Understanding overlap between lion and livestock movements!

Pride in Our Prides is about improving human-lion coexistence outside protected areas.  We develop pragmatic tools that reduce livestock losses and increase tolerance for the big cats.  Approaches to conflict mitigation can be either traditional (like livestock kraals) or more modern using advanced technology.  For example, we fit lions with state-of-the-art GPS collars that relay warning messages when lions leave safe tourism areas and move closer to people and their livestock.  As part of our conflict prevention research we continually refine this alert system.  To identify zones of highest conflict likelihood it is important that we also understand the daily movements of cattle in our area.  For that purpose we recently started to tag cattle with GPS trackers too.  The units will reveal crucial detail of the herds’ movements that can be assessed against lion activity.  Here are some action shots from the field. flo

New Crowd Funding Campaign for lion collars

On May 19th, we launched a new crowdfunding campaign for Pride in Our Prides!  As our project grows in Northern Botswana, we want to expand our lion tracking efforts to develop a more comprehensive coverage of the study area.   With each additional satellite tracking collar, we are able to learn about the lion social groups, inform communities about their personalities and habits and integrate their movements into our early-warning system.

Since this campaign is only awarded IF we reach our goal, we hope that you feel inspired to support our effort!

Click HERE to visit the campaign site! Thank you for your support!

Pride in Our Prides welcomes Dr. Florian Weise to the field team!

Pride in Our Prides Team: Eric LeFlore, Mr. Mwezi of DWNP, Pro Tomeletso and Dr. Florian Weise

Flo arrived on site to continue with PiOP’s project activities as Eric is getting ready to analyze results from the first 21 months of lion conflict work in northern Botswana.  Together with “Pro”, PiOP’s trusted project assistant and local lion guardian, they met the livestock kraal builders, wildlife officials, and village chiefs to introduce Flo.  One chief in particular stressed that lions are the main cause of problems for communities surrounding the Okavango Delta as the cats frequently take to livestock predation.  Often, villagers have little means to deal with the conflict and may resort to persecution – the reason why PiOP was launched in 2014.  While investigating a lion conflict site in the field, the team also had an exciting (and rather close) encounter with an elephant herd of 35!  The ellies moved on, as will PiOP with its continuous efforts to mitigate human-lion conflict and increase tolerance for these majestic cats outside protected areas.  Enjoy some photos of Flo’s first day in the Seronga area…

Pro and Flo having a laugh by the village water pump

The Village Kgotla