Newswise — CAMEROON, August 13, 2024—Ramping up protection efforts of Endangered Central African lions, a team of Cameroonian rangers and biologists from the Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife (MINFOF) and Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), has placed GPS collars on seven of the big cats in Cameroon’s Bouba Ndjidda National Park; this brings the number of collared lions to ten. The collaring is part of a long-term effort by the government of Cameroon and WCS to recover Bouba Ndjidda’s wildlife to its former glory.
Serge Patrick Tadjo is Bouba Ndjidda’s warden and fiercely committed to protecting the park. He said “Bouba Ndjidda and the surrounding landscape is one of the jewels of Central Africa but it is under relentless pressure from poachers, illegal grazing and illicit gold mining. Over a decade ago, we took on organized elephant poachers from Sudan, and succeeded in pushing them out of Bouba Ndjidda and Cameroon. GPS collars have helped us to safeguard our elephants, and we are very pleased to now use the same technique for lions. We now have 10 lions monitored, including three collared earlier this year by an excellent local NGO, Biodiversity, Environment and Sustainable Development.”
The ten collars are the latest high-tech tool to support the efforts of MINFOF rangers to safely and efficiently protect the park’s wildlife. Paul Bour, the Landscape Director for WCS assists the Cameroonian government in planning and preparing anti-poaching patrols. “The data from the collars help us to be strategic,” he said. “We receive lion locations four times a day, from the collars via satellite directly to our laptops, so we see which areas of the landscape lions use almost in real time. We can proactively prioritize those areas for patrols, to ensure they are well protected and poachers cannot access them.’
The collars will also provide insights into the ecology of lions from a region of Africa where the species is poorly known. Dr Paul Funston of African Lion Conservation worked with the team to capture the lions and said “Lions are Endangered across Central Africa and most populations are very depleted with a high level of threat. Bouba Ndjidda is exciting because lions are breeding well in parts of the park but they do not seem to be raising as many cubs as we would hope. Strong science with data from the collars will help to unravel that mystery and other unknowns in the population”.
There are an estimated 20,000-23,000 lions in Africa according to the latest IUCN RedList Assessment published in 2023. Continentally, the species is classified as Vulnerable, with the most secure populations occurring in Southern Africa and parts of East Africa. However, it is now thought there are fewer than 1000 lions remaining in Central Africa, and the species is considered regionally Endangered. It is also a unique sub-species, the Northern lion, which is genetically grouped with lions in West Africa as well as with the last remaining population in Asia, in India’s Gujarat State.
Luke Hunter, the Executive Director of WCS’s Big Cat Program said ‘The lion is often ignored in conservation planning because they are relatively common and easy to see in the famous, tourist-friendly national parks of East and Southern Africa. But the Northern lion is in real trouble and needs urgent conservation attention. Bouba Ndjidda is one of the only sites in Central Africa where we are seeing the early signs of recovery in the population. That points to the close cooperation between the Cameroon government and WCS on the ground. With a long-term commitment to that approach, I think Bouba Ndjidda is a beacon of hope for the lion in Central Africa”.
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WCS (Wildlife Conservation Society)
MISSION: WCS saves wildlife and wild places worldwide through science, conservation action, education, and inspiring people to value nature. To achieve our mission, WCS, based at the Bronx Zoo, harnesses the power of its Global Conservation Program in nearly 60 countries and in all the world’s oceans and its five wildlife parks in New York City, visited by 4 million people annually. WCS combines its expertise in the field, zoos, and aquarium to achieve its conservation mission. Visit: newsroom.wcs.org Follow: @WCSNewsroom. For more information: 347-840-1242. Listen to the WCS Wild Audio podcast HERE.
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