Make a Difference
Wildlife Impact
| WILDLIFE NUMBERS REBOUND! |
Natural Resource Protection
Nothing says “AFRICA” like the presence of unique animals! The elephant, lion and the rest of the “Big 5” epitomize the priceless resource that only Africa holds.
Results of semi-annual flyover counts show a general positive trend for all species (except buffalo) and a significant increase for hartebeest from pre-COMACO to post-COMACO dates. For example, the hartebeest is a large-bodied species found in small groups in hilly wooded areas and is sought by people who both hunt and set snares near waterholes. This species shows a significant improvement in numbers since COMACO inception, as highlighted in this table looking at individual species numbers.
From August to September 2009, COMACO organized an independently-conducted Luangwa Valley-wide wildlife aerial census survey, which was previously carried out in 1972 by the U.N Food and Agriculture Organization. The survey was outsourced to Dr. Howard Frederick (a wildlife survey specialist from Tanzania) and was flown by WCS pilot, David Moyer, based in Tanzania. Its objective was to establish an ecosystem-level baseline for wildlife numbers and wildlife distribution maps as the COMACO expansion begins to impact more broadly on wildlife numbers. Part of this survey repeated the annual wildlife census survey of COMACO core areas where we have operated the longest. Key results are summarized below.
| Pre-COMACO | Post-COMACO | ||||
| Estimate | SE | Estimate | SE | d-test | |
| Buffalo | 5,111 | 2,654 | 1,675 | 920 | -1.22 |
| Wildebeest | 1,149 | 542 | 1,912 | 712 | 0.85 |
| Waterbuck | 152 | 62 | 166 | 88 | 0.13 |
| Zebra | 568 | 220 | 1,029 | 482 | 0.87 |
| Elephant | 1,028 | 346 | 1,680 | 502 | 1.07 |
| Eland | 73 | 41 | 90 | 55 | 0.24 |
| Hartebeest | 13 | 10 | 309 | 111 | 2.67 |
| Roan | 16 | 11 | 168 | 109 | 1.38 |
| Kudu | 86 | 43 | 144 | 72 | 0.69 |
| Puku | 1,104 | 445 | 1,742 | 591 | 0.86 |
Particular species of interest in this study were wildebeest, roan, eland, hartebeest and waterbuck. All five of these species are low density species with known past threats of illegal hunting and provide an important basis for testing COMACO model’s efficacy in mitigating wildlife threats that may stem from rural livelihoods affected by hunger and poverty. To increase the statistical power of this analysis, counts for all five species were lumped as large-bodied, low-density (LBLD) species. The graph represents results for each of the five chiefdoms surveyed, and shows a strongly significant increase in LBLD species for all areas. While not uniformly statistically significant, the overall trend at this stage of COMACO’s development does suggest a positive growing wildlife population from levels surveyed prior to the introduction of the COMACO model.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
| Waterbuck |
Wildebeast | Hartbeast | Roan |
Common Eland |
Examined by year, annual fluctuations can be seen. These happen for a variety of reasons, the biggest being natural environmental conditions. For example, 2006 was a year of record flooding in Luangwa Valley. All-out rescue efforts took place to save people, homes, lodges, crops and of course, animals. Despite these efforts, thousands of animals were lost – an tragedy from which it has taken several years to recover. Nevertheless, numbers ARE rebounding, and in some areas have surpassed the count at baseline.
