The Death of a Lion

Dear all,

Hope everything is well in your lives. Sorry to come back after 2 weeks of silence with such a macabre title. I will get to that later, but wanted to have a catchy title so you read the whole entry!

The last 2 weeks have been spent doing an EarthWatch Institute Project (Lions of Tsavo) on 2 private ranches that are just south of Tsavo East National Park (a very dry park in Southeastern Kenya that is about the size of Connecticut). We were lending a hand in gathering research data on the infamous Tsavo lions that live in and around the park. As in much of Africa, there is much conflict between wildlife and humans and that project intended to gather research to potentially alleviate conflicts and provide for better conservation.

Overall the trip was good. We had 2 Africa guides, 1 Principal Investigator (Alex) and a Safari guide (Simon). We did wildlife drives for 2 weeks on the private ranches which cover about 200,000 acres. We stayed on Rukinga Ranch (80,000 acre private ranch leased to a British man for 99 years that does not allow cattle grazing and is intended for conservation). We also explored Taita Ranch (120,000 acres with better habitat but they allow cattle grazing). We did night and early morning drives and saw tons of wildlife: Lions, Cheetahs (very frequent on the ranches), Jackels, Hyenas (including a rare Striped Hyena), African Wildcats (look like house cats), Servals (another small, rare cat) and Caracals (miniature Cougars that are extremely rare and even rarer to see). There was also tons of antelope, giraffe, elephants, warthogs, birds, etc.

So, for Tsavo NP (an area the size of Connecticut), why do you need to worry about wildlife outside of the park? Isnt that enough land to maintain healthy populations? No, it isnt, not for Lions which require massive territories and constantly move with the rains (Tsavo only gets 12 inches of rain per year, so water is a highly sought after commodity). Therefore, the private land surrounding the ranches are critical for maintaining healthy Lion populations (even though Tsavo is the size of Connecticut, they think only a few hundred lions live there, thats right, hundred!). The existence of wildlife on private ranches brings conflicts with humans, particularly with herdsman. Most people have heard of the Maasai who have been herdsman for thousands of years and they frequently have conflicts with lions, but that relationship has been going on for thousands of years, it is mostly natural by now.

In Tsavo (a very dry landscape) cattle have not been a part of the landscape and as the population grows more cattle are appearing. Taita ranch is home to 10-15 thousand cows and probably has a capacity for 1-5 thousand. So the land is overgrazed, the water holes are empty and the wildlife is stressed. Additionally, even the presence of cows is enough to scare away lions and prevent them from establishing terrirories, this added stress reduces the lion populations both inside and outside the park. In fact, only 2-3 years ago (when Taita ranch had no cows) there were 35-50 lions on the ranches, they now think only 5-10 occupy that habitat.

OK, so what? People need to live and need to graze their animals for food, right? Shouldn't there be a compromise? How can we even ask starving Africans to not graze cattle because Lions are being reduced in number? Well, it isnt that simple. The cattle on the ranches are from Somalis, not Kenyans. Because Somalia and the northern regions of Kenya are in such disarray, the country is being overrun with Somalis. The historical Kenyan tribes (people that already struggle to feed themselves in an unforgiving landscape) are seeing their resources disappear with the abuse of the Somali people that have started to flock into the country. In fact, the cattle on Taita ranch DO NOT feed the people and they DO NOT provide ample employment. A few herdsman make a pittance from some rich Somali man. He (and it always is a he) trucks his cattle in and pays $6 per year to graze that cow! But, the ranchowners dont get paid for the 10-15 thousand cows, only a few of them. Most are there illegally. So in the end, 120,000 acres (plus the cows that consistently venture over to graze on Rukinga) gets ruined to benefit 1-2 rich Somali men who sell their cows to Saudi Arabia (who have the money to buy cows because Americans are addicted to oil). So do the math, Lions (which support a large tourism industry) are being reduced in number so that no local people benefit and a few rich guys benefit (and some Saudis get fatter). Taita ranch used to be run as a safari camp. When that was the case, the safari company paid the owners of the ranche a set price to run safaris on the land. In turn they employed local people as cooks, mechanics, guides, security, rangers, other staff. At that point the Lion population was high. So there is a middle ground, people can get paid to conserve wildlife, they just need to be incented to do it, this is a tough policy in a place like Kenya where corruption is rampant and it is difficult to police the entire country.

So cows are a problem, not a surprise, same thing happens here in the US. But what about the title, "Death of a Lion." During our second week, we found a pair of Lions that were courting and mating. We came back early in the morning (on Taita Ranch) to monitor their behavior. We were following them for 2 hours or so, keeping our distance. They were so preoccupied that we clearly didnt bother them. Then after one of their "intimate" 30 second sessions of mating, there was all this commotion and crashing through the trees and roaring. We first suspected that another male lion had crashed the party causing fighting to start. Nope, then we saw the female seemed to be injured and was lying on the ground pawing at her face. Ok, we supposed they ran into a beehive and had a few stings, nothing life threatening. Then all of a sudden we saw the lioness struggling just like a dog trying to wriggle out of its collar...as if the lion had something around its neck. It did! The worst case scenario, a snare! We had been driving around the area with 2 people that had been studying lions for over 7 years and we didnt even see the snare because it was so well hidden. Before continuing with the Lion's fate, let me give some background on snares. This particular trap was quite an operation. The poachers laid a fence of Acacia thorns (which we humans could hardly see, but the animals can see clearly). They had 5 spaces with wire nooses in the spaces. The animals avoid crashing through the fence and go through the openings where they get the noose around their neck. The wire is tied to a large log which is dragged by the animal and proceeds to choke it to death. These snares are meant for small antelope, not lions, but lions get snagged nonetheless. The snares are set by people who need to supplement their income with "bushmeat." They sell this meat to the butcher in order to buy other supplies. 1 antelope goes for 100 kenyan shillings - about $1.50.

In our particular case the female finally freed the log from the bushes and went down to rest. We took a closer look to see that she had the wire wrapped 4 times around her neck. We called the Kenya Wildlife Service Vet who ensured us he would be by in about 2-3 hours. We all felt good (given the circumstances) and headed back home to meet the vet and bring him back. A lion can exist without food or water for a few days, so we had time. Our guides figured she would not move very far given her stress level. Her male companion was keeping guard, so there is nothing we can do without the vet and his tranquilizer darts.

We returned about 3 hours later to search for the lions. As we approached the spot, there were antelope and birds, too much commotion for lions on the area, not a good sign. Neither lion was where we left them. We searched for about 15 minutes, then finally i spotted her. On her back, completely gone. She had tried to move under a large tree for shade and the log got jammed/ Her reaction to this is to pull as hard as possible (and the brute force of a lion meant she was pulling very hard). This only tightened the noose around her neck and she suffocated to death. This was unbelievable. The guides had encountered lion snares before and have had success calling the vet in to take care of it. Normally there are a few days to work with to fix the problem. Not in this case, she died shortly after we left.

So no only do cattle case problems, but the bushmeat trade does as well. This trade is a product of the utter poverty that exists in African countries. People are trying to get basic supplies and they decimate wildlife in the process. This lioness was killed for $1.50 worth of antelope meat. Her existence (and her offspring) can provide jobs for many people if she were only conserved. The problem is that local people DO NOT benefit from her existence. They do not feel any hard if she is killed so it is worth the option to set the snares. Really quite sad. We need to figure out a way that incents people to conserve wildlife while benefiting from it, if not, we will only see large cats in zoos and museums.