Endangered African antelope and the lions that prey on them may benefit from certain cattle ranching practices in Kenya, according to newly published research led by a 2017 University of Wyoming Ph.D. graduate.
Endangered African antelope and the lions that prey on them may benefit from certain cattle ranching practices in Kenya, according to newly published research led by a 2017 University of Wyoming Ph.D. graduate.
Caroline Ng’weno, who conducted the research during her UW graduate studies, is one of the first -- if not the first -- Kenyan women to have earned a Ph.D. working as a field biologist in Kenya. Ng’weno now heads the Pride of Meru program for the Born Free Foundation, an organization dedicated to research and protection of lions in central Kenya. Her work has provided new insights into the interaction among Jackson’s hartebeest, a species of conservation concern; other wild ungulates; cattle; and lions in Kenya’s Ol Pejeta Conservancy, which is managed for both wildlife conservation and cattle ranching.
As detailed in the scientific journals Ecology and Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, Jackson’s hartebeest -- a large antelope that can weigh over 400 pounds -- has been in significant decline in that part of Kenya since the reintroduction of lions in the late 1980s. That’s primarily because hartebeest share savanna habitat with zebras, the primary prey of the approximately 70 lions comprising five prides in the conservancy.
Read more at University of Wyoming
Image: Researcher Caroline Ng'weno and a colleague monitor the temperature of a lion on the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in central Kenya during her research on the interaction of lions with Jackson's hartebeest, other wild ungulates and cattle. (Credit: Douglas Kamaru)
