In Zimbabwe some conservationists took a failing cattle ranch, ringed it with very high double fences, and stocked it with wildlife. It’s about a third the size of our Yellowstone and it’s called The Bubye Valley Conservancy. Because of the large size of the land that was enclosed by the reserve, wildlife flourished to the point where it was possible to establish healthy populations of large carnivores such as lions and leopards.
The many armed guards that protect against poachers, when combined with the size of the habitat, have given sanctuary to one of the few populations of the extremely endangered black rhino. Because the rhinos have so much room they feel no social pressures and reproduce well. They are poached, but not as fast as the population is growing. The reserve also has the largest lion population in Zimbabwe, and 32 other species of large fauna.
The Bubye was a model for long term sustainability. No locals are killed by the carnivores from the reserve. The double fence protects in two directions.
There is now a thing called “The Cecil Effect”. What that term means is the disruption of scientific wildlife management via popular culture and the negative effects it has on conservation, such as with African lions.
Concordia Biologist on Cecil Effect
“If the money dries up, how will they hire park game wardens, buy cars for anti-poaching units and pay for animal tracking? The whole conservation effort is jeopardized. That’s where the disaster occurs.”
Southern Africa has been hit by a perfect storm of conservation catastrophes this year. There is a continent wide drought, the worldwide vilification of a Minnesota Dentist has kept trophy hunters away in droves, and the US Fish and Wildlife needs to authenticate a country’s conservation program before trophy importation resumes. There are now more lions than the habitat can support. Below is a statement from a resident biologist on why there is a need to cull a lot of lions.
National Geo on the cull highlighted below, the whole article is well worth a read, I excerpted.
I am an independent scientist working on the Bubye Valley Conservancy, focused on lion ecology, ….
Reducing numbers to alleviate overpopulation pressure does nothing to permanently solve the problem…..
Lions prey on a wide variety of species, and we are starting to see declines in even the more common and robust prey such as zebra and wildebeest—not to mention the more sensitive species such as sable, kudu, nyala, warthog, and even buffalo and giraffe…..
lions are aggressively competitive and will go out of their way to kill any leopard, cheetah, wild dog, or hyena that they encounter, and have caused major declines in these species,…..
Warning: video of loose lion being shot Kenya. When wildlife has no value it becomes valueless. Kenya has lost 70% of it’s wildlife since the 1977 ban on hunting.
The death of a couple hundred lions is insignificant from a conservation perspective. What is not so great is that if hunters had paid as much as the dentist did for his hunt, those 200 lions would have brought in 10 million dollars of revenue. A large reserve such as the Bubye employs hundreds of people and has many ripple effects on the economy of the surrounding human population. The Bubye also has a large black rhino population that is unhunted and therefore brings in no revenue. Ten million is huge for conservation.
Unfortunately lions are only an indicator species. The accompanying decrease in all big game hunting equals a significant drop in revenue. The Bubye has a continuous problem with rhino poaching those horns are worth $30,000 a kilo. Rhinoceros are more difficult to breed and they are a very strong attractant for poachers. Without income to pay the salaries of staff to protect wildlife reserves such as the Bubye, enforcement is going to suffer, and at some time deaths might well begin to exceed births of that critically endangered rhino.
Most all of the wildlife reserves in South Africa are operated on money from big game hunting. The Bubye is only one such conservancy. Bubye is famous, probably the best run and largest in Zimbabwe. If Bubye is culling lions, probably others are as well, all across the southern portion of Africa. Revenues are falling and poaching is increasing. Bubye has already caught grief for suggesting a cull, they can only delay the inevitable. Math is not the friend to lions this dry season. No miracle will happen, they have to go one way or another. More than likely that process is already taking place without fanfare. Lions no longer pay their way.
Why is this a failure of conservation? Beyond the loss of wildlife Cecil shows just how misinformed the public is and what an outsized negative effect the public can have on wildlife conservation. A well placed web posting can set back conservation efforts further than the most pernicious poachers. The cecil effect was here in the USA long before there was a cecil. When scientists, specifically wildlife managers, are no longer the managers of wildlife, we lose. We lose more than the wildlife, but also the idea that wildlife conservation should be based on science, a basic tenant of the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation.
And the Daily Kos? Part of the vigilante mob involved in a worldwide shaming of a dentist who in the end it turns out did absolutely nothing wrong, legally or ethically. Part of the problem. The Cecil Effect. No expertise beyond owning a pet cat required, one only needs to “feel”. Clickbait on a par with supermarket tabloids. Not one fact based article from a conservation or scientific viewpoint posted here to this web site.
I wonder how many of the keyboard pontificators care about 200 lions in one reserve, or even more to the point how many actually care about wildlife conservation in Southern Africa. I doubt very many if any.
www.namibian.com.na/…
www.nytimes.com/…
portals.iucn.org/…
www.theguardian.com/…
www.nytimes.com/...
It’s really not my place to offer an opinion on wildlife conservation on the other side of the world. (implied is that it isn’t yours either) Conservation decisions should be for the people who live there to decide, preferably the people who live closest to each park or reserve and are affected most by any conservation action. Lions kill a heck of a lot of people every year, a lot more than our grizzly, maybe 250 fatalities a year. Cattle grow better and feed more people than lions. I hope in the end the people who live in Africa find a place on their continent for wildlife, but that’s for them to decide.