Researchers at the University of California, Davis, have identified 52 potential wildlife corridors linking protected areas across Tanzania. Using a cost-effective combination of interviews with local residents and a land conversion dataset for East Africa, they found an additional 23 corridors over those previously identified by Tanzanian government reports.
Researchers at the University of California, Davis, have identified 52 potential wildlife corridors linking protected areas across Tanzania. Using a cost-effective combination of interviews with local residents and a land conversion dataset for East Africa, they found an additional 23 corridors over those previously identified by Tanzanian government reports.
According to their publication in the journal PLOS ONE, nearly a sixth of all the wildlife corridors previously identified in Tanzania in 2009 potentially have been separated by land conversion, and a third now pass across lands likely to be converted to human use in the near future.
The results show that structural wildlife corridors still connect protected areas from east to west across the nation to some degree. But no open wildlife corridors remain to link protected areas between northern and southern Tanzania, and two reserves — Gombe Stream National Park and Pande Game Reserve — are completely isolated from all others in the country.
Read more at University of California - Davis
Image: A satellite dish stands in the background as elephants walk in Tanzania. Wildlife increasingly has to pass through human-dominated landscapes in the country. (Credit: Courtesy Tim Caro/UC Davis)
