Living with Lions

In order to develop successful lion conservation strategies, the projects are carrying out ecological and behavioural research on the local lions by attaching radio collars to them and monitoring their movements, and the effect of human activities on them. By monitoring the lions and conducting interviews with local livestock owners they are gathering information on different aspects of lion biology, population ecology and behaviour. With this information they will be able to develop biologically sound strategies for the management and conservation of lions.

Because lions outside national parks have been subjected to persecution, they are very cautious of humans and vehicles, and in order to gain any information from them it is essential to radio collar them so they can be tracked. Collaring these wary and nocturnal animals is a difficult procedure, as the lions cannot be free darted from a vehicle, as would be possible for more habituated lions in protected parks. This means that lions need to be trapped in foot snares before they can be darted and collared, and first they need to be tracked by locating recent footprints or kills (right).

Traps are set up at locations near to recent lion sightings, kills or tracks. They are made by building a dense thorn bush enclosure around a tree, leaving a corridor leading towards some bait, which is secured from the tree.

Two snares are set in front of the bait (left), where an approaching lion would be directed to step. Sounds known to attract lions, such as a distressed buffalo calf are played from loudspeakers, and lions that approach and are trapped are darted and immobilized.

Once the lion is tranquilized an antibiotic injection is given to ensure that the dart wound does not become infected (right), and a radio collar is put on the lion (left).

The dart is carefully removed (above) and an antibiotic injection is given (below)

Blood samples are taken to be screened for diseases.

Other standard measurements are taken, such as tooth length.

The lion's age is estimated by assessing the black pigmentation of the nose, which becomes more black as a lion gets older.

The anaesthesia is reversed about an hour after darting, and the lion is guarded until fully competent. These collars are not detrimental to the lion in any way, and their capture in foot snares and other procedures involved have never been found to cause any harm to the lions.

The lions are tracked weekly from the air to record information on their locations and home ranges, and the resulting data is analysed in relation to human land use and concentrations of wild herbivores and livestock. The lions are also regularly tracked from the ground using a hand-held receiver connected to a directional antenna to gather information on their social structure, reproduction, mortality rates, causes of mortality and feeding ecology.

The LPP researchers are hoping to get funding for GPS collars, which provide data on the position of the collared lion at hourly intervals. This information would enable the projects to carry out more detailed research on the lions, which would be invaluable, as so much is still unknown about their movements and behaviour.

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