries than in the past. The need for fencing will continue to grow as the human population in Africa is expected to quadruple in the coming years. Rapid economic development in Africa will further lead to exploding demand for ever more livestock. Lions won’t have a chance over most of the continent if they aren’t safely separated from the growing human footprint. East African conservationists tend to be more idealistic than their South African counterparts, but local people are increasingly demanding to be heard — and they want to be safe from lions and protect their livestock. Of course, not every landscape can be fenced. As we saw decades ago in Botswana, poorly positioned fencing can destroy large-scale animal migrations. However, human activities are already so intensive in many parts of Africa that the wildlife is mostly already blocked off. Imagine having wildebeest pass through Nairobi or elephants in Kampala. So it would be a good idea if the conservationists started working with local authorities to decide how best to partition the land, and that will inevitably include fencing.

Nature versus commerce: ‘Nature’ tends to weed out weaker individuals, if only because those individuals are less likely to escape predators and more likely to die from disease. And yet, trophy hunting practises the opposite strategy – it removes the big and robust individuals. How can practising the opposite of what nature does ever be ‘sustainable’?

C.P.: With an age-minimum, hunters are not necessarily removing the best genes from the population; and every mature male gets to breed before being shot. I would recommend an age minimum for antelope, buffalo, elephant, and all carnivore species. In fact, South Africa also has an age minimum for leopards.

Where to now, for lion conservation? So many trophy hunting blocks in Tanzania have now been abandoned over the years by the industry, often with the excuse that trophy import bans have killed the industry, and so poachers have moved in to strip bare. Our observation is that most bans are relatively recent, and that over-exploitation over many years and lack of investment into conservation and community are the primary reasons for these vast areas being no longer attractive to the trophy hunting industry. Your thoughts on that topic, and suggestion about what to do with those former hunting areas?

C.P.: It’s very convenient for the hunting industry to blame restrictions that were, in fact, imposed because of the impacts of their past practices rather than to accept that they have long been part of the problem. Not only did they overhunt in much of Tanzania, but they also failed to generate the funding to protect the areas they were claiming to conserve. They were given dominion over the land at cut-rate prices, and they didn’t give back to some of the poorest countries and communities in the world. On the other hand, there’s still the problem of what to do with all those abandoned hunting blocks. The anti-hunting lobby has never found a way to pay for the conservation of those areas either. So if people are philosophically opposed to hunting, I ask you: how would you pay for it? Tanzania has something like 300,000 km2 of hunting blocks — can you raise the $300 million every single year that will be needed to protect this land? If you’ve got any good ideas, I’d love to hear from you.

Buy Craig Packer’s book: LIONS IN THE BALANCE: Man-Eaters, Manes, and Men with Guns

Monsters take many forms: from man-eating lions to the people who hunt them, from armed robbers to that midnight knock at the door of a cheap hotel room in Dar es Salaam. And celebrated biologist Craig Packer has faced them all.

With Lions in the Balance, Packer takes us back into the complex, tooth-and-claw world of the African lion, offering revealing insights into both the lives of one of the most iconic and dangerous animals on earth and the very real risks of protecting them. Packer is sure to infuriate millionaires, politicians, aid agencies, and conservationists alike as he minces no words about the problems he encounters. But with a narrative stretching from far flung parts of Africa to the corridors of power in Washington, DC, and marked by Packer’s signature humor and incredible candor, Lions in the Balance is a tale of courage against impossible odds, a masterly blend of science, adventure, and storytelling, and an urgent call to action that will captivate a new generation of readers.

Mud

Mud, mud, glorious mud,
Nothing quite like it for cooling the blood.
So follow me, follow,
Down to the hollow,
And there let us wallow in glorious mud. ~ ‘The Hippopotamus Song’ by Flanders & Swann

Thanks to our talented Photographer of the Year entrants whose images below celebrate MUD in all its glory and danger.

Monitor lizard looking out of the mud. Mana Pools National Park, Zimbabwe © Jens Cullmann

A young lion after a zebra meal in the mud in Serengeti National Park, Tanzania © Panos Laskarakis

A baby elephant that was stuck in the mud and eventually died – Mana Pools, Zimbabwe ©Jens Cullmann

Butterflies look for moisture in the mud in Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park, South Africa © Vittorio Ricci

Mud — “The perfect catch” in Savute, Chobe National Park, Botswana © James Gifford

Mud — Buffalo covered in mud in the Maasai Mara, Kenya © Chris Schmid

Mud — “Horror of drought” in Nsumo pan, uMkhuze Game Reserve, South Africa © Tanya Nadauld

Mud — The yellow eye of a muddy crocodile. Mana Pools National Park, Zimbabwe © Jens Cullmann

Leopard tortoise drinking at a waterhole in the Kruger National Park, South Africa © Gabriella Kiss

Mud — An elephant herd takes a mud bath in Madikwe Game Reserve, South Africa © Kevin Dooley

Mud — “Starvation” – lions fighting over a carcass in Serengeti National Park, Tanzania © Panos Laskarakis

Mud — A Cape buffalo in near-perfect dried mud camouflage rests during the midday heat, Sabi Sands Private Game Reserve, South Africa © Bruce Miller

A white rhino enjoys a cool mud wallow during the heat of the day. South Africa © Julie Escoffier

Mud — A crocodile waits patiently with a fly on its head – Mana Pools, Zimbabwe © Jens Cullmann

Sitatunga

The early morning mist hovered over the marshland as the sun crept above the tangled, thick reeds, turning the sky from violet and brooding grey to pale pink. The floodplain was below us, and we watched as one by one, sitatunga emerged silently from the dense beds of phragmites and papyrus to graze in the open.

We were in Vivienne’s Hide in Kasanka National Park, Northern Zambia. Kasanka is one of Zambia’s smallest national parks, at 470km2, This peaceful little park is well endowed with rivers, lakes, wetlands, forests, lagoons, meadows and dambos that support an abundance of animals and birds. Kasanka is also home to a unique and spectacular annual migration of several million straw-coloured fruit bats. But what we had come to see was the sitatunga, and this is one of the best places in the world to spot this secretive, semi-aquatic antelope.

Sitatungas are early risers and most active just after dawn, which is why we were here, coffee in hand, at the misty start of a new day to silently watch as small groups and lone bulls with long curly horns graze peacefully. As the sun rose and the mist dissipated, a herd of elephants made their way across the flood plain, and one by one, the sitatunga melted away into the reeds. Delighted with our morning, we headed back to camp.

The sitatunga is Africa’s only amphibious antelope, and they are specially adapted to their habitat. Their elongated, widely splayed, banana-shaped hooves allow them to walk almost silently through the water and across swampy ground. But when they find themselves on firm terrain, these same hooves can make them rather clumsy. Their shaggy, oily, water repellent coat is another adaptation to their aquatic lifestyle. Their wedge-shaped and lowered head, coupled with the backward bend of the males’ horns allow for easy navigation through dense vegetation. These antelope are strong swimmers, able to move slowly through water for several kilometres. They submerge their entire bodies, both when swimming and to avoid detection from predators, with only their nose and eyes poking above the water. Sitatunga tend to frequent the deepest, densest parts of the swamp, where they make themselves even more inconspicuous with slow and deliberate movements, often standing and ruminating in water up to their shoulders. Their hearing is acute, with ears structured so they can accurately pinpoint the origin and direction of any sound; this is particularly useful in their dark and densely foliated environment, where long sight is of very little value.

Though common, even abundant, in African swamps and permanent marshes, the sitatunga is one of the most secretive and least-known of Africa’s large antelopes. Females are fawn-coloured with vertical white stripes and spots across their rump, to provide camouflage in dappled light. Males are larger, and chocolate brown with long, spiralled ivory-tipped horns, a mane and white stripe down their spine.

Dr Vera Rduch completed her thesis on puku in Kasanka National Park. As a by-product, she also collected information on the park’s sitatunga, as the antelope overlap both in distribution and diet throughout the park. Sightings of puku and sitatunga grazing together on the flood plains, combined with camera trap images of them entering woodlands in the late evening, in the hot, dry season (Sept-Oct), showed that while sitatunga tend to graze on young papyrus and reed shoots for the bulk of their diet, they don’t limit themselves to swamp vegetation. [Vera Rduch, 2013. Ecology and Population Status of the Puku Antelope (Kobus vardonii LIVINGSTONE, 1857) in Zambia. PhD Thesis in Zoology, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn. 287 pp.]. In some parks they have even been recorded feeding on elephant dung, obtaining nutrients from undigested seeds.

Using faecal analysis, Rduch ascertained that, in Kasanka, crocodiles feed on sitatunga, not surprising given their considerable overlap in habitat. She also found sitatunga hair in the scat of civet and white-tailed mongooses, who must have fed on sitatunga carrion as scavengers. [Vera Rduch, 2013. Ecology and Population Status of the Puku Antelope (Kobus vardonii LIVINGSTONE, 1857) in Zambia. PhD Thesis in Zoology, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn. 287 pp.]. Sitatunga don’t only fall victim to natural predators. Their regularly used, well-worn pathways through reeds and papyrus, between feeding and resting areas, make them especially vulnerable to poachers’ snares and hunters with dogs and guns. Sitatunga is prized bush meat. In Zambia they are afforded some protection because they are classed as a ‘government trophy’, meaning if a poacher is caught with sitatunga meat, he will get a more severe sentence than if caught with puku or common duiker meat.

Sitatunga breed throughout the year, females usually producing a single offspring, after an approximate seven month gestation period. A calf will weigh between 3.5 and 4 kilograms at birth and potentially double in weight during its first months. After the birth, the female hides her calf on a vegetation platform, secluded in dry reeds for protection. This youngster will stay with its mother, being suckled by her for about six months, and learning to navigate the swamp safely, following its mother about, even after she has given birth again. A calf takes time to master the specialised gait of the sitatunga, and will often, in the early months, lose its balance and fall into the water.

Though the sitatunga has been classified under the Least Concern category by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN), habitat loss is the most severe threat to the survival of the species. Other threats include the increasing loss of wetlands that has led to isolated populations, long-term changes in the water level that affect nearby vegetation and consequently their diet. In Zambia vast areas of the Bangweulu and Busanga swamps are burnt every year, placing animals like the sitatunga at grave risk.

At the end of the day, we returned to Vivienne’s Hide, as the sun began to sink in the sky and were rewarded with a spectacular sunset tinting the flood plain orange and scarlet. The grazing sitatunga glowed golden in the fading light. We stayed till we could see them no longer, and as the moon rose, climbed down the ladder and left them in peace.

SITATUNGA FACTS AND FIGURES

Sitatunga or marshbuck get their scientific name, Tragelaphus spekii, from John Hanning Speke, the English explorer who described them in 1863. Speke first observed the sitatunga at “Little Windermere”, now Lake Lwelo, in Tanzania
Sitatunga stand between 75 and 100cm tall and weigh between 50 and 125kg
Researchers estimate that the global population on sitatunga is somewhere around 170,000. They are found in more than 25 African countries, with almost 40% living in protected wilderness areas.
Sitatunga have an unusual leg length, often looking like they are hunched over because their rear legs are actually much longer than their front legs, this difference in leg length helps them to balance better in marshy areas. Another interesting fact about sitatunga legs is that their pasterns (the part of the leg just above the hoof) are flexible, this unusual leg construction makes it easy for sitatunga to run on damp surfaces.
The average lifespan for a sitatunga in the wild is 12 years (and up to 22 years in captivity). Their age can often be told by looking at the colour of their coat; as they age their coats turn from a light russet brown to a darker greyish brown colour.
Bushbuck and sitatunga are genetically similar enough to hybridise. Hybrids between bongo and sitatunga have also proved fertile.

Tiny primate: new species of mouse lemur discovered

Scientists in Madagascar have discovered a new species of mouse lemur in northeastern Madagascar but warn that it may already be threatened by deforestation and habitat loss. The little primate was discovered during a lengthy survey on different communities of mouse lemurs and is now known as Jonah’s mouse lemur (Microcebus jonahi).

Over nine years, from 2008 to 2017, the team captured some 117 mouse lemurs, either using traps or by hand during nocturnal surveys. The lemurs were extensively measured and observed, and small biopsies were taken from their ears for DNA purposes before they were released back into the wild where they were captured. While the status of some mouse lemurs has been contested in the past, in this case, the biologists were able to show both sufficient genetic diversity as well as distinctive morphology (physical characteristics) to justify concluding that M. jonahi should be considered to be a distinct species.

The new species of mouse lemur is among the larger mouse lemur species and has a prominent white stripe running down its nose, with reddish-brown fur and the typical large eyes of this nocturnal genus. It measures around 26cm from the tip of its nose to its tail and weighs on average 60 grams. It was named for Professor Jonah Ratsimbazafy, a respected Malagasy primatologist, who according to the study, “serves as an inspirational role model for young Malagasy students and scientists”.

M. sp. #3 (in red) refers to the Jonah’s mouse lemur

There are over 100 species of lemur endemic to Madagascar, which translates as some 20% of all primate species on the planet. However, the full extent of their species diversity is still being researched. Mouse lemurs (Microcebus) are the smallest of all primates. New species have been regularly discovered and described since the 1990s, the most recent additions (before Jonah’s mouse lemur) being described in 2016 based on genetic evidence from mitochondrial DNA.

Yet almost as fast as they are being described, the conservation status of primates in Madagascar becomes more precarious. In a recent announcement, the IUCN revealed that 31% of all lemur species in Madagascar are now listed as critically endangered, and 98% of them as threatened, primarily due to deforestation and bushmeat hunting in Madagascar. Newly listed as critically endangered are the Verreaux’s Sifaka (Propithecus verreauxi) and Madame Berthe’s mouse lemur (Microcebus berthae), which is the smallest primate species in the world. Madagascar has lost nearly half of its forests in the last 60 years.

“Alarmingly”, reads the study, “lowland rainforest habitats have disappeared from most of the east coast, and our study region is no exception. Under these circumstances, population declines are unavoidable”. This accelerating loss of habitat will most likely impact Jonah’s mouse lemur (and probably already has), given that it seems to be found only in Mananara‐Nord National Park, which is already isolated from surrounding forests.

Dominik Schüßler, one of the lead authors of the study, told Africa Geographic that “although it is only a tiny lemur species that we recently described, it is a symbol for the situation of nature conservation in Madagascar.” Professor Ute Radespiel of the Institute of Zoology, University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, explained further that “this study with the description of a new mouse lemur species demonstrates that the unique biodiversity of Madagascar is far from being understood. Many of the recently described species have only small distributions, which puts them at high risk, since the remaining forests of the island are under acute pressure from habitat destruction and fragmentation. Major and immediate conservation efforts will be needed to ensure their long-term survival during this critical period.”

The full study can be accessed here: “Ecology and morphology of mouse lemurs (Microcebus spp.) in a hotspot of microendemism in northeastern Madagascar, with the description of a new species”, Schüßler, D., Blanco, M., et al., (2020), American Journal of Primatology.

Roan antelope conservation challenges

The roan antelope Hippotragus equinus is currently classified as a “Species of Least Concern” on the IUCN Red List. How accurate is this classification, and how should it influence how situations are managed where numbers are dwindling? In many African countries, roan antelope populations have dropped to perilously low levels, and there is every chance they could disappear from the wild altogether. Some argue that some of these examples are animals on the limit of their geographical range and could be regarded as “refugee sub-populations”. This poses the question: is it important to intervene to save these “refugee” populations?

According to the IUCN Red List, there are an estimated 60,000 mature roan in Africa, with the largest populations in Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Zambia and Tanzania. In some areas, these populations are believed to be stable, but in others, the numbers have declined. In Ruma National Park in western Kenya, the roan population has declined dramatically to about 13 animals, making it genetically unviable. Likewise, in the Kruger National Park, numbers have dwindled to just over 50 individuals. Roan are a charismatic species, and it could be argued that their presence in these parks is important both from a biodiversity and national pride perspective and while purist conservationists may regard this as irrelevant, in attracting tourists, which in turn stimulates the economy of the region.

Numerous studies have been conducted to establish the reason for the decline in the Kruger Park and Ruma. In the Kruger, the consensus of opinion suggests it is all to do with water provision. The northern part of the park had lower animal densities than the south, so managers sunk boreholes to provision animals in the hopes this would enhance the game viewing. Indeed, the water-sensitive bulk grazers such as buffalo made it their home and changed the habitat. With them came predators. Roan, being selective grazers, did not compete well. They also have an unusual approach to calf-rearing behaviour, often hiding their calves and leaving them for hours at a time. With the increased predator load, these calves did not survive. It just goes to show that humans with good intent can make management decisions that have catastrophic outcomes! Recently, a Kruger National Park section ranger was fired for “gross negligence” after 20 roan placed in a fenced breeding camp in the park died of dehydration after the drinking trough water dried up due to negligence. Eight years prior to that 45 roan died of anthrax in Kruger breeding camps.

In Ruma, it appears predation is also the problem, and plans are afoot to enclose the roan in a camp free of predators. Unfortunately, with only 13 individuals, the population has reached a genetic bottleneck, and there is no other option but to bring in new animals to remedy the problem.

Interventions would involve the infusion of new genes, but the challenge is where to source animals for this genetic refreshment. The very existence of subspecies is controversial, with some eminent scientist being “lumpers” and others “splitters”. Some argue that “splitting” can impede conservation outcomes, while others would say ignoring subspecies issues is irresponsible. As is so often the case with a species on the brink, decision-makers are faced with a myriad of different considerations that need to be weighed up in a race against time, not least of which involves reconciling the science with the conservation realities. As it is, the subspeciation of roan antelope is a genetic quagmire.

Roan in Savute in Chobe National Park © Fred von Winckelmann

Using mitochondrial DNA analysis of roan antelope, researchers split the roan species into six subspecies. Hippotragus equinus equinus in South Africa Botswana and Namibia; H. e. cottoni in Angola, Zambia and Malawi; H. e. langheldi from Tanzania and Kenya; H. e. bakeri from South Sudan and Central African Republic; H. e. charicus from Chad and Nigeria; and H. e. koba from Benin, Senegal and Ghana. There are morphological differences between these “subspecies”, but in many cases, it is impossible to tell the difference.

More recent studies (Alpers, Van Vuuren, Arctandervand Robinson) using nuclear DNA analysis would suggest that the North-West African Hippotragus equinus koba from North-West Africa is a distinct and evolutionarily significant unit and all the rest should be lumped together. In other words, there are only two subspecies of roan antelopes. This is about more than scientific disagreement – the outcomes of studies such as these will invariably influence conservation decisions.

The IUCN has published a document, titled “Guidelines for Reintroductions and Other Conservation Translocations”. This document deals with the genetic considerations regarding sourcing animals for reintroductions or translocations and, naturally, it advises sourcing populations physically closer to, or from habitats that are similar to, the destination. However, the document also recognises that there will be situations where this is not possible, and here it defines a “taxon substitution”, where a similar, related species or sub-species can be substituted as an ecological replacement in dire conservation situations.

There are inevitably going to be differences in opinion when interpreting scientific publications and conclusions. When these issues are controversial, as is the case with the roan subspeciation, decision-makers are forced to tread carefully to avoid action that, in hindsight, could do immense damage to their conservation reputation. This is where the appropriate IUCN specialist groups should be involved. This panel of experts is best placed to make appropriate decisions, and responsible conservationists would be wise the follow their sound advice. Likewise, responsible government conservation bodies would abide by the advice given. It goes without saying that care must be taken to make decisions based on sound science and not by emotion.

In Kenya, it would be ideal to source wild langheldi from neighbouring East African countries. Every effort is being made to achieve this, but this is complicated and could take years to achieve. Another option is to source langheldi from zoological institutions that breed the subspecies. This has been done before, in Eswatini, by the Back to Africa organisation (www.backtoafrica.co.za), of which the writer is a director – where there is now a thriving population in the Mlilwane Wildlife Sanctuary. These immunologically naïve zoo animals are susceptible to tick-borne protozoal diseases, including theileria, and it took years to habituate them.

Another option would be to source animals from South Africa, where the wildlife industry evolved to support hunting and ecotourism. In the past, game traders imported animals from a variety of African countries. This was done for financial gain, with wealthy men paying African countries or individuals for their biological treasures. Their argument was they were saving these animals from an inevitable demise by bringing them back to South Africa, where they would be saved and protected. Their motives in this may well have been fiscally motivated, but that is a topic for another article!

This industry in South Africa has all but collapsed, and prices have diminished significantly to the point that farmers are sitting with large numbers of animals and don’t know what to do with them. Imports came primarily from a few African countries, with equinus subspecies imported mostly from the dry arid Waterberg area of Namibia. A well-known South African veterinarian Dr Johan Kriek imported cottoni on two occasions from Malawi, and South African National Parks cooperated with Botswana in trading roan for rhinos, with equinus animals going from Punda-Ma-Tenka in Botswana, to Graspan near Kimberley. These animals now exist in the Mokala National Park near Kimberley.

Some koba were also imported from Benin’s Pendjari biosphere reserve by game trader Riccardo Giazza, and in 2000, Mr Fred Keeley of Sable Ranch caught wild roan from the Niokolo-Koba National Park in Senegal. Some of these ended up on Mr John Hume’s farm Mauricedale near the southern Kruger Park. At the time, genetic issues were not considered, but retrospectively this was an irresponsible activity as koba have subsequently become recognised as a genetically inappropriate subspecies for Southern Africa. This did nothing for South Africa’s conservation reputation, but the issue was recognised, and genetic testing became the order of the day as nature conservation authorities took steps to prevent the sale and movement of koba within South Africa.

So, as it stands, there are numerous farms in South Africa holding roan antelope which originate from Namibia, Malawi and Botswana (there are tests available to confirm their genetic origin) that could be used to repopulate other areas.

There are, essentially, two questions here. The first is how many subspecies of roan antelope should be recognised? The latest genetic publication by Alpers, van Vuuren and Arctander suggests these animals would be appropriate for reinforcement of dwindling populations such as those in Kenya, as there are only two subspecies: West African and the rest.

The second question is more complicated. At what point does the subspecies distinction no longer matter if it comes at the cost of the local extinction of a species? If one were distrustful of the validity of the aforementioned study and the division of roan into two subspecies rather than six, and if no other options existed for sourcing pure langheldi, what would the risk be in exercising a “taxon substitution” as defined by the IUCN? In that way, some of the roan bred in South Africa could be used for the overall conservation of the species, regardless of subspecies.

At what point does this decision move from being an IUCN recommendation to a sovereign decision accepted by all parties as being in the best interests of the species? Government authorities and conservation entities have the tricky job of striking a balance between good science and timeous intervention to save a species. It would, however, be such a pity if this intervention came too late for these desperate roan populations. Would it not be an excellent outcome if these animals in South Africa could now play a role in species conservation in other parts of Africa? It would be sad to think these animals now have no conservation value because they are of mixed genetic origin.

Dr Hamish Currie is a wildlife vet who regularly works in wildlife management projects across Africa. He is a pioneer of the introduction of zoo animals back into Africa, including engineering the translocation of the last northern white rhinoceros from the Czech Republic to Kenya. Hamish is a director of Back to Africa.

Sources:

Population genetics of the roan antelope (Hippotragus equinus) with suggestions for conservation, Alpers, van Vuuren, Arctander and Robinson, Journal of Molecular Ecology, 2004

Roan antelope Hippotragus equinus in Africa: a review of abundance, threats and ecology, Havemann, Retief, Tosh and de Bruyn from the Mammal Research Institute, Department of Zoology and Entomology, University of Pretoria.

Mauritius oil spill – pictures, map and details

“The oil spill and the ecological crisis happening right now in Mauritius will have an everlasting impact on the natural ecosystem, the marine ecosystem of the lagoon.” says Mauritian ecologist, environmental expert and former global strategist for Greenpeace International, Sunil Dokwarkasing.

On the 25th of July, the MV Wakashio, owned by Japanese company Nagashiki Shipping, ran aground on a reef 3 km off the south-east coast of Mauritius. The carrier, which was en-route from China to Brazil, held 3,894 tons of low-sulphur fuel oil, 207 tons of diesel and 90 tons of lubricant oil.

The oil spill is on the Mauritius south-east coastline

Despite residents’ warnings that the ship was sinking on the 5th of August, it took days for the government to finally swing into action. Sunil Dokwarkasing, a Mauritian ecologist, noted that the “delay in trying to address the problem of this wreckage on our reef is, I would say, grossly negligent by our government. Their primary concern was to refloat the ship – no one considered the danger represented by the 3,800 metric tonnes of oil on the ship. No one considered or seemed to care about the substantial risk this would present to the island and the lagoon; the government sat on the file for more than 12 days without making the decisions that should have been made”.

Satellite and drone images show a dark slick spreading in the turquoise waters and videos posted online show oily waters lapping the shore. “The oil trail is right next to an island called Ile aux Aigrettes, which is a natural reserve with endemic and endangered species,” said Reuben Pillay, director of virtual tour site reubsvision.mu. “For the local people, it’s been terrible.”

Around 1,000 tonnes of fuel have leaked into the ocean so far and, while some 500 tonnes have been salvaged, around 2,500 tonnes remain on board. The fuel spilling from the Wakashio has created an ecological disaster that endangers corals, fish and other marine life around the Indian Ocean island, officials and environmentalists say. “This is likely one of the most terrible ecological crises ever seen on the small island country,” Greenpeace Africa said in a statement on Friday. Sunil Dokwarkasing elaborated, “we know that an oil spill in any marine ecosystem will disturb and even destroy the marine ecosystem; it may never regain its original status. I don’t have much hope that we will be able to restore the lagoon to the way it was fifteen days ago”. Sunil refers not just to the ecological impact, but the inevitable sustained social impact. He explains that there are 400 registered fishermen that earn their livelihood from fishing in the lagoon and surrounding areas, and possibly the same number of unregistered fishermen. He estimates that the livelihoods of about 1,000 households will be destroyed and that the tourism industry will be heavily impacted, given that many people take tourists out on sightseeing tours of the lagoon.

Just days before lockdown I was in Mauritius, swimming in these very waters with local NGO Eco Sud, examining signs of coral bleaching in the bay that dated back to the late 1980s and seeing the regeneration that was just starting to be visible, decades later. I’d spent time in the lagoon monitoring some of the island’s critically endangered hawksbill turtles and taking part in a coral farming project that aims to grow corals to replenish damaged areas of the island’s reefs. I now know that everything I had seen is more than likely shrouded in oil – and dying. I also visited the tiny rocky wildlife sanctuary of Ile aux Aigrettes, where resident scientists from the Mauritian Wildlife Foundation introduced me to some of the country’s more endangered inhabitants, including pink pigeons, the Mauritius kestrel and the Mauritian skink, all of which have all been brought back from the brink of extinction. I toured the island’s extensive nursery of indigenous and native plants. The passion of the scientists was contagious, and I left the islet with an appreciation of the dedication that goes into conservation, habitat restoration, and saving of species. These same scientists and wildlife workers are now ferrying dozens of baby tortoises and rare plants from the island to the mainland in an attempt to save them.

View from Île aux Aigrettes towards the mainland – before the oil spill

The National Coast Guard received no distress call from the ship, a government statement said, adding that police are investigating possible negligence. Attempts to stabilise the vessel and pump the remaining fuel from its hold have failed, and local authorities fear bad weather, rough seas and strong currents could further rupture the tanker. “Due to bad weather and constant pounding over the past few days, the starboard side bunker tanker has been breached, and an amount of fuel oil has escaped into the sea,” said Nagashiki Shipping Co. Ltd, owner and manager of the vessel, in an emailed statement. “Given poor sea conditions, salvage efforts are currently on hold.” Sunil Dokwarkasing was quite scathing on the subject of the clean-up, adding that “in the environment, the first thing we do is consider precautionary principles… and this particular principle has been totally neglected by the government in their decision making. Had they emptied the tanks of the ship, the probability of leakage would have been minimised.”

Akihiko Ono, executive president of the shipping company, today told a press conference in Tokyo “we apologise profusely and deeply for the great trouble we have caused… we will do everything in our power to resolve the issue.” A statement from the Japanese foreign ministry says the country is planning to send a six-person disaster relief team, at the request of the Mauritian government, to help with removing the oil. France is also sending a specialist team and equipment. Meanwhile, police in Mauritius, accompanied by the ship’s Indian captain, are preparing to board the vessel and conduct a search.

The vessel ran aground on a reef about 3km from the mainland.

A government environmental outlook released nearly a decade ago stated that Mauritius has a National Oil Spill Contingency Plan, but the equipment on hand was only “adequate to deal with oil spills of less than ten metric tonnes”. In case of major spills, it said, help could be sought from other Indian Ocean countries or international oil spill response organisations. Some 400 sea booms, mostly homemade, have been floated out into the lagoon, in an attempt to prevent the oil spreading in the strong marine currents. Surface oil is also being pumped out of the ocean. “The clean-up efforts by the civil societies, NGOs, service clubs and others, have surpassed the government’s effort to deal with cleaning, mitigation and containing the spreading of oil,” says Sunil.

Greenpeace’s Happy Khambule concluded, “there exists no guaranteed safe way to extract, transport and store fossil fuel products. This oil leak is not a twist of fate; it is the result of our twisted addiction to fossil fuels – we must react by accelerating our withdrawal from fossil fuels. The risks associated with oil include aggravating the climate crisis, devastating oceans and biodiversity and threatening local livelihoods around some of Africa’s most precious lagoons”.

Update 15 August 2020:

Over the past few days, salvage teams have been battling rough seas to remove the remaining oil as cracks spread across the hull of the MV Wakashio. The ship finally broke apart three weeks after it ran aground. The Mauritian Wildlife Foundation confirmed that there were still around 100 tonnes of oil remaining on board but that there is chance that this can be contained. A further 653 tonnes have been pumped out of the lagoon to date. According to Greenpeace Africa, volunteers are being asked to cease their activities and stay away from the waterfront.

CALL TO ACTION:

1. If you are in Mauritius you can register to volunteer for beach clean-ups with the Beach Authority office at the Blue Bay Marine Park Centre, the contact person there being Daniel Laurent, Tel: +5259 7355.

2. If you would like to contribute to helping Mauritian Wildlife Foundation actions, please contact MWF hotlines +5710 4141, 5473 0103 and +5948 9823 and let them know how you can help.

3. If you would like to help financially and contribute to the Wakashio Fund, you can donate online via the website https://www.mauritian-wildlife.org/donate mentioning ‘Wakashio’.

Will legal international rhino horn trade save wild rhino populations?

Will the legal international trade in rhino horn save the wild rhino population? This is a question that finds scientists, policymakers, conservationists, and NGOs on polar opposite ends of the debate, resulting in what seems to be an effective deadlock. As wild rhino numbers continue to decline in Africa, many believe that the only way to save to future of the rhino is to lift the ban in the trade in its horn. Others are equally vehemently opposed to lifting the ban, mostly concerned that to do so would see an unprecedented surge in rhino poaching. While scientists have had two decades to investigate the potential effects of lifting the ban, the answers have been conflicting and provided no clear conclusions.

A study sponsored by the Graduate School for Production Ecology and Resource Conservation and the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research set out to summarise and review the effects of legalising the trade in rhino horn, the pros and cons thereof, and the vast amount of data available for each side of the debate. For those looking to understand the complexities of the arguments, this is a good place to start.

The main theoretical arguments for legalising the trade in rhino horn can be simplified as follows: firstly, it would create a legal market that could offset poaching and secondly, this legal market could provide the necessary financial viability to keep, protect and breed rhino populations. The researchers focussed mainly on South Africa on the basis that private wildlife ownership is permitted by law and that South Africa was, in 2010, home to an estimated 95% of the remaining white rhino and 40% of the black rhino in the world. With these arguments in mind, the report identified and selected four primary mechanisms occurring in both scientific literature, as well as the arguments for and against put forward by conservationists and private rhino owners: 1) financial viability for private rhino owners, 2) rhino horn demand, 3) laundering of rhino horns and 4) behaviour of rhino horn consumers.

1. Financial viability of private rhino ownership

80% of land in South Africa is privately owned, and South African law allows for the private ownership of wildlife
An estimated 33% of South Africa’s rhino are privately owned.
Therefore, private rhino ownership could play a critical role in conserving the species.
Increased costs to provide security in the face of the dramatic rise in rhino poaching are prohibitive.
The sale of harvested rhino horn could be used to fund anti-poaching measures and could serve as an incentive to encourage others to keep rhinos.
The tax raised through legally traded horns could be fed back into the system to keep wild rhinos safe (the authors argue that this is more likely to go towards politically important causes such as health care and housing).
The authors of the study agree that legalising rhino horn trade would have a positive effect on captive rhino populations but question whether or not it would result in a significant financial benefit to the conservation of wild populations.

2. Demand for rhino horn – Would legalising the trade increase the overall market demand and how will the illegal market respond?

Current illegal demand is already far higher than the current illegal supply.
Previous studies indicate that there is a demand of at least a million people in Vietnam alone.
Rhino horn grows at an average of 6cm per year, and the reproduction rate is one calf every 3-5 years; therefore, the process of farming horn is relatively slow.
Lifting the ban will remove the stigma attached to the consumption of rhino horn.
A substantial increase in demand could promote a positive feedback loop dubbed the Anthropogenic Allee Effect – that is, demand for products increases as the animal species abundance decreases.
There is a preference in some of the markets for ‘wild’ horns
The effect of price on overall demand and illegal demand is ambiguous, and it is difficult to control the final price – legalising trade may not drop the price sufficiently to make illegal trade or consuming not worthwhile.
Understanding and anticipating motives behind consumption is critical in reducing demand.
Demand is expected to continue to rise with economic and population growth in Asia.
Here the authors conclude that it will likely be impossible to satisfy the demand with legal horns and so legal and illegal markets would exist in parallel, particularly if illegal horns come at a lower price.

3. Laundering of rhino horns

Illegal rhino horn traders are likely to remain in business after trade legalisation and could launder their products into the legal markets
This was the case with the legal ivory trade
Legal market can provide an incentive to illegal suppliers by minimising the risks of being caught in an illegal exchange
Widespread corruption exists and expands to all nodes in a trade chain
Legalising rhino horn trade would need to be highly regulated.
The potential for even 5% of the legal market consisting of illegal horns could be problematic for the remaining rhino population.
Illegal supply of rhino horn is likely to increase when legalising international rhino horn trade.

4. Long-term behavioural change of rhino horn consumers

It is generally believed that the ultimate solution to stop rhino poaching lies in a change of consumer behaviour.
The demand could be drastically reduced by creating a uniform morality that it is wrong to purchase products that compromise the survival of a threatened species.
While there are several programs in place to change perceptions around rhino horn, these have yet to be successful.
The rhino horn trade represents an international conservation crisis involving stakeholders other than consumers.
Traditional Chinese Medicine is increasing in popularity, promoted by the Chinese government, and supported by the World Health Organization.
Interviewed consumers are aware of the extinction risk for rhinos but do not feel responsible.
Legalising the market can be considered the complete opposite of campaigning to reduce demand – legalising marijuana caused a rise in total consumption due to new users

While the authors acknowledge that there are instances where legal commercialisation of animal products has had potentially beneficial effects for the conservation of certain species (such as the trade in crocodilian skins or bison mean), they also point to examples where it has had the opposite effect, such as the ivory and lion bone trades. Previous studies point to five different criteria if wildlife farming is likely to be of benefit to a specific species:

There cannot be a consumer preference for wild-caught animal products – unlikely to always be the case with rhinos since larger rhino horns make for more impressive status symbols and there is a general belief that the suffering of the animal will increase medicinal potency.
A substantial part of the demand should be met, and the demand should not increase due to legalisation – research from consumer countries does not indicate that this would be the case where rhino horn is concerned.
Legal products should be more cost-efficient to combat black market prices – again unlikely to apply to rhino horn where previous studies have estimated that legal horn would have to be sold at a minimum of $ 11,500 per kg to be profitable.
Wildlife farming should not rely on wild populations for restocking – given that 30% of South African rhinos are privately owned, this criterion would be applicable.
The laundering of illegal products into commercial trade should be absent – due to the high value of rhino horn and the extent of corruption concerned; the report also suggests that this is unlikely.

Without the actual legalisation of rhino horn trade and subsequent empirical data, it is challenging to draw specific conclusions regarding different potential outcomes. However, the report points to several areas where further studies would help, particularly concerning quantifying the demand and the extent to which this would increase should the sale be legalised.

Conclusion

The study concludes that though legalising trade in rhino horn would have a positive effect on captive rhino populations, this will probably not be sufficient to counteract the negative impact, including increasing demand by removing the stigma attached to purchasing the horn. The authors also acknowledge that there is an argument that rhinos should be conserved as a species, rather than prioritising wild rhinos, and that, in retaining the ban, the inevitable consequence is that less captive rhinos will be kept. If, despite best efforts, rhinos do go extinct in the wild, a lack of captive rhinos would complicate future reintroductions.

Nevertheless, the study concludes that regardless of the stance of legalising rhino horn trade, the debate should not prevent the relevant stakeholders working together to reduce corruption, increase rhino populations and reduce the demand, since neither approach will be successful otherwise.

The above is a summary of an extensive report, and reading it in full is recommended. It can be accessed here: “Will legal international rhino horn trade save wild rhino populations?” Eikelboom, J., Nuijten, R., Wang, Y., (2020), Journal of Global Ecology and Conservation

It’s not about the worm

Guest blogger: Louise Swemmer

Of course it’s about the worm, but it’s not JUST about the worm. Harvesting mopane caterpillars from the Kruger National Park provides people with much-needed food and income, but it also does a lot of good for conservation.

Mopane worms (Mashondza in Xitsonga), the larva of the Imbrasia belina moth, are a widely used source of protein and a delicious snack, especially for people in the Limpopo Province of South Africa.

Unfortunately, since they are so popular, they have been over-harvested in many areas and can be quite expensive to buy. The Kruger National Park (KNP) started a Mopane worm harvesting project in 2010, to help local people to access worms both for food and for the harvesters to make a small income. Accessing benefits from conservation helps to build positive relationships between people and conservation areas (ask any tourist about their feelings towards conservation after they have just visited a game reserve!). Having positive relationships with society, especially with local communities, is not only the right thing to do but can be really important for the sustainability of protected areas such as the KNP. Especially now, when biodiversity needs all the support it can get.

Mopane worms occur all over Southern Africa, including in Mozambique, Malawi, Southern Zimbabwe, Botswana, and Northern South Africa, closely linked (but not exclusively limited to) wherever one finds mopane trees (Colophospermum mopane). Fully grown Mopane caterpillars have multiple coloured stripes, are about 10cm long and are covered in prickles which can make them tricky to harvest if you have soft hands. The best time to pick worms is just before they bury themselves underground to pupate into Mopane moths, that way they have high protein content and when it’s easier to expel the internal organs – a requirement before they can be eaten. The moths that emerge from the pupae are enormous, with two big false eyes on their wings, acting as a defence mechanism against predators. The moths lay a batch of tiny white eggs very soon after they emerge, which hatch about 21 days later. The tiny worms then start their journey to adulthood. The caterpillars shed their skin four times before they are ready to pupate into moths, and it is after the final shed that they are the tastiest!

The Kruger Mopane worms are harvested from a demarcated area less than 0.2% of the area of the KNP, within the vast Mopane veld found in the north of the park. The harvesting takes place once a year, in years when there is a large enough outbreak to provide worms for harvest as well as allow enough worms to descend into the soil to reproduce for following years. The outbreaks last between 1 and 2 weeks. Harvesters from local villages are invited to participate and issued with a permit. They are kept safe by the SANParks rangers while harvesting. People usually harvest about 25 litres of caterpillars per person, which can contribute the equivalent of half of a month’s income for some households.

In a recent study, it was shown that apart from the nutritional and economic value of the worms, people who were part of the harvesting enjoyed the experience, feeling that the park is opening up to them, and seeing the park more positively as a result (Table 1). For most participants, the project provided them with their first chance to visit the park, and many enjoyed the opportunity to learn and experience new things (Figure 1). Apart from enjoying nature, a highlight for many participants was meeting and getting to know the park staff. It is important to remember that the KNP has not always been accessible to the majority of South African society for much of its existence. During the former apartheid era of South Africa, national parks were not open to all demographic groups. In fact, some people were forcibly removed from within the park boundaries to make way for conservation. As a result, some people feel alienated and separated from the land and resources found within protected areas such as the KNP. For the past few decades, the park has been implementing various projects that aim to restore rights to people, build positive relationships and reconnect people to the land, cultural and natural resources within the park. The mopane worm project is one example of doing just that. Not only did the study show the broader project impacts on participant wellbeing, but also revealed how participation changed how people viewed the park. Harvesters said their relationship with the park was positive and expressed hope for building on this in the future.

Conducting social science research takes time, but it contributes enormous value when assessing the impacts of such projects. The study has shown that when managed effectively, small scale, sustainable resource use projects such as the KNP mopane worm harvest, have the potential to contribute both to human wellbeing as well as conservation. As we move further and further into the Anthropocene, biodiversity needs all the help it can get, and conservation approaches need to be robust and to accommodate a multitude of value systems if these beautiful and valuable places are to persist for our children, and our children’s children. Thinking out of the traditional conservation box is one such mechanism that may just be key for its survival.

**Table 1**. Illustrative examples of Mopane worm harvester’s perceptions of the Kruger National Park as a result of the mopane worm project

**Figure 1**. The contributions that mopane worm harvesting from the Kruger National Park, South Africa has made towards multiple dimensions of human wellbeing (with thanks to Corli Coetsee for the infographic)

Citation:

Swemmer, L.K., R. Landela, P. Mdungasi, S. Midzi, W. Mmatho, H. Mmethi, D. Shibambu. A. Symonds, S. Themba, and W. Twine. 2020. It’s not just about the worm: the social and economic impact of harvesting mopane worms from the Kruger National Park, South Africa. Conservation and Society 18(2): 183 – 199.

Bio:
Dr Louise Swemmer works as a social scientist for South African National Parks, based in Hoedspruit, Limpopo. Louise’s primary professional interest is in promoting fair access to benefits that flow from Protected Areas, both in the interests of justice as well as for the sustainability of conservation.

Aardvarks and climate change

Three years ago, a Wits University media release warned of the impact of climate change on aardvarks, particularly those in arid areas where temperatures are expected to rise in coming years. Now the full peer-reviewed study on this research has been released and yields worrying results. The study, which was conducted on Tswalu Kalahari Reserve by the researchers of the Brain Function Research Group at Wits University, indicates that in drought years aardvarks are unable to meet the necessary nutrient levels to maintain their metabolisms, as indicated by dramatic changes in internal body temperatures. During the first year of the study, low rainfall levels and the subsequent dry season resulted in the deaths of numerous aardvarks, including five of the initial study subjects.

Aardvarks (Orycteropus afer) are highly elusive creatures that are generally active at night and feed solely on ants and termites. To study the effects of seasons, rainfall and food availability, researchers implanted 12 adult aardvarks with sensors to measure body temperature and activity levels and monitored the data for varying durations over three years. Tswalu typically experiences rainfall during the summer months, between November and March, where temperatures regularly reach maximums of up to 40˚C, while the winter months are dry – with temperatures dropping below freezing at night. During the first year of the study period, the region experienced particularly low rainfall levels, with no rain falling during the hottest months of the summer and, as a result, the vegetation levels dropped below 54% of the maximum levels. The rainfall levels during subsequent years were higher, as were the resulting vegetation levels. The available vegetation impacts the prey availability for aardvarks (aardvarks in the Tswalu region feed mainly on the harvester termite Hodotermes mossambicus) – as vegetation decreases, so do termite and ant numbers.

While diurnal animals in arid areas face the challenges of keeping cool and evaporative water loss during high daytime temperatures, nocturnally active mammals like the aardvark have to expend extra energy to stay warm during the cold nights. In times of reduced resource availability, the ability of these animals to increase their metabolic activity to maintain internal body temperatures becomes compromised and, as a result, they may increase diurnal activity to compensate for these demands.

Under ideal conditions, the internal body temperature of a large mammal remains as constant as possible, with the difference between maximum and minimum body temperatures being labelled the “amplitude”. The research revealed that during “good” conditions (higher rainfall years and increased food availability), the 24-hour body temperature rhythm of the aardvarks only varied by an average of 1.8˚C in summer and 2.1 ˚C in winter. By contrast, during the dry year, their minimum body temperature declined, with an average amplitude of 2.3 ˚C in summer and 4.7 ˚C during winter. One aardvark exhibited an 11.7 ˚C change in 8 hours, the most substantial change ever recorded in a large mammal – its body temperature dropped to a minimum of 24 ˚C.

As expected, the low body temperatures were associated with increased diurnal activity but shorter periods of activity overall, with some aardvarks emerging in the afternoon and returning to their burrows at night, eliminating nocturnal activity. Yet despite their demonstrated behavioural flexibility, many were unable to meet their nutritional requirements, and of the six aardvarks initially fitted with monitoring devices, five died during this period. Those that survived demonstrated a return to a more level internal body temperature as conditions improved, but it took them time to recover.

The concern is that the Kalahari region is one that is predicted to become hotter and drier as climate change progresses. While droughts are part of typical climate patterns, this research indicates that aardvarks are not sufficiently adaptable to cope with this change. As drought frequencies and durations increase, the vegetation in the area will suffer, and ant and termite populations will decrease, resulting in the death by starvation and dehydration for the aardvarks that depend on them. While they may not be considered threatened yet, aardvarks are ecosystem engineers, and numerous species of birds, mammals and reptiles utilise the burrows that they dig.

“Populations of many animals in South Africa are already declining as a result of habitat loss and over-exploitation,” says Professor Andrea Fuller, one of the co-authors of the study. “Climate change adds an additional threat, which may push species to extinction faster. By 2050, the aardvark may not be the only species removed from tourist checklists”.

The full study can be accessed here: “Increased Diurnal Activity is Indicative of Energy Deficit in a Nocturnal Mammal, the Aardvark”, Weyer, N., Fuller, A., Haw, A., et al (2020), Frontiers in Physiology and is part of a collective effort by the University of Witwatersrand, the University of Pretoria, University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna and the University of Cape Town.

Buffalo – Godfather of the African bushveld

“There is something frightening about a buffalo when encountered on foot that sets it apart from lions, leopards, elephants and rhinos. Those cranky old males look at you like they hate you personally, like they are the Godfather come to collect your debt, like they will hunt you down and pound you into the dry African dust.” Ant Collett, experienced trails guide, Greater Kruger

The African (Cape) buffalo (Syncerus caffer) has earned itself something of a reputation, particularly when it comes to the cantankerous old bulls that spend their time wallowing in pans or hanging around in dense reedbeds along Africa’s rivers. Immense and powerful, the buffalo should not be under-estimated. Don’t be fooled if your only experience of them is from the safety of a game drive vehicle, which perspective makes them look like wild cows.

Aside from the raw energy of encountering buffalo on foot, the quintessential African scene is a highlight for many – that herd coming down to drink, emerging ghost-like from lingering dust kicked up by thousands of hooves, backlit by the golden sunset. When properly understood, these massive bovids are an essential part of any safari experience: a social creature prone to profound moments of courage when threatened or defending a member of the herd.

Quick facts:

Social structure: solitary males, bachelor groups and breeding herds of anywhere between 50 to over 1,000 individuals.
Mass: 500-1,000kg (forest subspecies significantly smaller, at 250-450kg)
Shoulder height: 1.0 to 1.7m
Gestation period: 11 months
Number of offspring: 1 calf (twins rare)
Life expectancy: about 20 years in the wild, up to 30 in captivity

Taxonomy:

While there is some disagreement, there are currently four recognized subspecies: West African savanna buffalo (S. c. brachyceros), Central African savanna buffalo (S. c. auquinoctialis), Southern savanna buffalo (S. c. caffer) and, the most easily distinguishable, the forest buffalo (S. c. nanus). The African forest buffalo, found in West and Central Africa and also known as the dwarf buffalo, is considerably smaller than the rest of the buffalo subspecies; their horns are proportionately smaller and their coats a more reddish-brown colour. They tend to form smaller herds, with one or two bulls and a harem of females and offspring. There is still argument today as to whether or not they should be considered to be a separate species, but hybrids between the forest buffalo and more familiar buffalo subspecies are common.

Despite their passing similarity to oxen, buffalo are only very distantly related to domestic cattle and, unlike their relatives the Asian water buffalo, all attempts to domesticate buffalo were largely abandoned as they proved too temperamental. They are, however, susceptible to several diseases that also affect cattle, including foot-and-mouth and bovine tuberculosis.

African forest (dwarf) buffalos in Odzala-Kokoua National Park, Republic of Congo

The basics

Buffaloes are the most numerous of the large herbivores and almost exclusively eat grass, with some limited exceptions at the height of the dry season. They are water-dependent, and it is easy to see when a herd has moved through an area by the flattened grasses and cow-like pats left behind. They are also almost constantly vocal, particularly around water, and produce lowing sounds similar to cattle, as well as grunts and growls during their regular skirmishes. Ecologist believe that buffalo herds decide on where to move through “voting behaviour” – while the herd is resting, individual adult females will stand and stare in a specific direction, and the subsequent movement of the herd can be predicted when the majority gaze in a particular direction.

A female will have her first calf at about five years of age, and these calves are born during the rainy season. The bond between mothers and calves remains for an extended period – up to three years, before the next calf is born. The number of individuals in a herd is highly variable and can be affected by season and water availability. The mixed breeding herds consist of females and their offspring, young males, and older, dominant males in their prime. Males are also found in bachelor herds, and after a certain age (about 12 or so), most males move away from the safety of the breeding herds and live out their lives in small groups or on their own.

Nature’s battering ram

One of the defining features of the African buffalo is the fusion of the two horns at their base on the top of the skull. This is known as the ‘boss’ and is solid bone covered in keratin, particularly prominent and well-developed in the males. Knowing that a buffalo can reach top speeds of around 60km/hour and that a big male can weigh close to a ton, it is easy to see how an angry or frightened buffalo could use this thick layer of bone as a deadly battering ram. Males fighting over females sometimes clash with earth-shaking power and over-confident or unlucky lions have been killed by the horns and crushing power of a buffalo.

Buffaloes are far from defenceless, and they are known for their ability to turn the tables on predators. For the most part, smaller predators like leopards, wild dogs and spotted hyena will target the calves, though large hyena clans have been known to hunt adult buffaloes. While crocodiles do occasionally grab unwary individuals at the water’s edge, lions are considered to be the main predators of buffalo – probably due to their size and strength. While individual lions are capable of killing adult buffaloes without assistance, it generally requires the effort of an entire pride or coalition, especially in the case of buffalo bulls. Stand-offs between lions and buffalo herds can last for hours, with the buffaloes chasing the lions away if they get too close and the lions biding their time until the herd finally panics or lets its guard down. Even in situations where lions have killed a herd buffalo, the other herd members may return to harass and chase the lions away. Many of these encounters have been captured on camera and are considered by many to be examples of true altruistic behaviour; unusual in the wild.

A standoff between a herd of buffalos and lions that have caught a buffalo calf. Ngorongoro Crater, Tanzania

The ‘dagga’ boys

The old males that have moved away from the safety of the breeding herds lack this social support, and their behaviour tends to be entirely different as a result. Famously dangerous, these males are easily recognizable by their pock-marked horns and bald patches of fur. They tend to be edgy and cantankerous, though this needs to be understood in the context of their circumstances. Lions regularly target these relative loners and ‘dagga’ boys are often forced to rely on their strength to fight back and escape. As such, they may well not waste time working out whether or not something is a threat, instead choosing to explode into action. For a human, this can be extremely dangerous and even deadly. African buffaloes are believed to kill about 200 people a year in Africa. The term ‘dagga boys’ is derived from ‘udaka’ – the Zulu word for mud – because male buffaloes are often seen lying in muddy wallows and are frequently coated in dry mud.

Like most animals in the wild, they will generally choose flight if given the option but can be canny if they get the impression that they are being followed. Many a ranger has reported following buffalo tracks only to discover it has been waiting to ambush them or that its tracks turn in a circle and it is following them. Equally as many rangers, trackers and guides have discovered just how easy it is to climb a thorn tree when push turns to shove.

Final word

While buffalo may not be vindictive or actively malignant, there is no doubt that they should be viewed as unpredictable and given a wide birth when on foot. Old males often spend their evenings hanging around in the comparative the safety of lodges, and visitors would do well to pay careful attention to the rules of the lodge and not attempt any nocturnal wanderings.

Most importantly, they should be appreciated as an animal that nearly disappeared from much of Africa during the rinderpest outbreaks of the early 20^th century. Their numbers may have improved since then, but the IUCN Red List recently moved their conservation to status from ‘least concern’ to ‘near threatened’, concluding that there are fewer than half a million mature African buffalo remaining. Despite their stubborn courage, buffalo are at risk from poaching and the ever-increasing human and livestock encroachment that threatens all of our continent’s wildlife.

Rhino poaching stats 2020 – more shades of grey

Written by Susan Scott – STROOP director. Research provided by Bonné de Bod – STROOP presenter & producer.

‘STROOP – journey into the rhino horn war’ has garnered international acclaim for its groundbreaking work documenting illegal wildlife trafficking in Asia and the poaching war in South Africa.

“Rhino poaching decreases by more than half in first half of 2020” read the misleading headline on the government’s press release issued on Friday.

Let’s take a closer look at this situation, much as we did concerning the 2019 poaching figures in our story Latest Rhino Poaching Stats: Shades of Grey. In that story, we focussed on the lower poaching stats being primarily a function of fewer rhinos surviving the ongoing poaching onslaught and the devastating drought that was ravaging Southern Africa at the time. This time we call for perspective because of another contributing factor: COVID-19.

The above government headline really should have added “due to Covid-19’s harsh lockdown” – the route taken by the UK’s Guardian Newspaper when they covered the same topic. Because they did not attribute the reduction to the impact of COVID-19 lockdowns, our local mainstream media reported the success in combating poaching with headlines proclaiming various iterations of “South Africa has cut rhino poaching by half”. One can hardly blame them, given that the Environment, Forestry and Fisheries Minister, Barbara Creecy’s first statement in the release was “After a decade of implementing various strategies… efforts are paying off,” even adding, “we have been able to arrest the escalation.”

The fact is that the closure of provincial and international borders and lack of international air travel has meant that people have had limited ability to move around and the horn cannot get to the demand countries in Asia – dominating factors in the reduction of poaching.

Imagine being told by the BBC in April that crime that month was down in countries around the planet due to the efficacy of those governments’ enforcement policies, and not due to the onset of Covid-19 lockdowns? The BBC article in question rightfully attributed the drop in crime globally due to the pandemic. The pandemic had a dramatic impact – from social distancing El Salvadorian gang members to officials in cities across America who noted upwards of 50% declines in crime during the lockdown. And so too here with our rhinos, because, as the BBC observed, “the result of fewer people in public is less crime.”

To be fair, back in May, the Minister did note that the lockdown was having a tremendous impact on curbing poaching. And she did add further down in the detail of Friday’s release that the restricted movement from the Covid-19 law enforcement measures have had a striking impact, especially as “the decrease in rhino poaching can also be attributed to the disruption of the supply chain resulting from the national travel restrictions.” – so why not include that vital factor in the headline?

To the numbers:

166 rhinos have been poached during the first half of 2020, compared to 316 at the same time last year. Of the rhinos killed this year, nearly three-quarters happened before the lockdown. In fact, in the month of April, no rhinos were killed in the Intensive Protection Zone in Kruger for the first time in almost ten years.

Further proof of the success of the lockdown is the reduction in the number of arrests and firearms confiscated in the park for 2020 (2019 figures in brackets): Arrests 38 (122) and firearms seized 23 (61). The report did not provide the number of incursions as it did in the past, so we have to assume from the arrest numbers that there is much-reduced traffic inside the park.

We can also see that the swing in who owns South Africa’s rhinos continues to pivot, with positive gains towards privately owned rhinos; the private sector losing only 16 rhinos compared to the state’s 150 rhinos. The department claimed a year ago that private rhino populations had increased by a third while Kruger’s rhinos had declined by half. Private rhino owners have been successful in protecting rhinos since they were so badly hit several years ago. Smaller areas are easier to confine, plus being able to close down areas with neighbourhood security patrols and roadblocks while working with SAPS has been a significant crime deterrent. We’ve seen these efforts in effect – they have worked well – and their results are strikingly similar to the nationwide Covid-19 lockdown.

Private owners have told us that the harsh lockdown was a godsend for their security (though naturally not so for their tourism revenue). With the defence force and police services patrolling the public roads and maintaining roadblocks, poaching gangs could not travel with their tools of the trade: axes, pangas and stolen hunting rifles with home-made silencers.

In Kruger during the lockdown, the gates were closed to all visitors. And this is without a doubt the driving factor in the reduction in poaching numbers. There is a popular perception that poachers crawl in under fences to access the park, and while that does happen, the reality is that poachers often employ the easy route of driving in undetected as a day visitor. To be clear, poachers are dropped off inside the park from a comfortable vehicle, having entered the park as visitors. And, just as chilling, spotters drive around in visitor vehicles and send rhino locations to the syndicates they work for.

Those on the inside maintain that rangers are highly effective in preventing breaches over the international border and across park boundaries and that access gates are most certainly the security weakness of the park. And the lockdown clearly proves that. Many have said that corruption, sloppy work, lack of proper co-ordination of the access and exit data are all factors resulting in the majority of current poaching events, and this needs to be tackled, urgently. The lockdown has shown us the park’s Achilles heel.

Stop Rhino Poaching’s Elise Serfontein said in an interview with The Citizen that “Kruger remains the epicentre for rhino killings in South Africa, with most rhinos being shot by poachers arriving via the gates. Fundamental issues such as known internal collusion and access control for drop-off poaching remain a systematic threat.”

She added further: “Government needs to consider perhaps redefining their measures of success and introduce some additional factors. When rangers are still run off their feet chasing multiple groups of poachers every day, or finding multiple carcasses, as has been the case since the lockdown restrictions were eased, then it’s pretty clear that things aren’t that much better”. She also explains that what is needed to reduce poaching is the reduction in park incursions (by foot and by vehicle), successful long term convictions of kingpins and reinstating interventions that have been broken, for example, the closure of both the Skukuza Regional Court and RhODIS (the Rhino DNA database).

Sadly, the Minister has confirmed that the figures are on the increase again, after the Kruger gates were again opened to the public.

A plane full of hyenas

Four young spotted hyenas have completed a journey of more than 1 400 km to Zinave National Park in Mozambique, where Peace Parks Foundation will introduce them as the founder population of the first resident large carnivores in decades. The hyenas were captured in Sabie Game Park and moved to a temporary boma in Karingani, and then later airlifted to Zinave. This remarkable journey is the result of a partnership centred around dedicated conservation efforts in Mozambique.

Over the last five years, Zinave National Park, which lies in the Mozambique component of the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Conservation Area, has seen the reintroduction of more than 2 000 plains game, giraffe, elephant, buffalo, warthog and even ostrich. A total of 13 species have been translocated here, each with a unique ecological role to play in restoring balance to this landscape.

“Zinave’s herbivore population is growing extremely well,” says Bernard van Lente, who works as Peace Parks Foundation’s Project Manager in Zinave, “so much so, that we have decided that it is now time to reintroduce predators such as hyenas into the system. Animals die of natural causes, which is completely normal and part of nature’s cycle, but because there are no large predators and very few scavengers in Zinave’s sanctuary where most of the wildlife was introduced, the carcasses are not being properly recycled.”

Peace Parks Foundation, who, through a 20-year partnership agreement signed in 2015 co-manages Zinave with Mozambique’s National Administration for Conservation Areas (ANAC), requested the assistance of the Endangered Wildlife Trust (EWT) to undertake a feasibility study on the introduction of predators into the park.

The EWT team first visited Zinave’s sanctuary in November 2019 to assess various possibilities. Dr David Mills, head of EWT’s Carnivore Conservation Programme, says, “because we found that there were almost no carnivores in Zinave, we suggested that rather than reintroducing only one species, there would be much more conservation value in reconstructing the lost carnivore guild which will eventually revive important ecological functions and processes.”

Following a presentation of this study to ANAC, approval was granted to reintroduce those apex predators that exploit related natural resources, such as hyenas, leopards and lions to Zinave National Park, setting in motion this remarkable hyena translocation operation.

The ecological impact of spotted hyena entering Zinave’s system will be significant as the species is both a predator that will take off weaker animals from herds (which will keep the gene pool strong), as well as a scavenger that will remove carcasses, ensuring systems remain disease-free. Another significant advantage is that they will most likely attract smaller scavengers. David says, “there is evidence from elsewhere in Africa that vultures need hyenas to open carcasses since most are not strong enough to do so themselves. We learned that only a few jackals were occasionally seen, and no vultures were present in the sanctuary. We, therefore, decided that it was critical to kick-start the scavenging process by introducing spotted hyenas first as they will both hunt and feed on existing carcasses.”

Sabie Game Park, which is one of Mozambique’s flagship private reserves, did not falter in again stepping up to support rewilding of the country’s national conservation areas. During 2019, Sabie donated 99 buffaloes to Maputo Special Reserve, which is also being developed through a partnership between Peace Parks and ANAC. Sabie CEO, Sandy McDonald, says, “we are in the privileged position to be able to offer hyena for a relocation due to our successful conservation programme.”

In mid-April 2020, Saving the Survivors, a wildlife veterinary organisation that serves as ANAC’s official veterinary resource in Mozambique, commenced with the identification of a hyena clan in Sabie to start preparations for the translocation operation. Working with the Sabie team, the selected clan was slowly baited over time to habituate the animals to vehicles. “Saving the Survivors has lent its entire weight to this project, not only its Mozambique operation but also the back-office functions in South Africa and the UK. We are supplying two wildlife veterinarians, Dr Joao Almeida and Dr Hugo Pereira, as well as all the medical equipment, treatments and drugs required to safely complete the capture, translocation and ongoing care of the animals following their release in Zinave,” says Tristan Wood, Saving the Survivors Director.

In early July, despite delays due to COVID-19 restrictions, two males and two females were successfully darted and transported to Karingani. “As part of Karingani’s larger restoration plan, we already had appropriate predator bomas (holding facilities) that were made available for the hyena while they underwent veterinary tests,” says Karingani Warden, Ellery Worth. His team kept a close eye on the animals to ensure they remained healthy and kept feeding after the capture operation. “Landscape restoration and collaboration are at the core of our ethos – what better example of that than to be a part of the restoration of Zinave National Park in partnership with like-minded public and private conservation organisations.”

Hyenas — Zinave National Park, Mozambique

After receiving the all-clear from the veterinarian team, the clan spent about a week enjoying Karingani’s hospitality before embarking on the final leg of their journey, by small airplane no less, to Zinave. Upon arrival, the animals were released into an electrified boma where they will stay for approximately six weeks before being given access to the bigger sanctuary. Large predators have a fantastic homing instinct that allows them to return to their capture location from hundreds of kilometres away. To help them establish Zinave as their new home, Bernard says, “during this period, we will ensure that the four are well-fed and watered, basically catering for all their needs which will help hone their homing instincts to Zinave and ensure they remain within the sanctuary.”

Two of the animals were also collared to enable Zinave’s team to keep track of the clan’s movement. Robust anti-poaching efforts are ongoing to ensure that the area remains safe.

A sentiment shared by all partners was the fact that being part of this conservation effort is a privilege. “I think the emphasis on collaboration is key to successful and holistic conservation – multiple stakeholders all driven by the same desired outcome of safeguarding the planet’s heritage, is a significant aspect of this and future projects,” concludes Ellery.

WATCH: A clan is born. Click here to follow the remarkable journey of four hyenas.