Tuberculosis in Lions hits the Saskatoon stage

Wildlife issues - a true lion story in this case - crop up in the most unlikely of places. I have just spent an enthralled and enthralling three days at a conference in Saskatoon, or more accurately, two intertwined conferences. The academic one titled "The Oral, the Written, and Other Verbal Media: Interfaces and Audiences" was closely linked with performance spoken word of several kinds in the cleverly titled “The eVOCative Festival and Conference”. There was Slam Poetry, Sound Poetry, Punning Poetry and beautiful poetry in several forms ranging from Hip Hop to Erotic and beyond as well as formal storytelling, although all of it could really be called storytelling.

The main organizer, Susan Gingell of the University of Saskatchewan, and her amazing team built the two events to complement each other and bring artists and academics from as far away as New Zealand and Australia, Trinidad, and Scotland as well as all over North America together. A core element was the involvement of aboriginal artists and their stories. She succeeded with gold stars.

Imagine my surprise when one of the presenters – Catherine Kidd (known by weird coincidence in this case as Cat) proceeded to tell the story, in a mesmerizing word and movement act full of clever rhymes and vivid images, of her witnessing the dying of a lioness in South Africa’s Kruger National Park. She and her host saw the animal, its skin stretched tight over unnaturally prominent ribs and hip bones, as it lay almost moribund beside the road. Her words soon confirmed my suspicions that the animal had been dying of tuberculosis and was a victim of its diet, as it surely must have eaten some part of an infected cape buffalo.

Cat’s prose poem and sinuous body movements (she later confirmed to me that she is a devoted yoga practitioner) moved on from the lion to a meeting with two refugees from Mozambique who were running the sixty kilometre gauntlet of a national park where lions and other large predators roam free in order to find jobs in South Africa. It is an all-too-chilling version of a certain TV show where good-looking guys and scantily clad women have to survive a weird collection of “hazards” dreamed up by script-writers. Nobody knows how many desperate men and women make it to safety, or fail horribly, in the real-life version.

This was drama enough, but I know that I was the only wildlife vet (albeit retired) in the audience and also the only one who knew and had written about these very same things. I was able to show Cat the photo that the Kruger’s chief vet, Dr. Markus Hofmyer had sent me of a lion that had died of TB lying on the postmortem room floor at Skukuza, site of the park headquarters. Of course TB has been known in the Kruger for the best part of thirty years, ever since it entered the park with infected cattle from the south. Buffalo are the main victims, but other species, including several antelopes and other predators such as leopards, cheetahs and hyaenas have also suffered. Markus has told me that about 25 lions a year die from the infection. And those are the ones they find!

Cat took some video footage of the lion’s last minutes, but has not yet edited it for release or published the written version, but she assures me that she soon will. When she does, I will get the news and permission and be one of the first to alert you and show you the text. Meanwhile you can find more about her published work and see some videos, almost all of it about animal life and her quirky view of it, on her web site.

Rhino Conservation and the probable disappearance of one race

It looks as if the planet’s last four wild Northern White Rhinos, which lived in the Garamba National park in the DRC have gone. As reported by Reuters in an article of June 16th Martin Brooks, head of the African Rhino Specialist Group, has stated that recent fieldwork has failed to find the animals. A new, and intensive, survey is planned under the direction of the African Parks Foundation, but it would seem to me that they have little chance of finding anything.

Northern White Rhinos do not look any different than their cousins of the Southern race, and it is now these that have been translocated to Uganda, to the Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary, where I have taken students,and in 1966 were taken to Meru National Park, in Kenya, where I later had to do some medical interventions.

which I have documented in Wrestling With Rhinos and in The Trouble With Lions.

If the colours and picture quality of the animal with the big sore on its side look a bit dodgy, you may be interested to know that the photo comes from an old Super8 movie taken in the early 1970s. Super8 is incredibly small (8mm) and only technical wizardry has allowed us to use this picture.

As those who follow rhino issues closely know only too well, the pressure on them is unrelenting. If their horns are not being sold into Yemen to make dagger handles, they go to the Far East for use in traditional medicine.

It hardly matters who did the killing. In a country where war has been the norm for years and years it could be remnant armed militias like the ones who killed hundreds of hippo and have now started to take out elephants, (the war is supposed to be over) or even heavily-armed guerrillas from northern Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army, led by Joseph Kony , he of the bestial child abduction and slavery group who operate in the region. Either type of group would be hungry for the money that they could raise through the sales of rhino horn.

When I was in Kenya in 2006 there was a strong feeling that those four rhinos might find a home at the Ol Pejeta Conservancy, where they would have been relatively safe, as the place is heavily guarded. As there are no white rhino of the southern race inside the fence there would have been no risk of cross-breeding. The scheme seemed to be well ahead, and some of the logistics were being worked out. Then it all came to a halt. I am not sure why, but one reason given us was that locals in the DRC had objected. A sad end.

Furadan again

Each week the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation puts out several excellent shows that fit into the “Investigative Journalism” box. Recently (May 26th) the host of one of those shows, Rick MacInnes-Rae, did an in-depth report on environmental issues from Cambodia and Russia’s Lake Baikal. I have added below the email letter I sent to the comment box on the show’s email address. Not long afterwards Rick contacted me to find out how to pronounce my name so that he could read the piece on air. Of course he edited it a bit, as all good hosts are likely to do. I have asked if I can make a copy of the email as an audio clip, but have not yet heard back from Rick or the copyright folks at CBC. If they do give the go-ahead I will add it to this blog. (By the way, the name is pronounced like the famous Dimple Haig scotch)

Meanwhile if anyone wants to hear the show they can get at it though the CBC web site. The full 50 odd minutes of each show lie under Dispatches, June 16, 2008 -- Mumbai, India, Montreal, Iraq, Managua, Nicaragua, Woodland Hills, California 
or Dispatches, May 19, 2008, Cambodia, Siberia, Oxford, Beirut, and Washington.

I missed the May 26th show that has a cryptic précis that goes “Pygmy elephants versus palm oil.” I’ll pick that one up as it would seem to fit the theme.

So here is my letter in response the Cambodia & Baikal reports of May 19.

Rick,
It was good to hear this evening that Dispatches continues to tell people about wildlife and conservation issues all over the world. The stories from Cambodia and Lake Baikal are part of that genre, and it is important that you folks continue that line.

Another story that might interest you and your listeners is the use of the agricultural pesticide carbofuran, sold in East Africa as Furadan, which as been wreaking havoc on wildlife populations. The chemical is not only effective as an insecticide, and no doubt proves useful in crops ranging from cotton to maize, but it is also a deadly poison, in minute amounts, for large mammals and birds. I have been taking Canadian veterinary students to Uganda for several years, where we link up with students and faculty from the Makerere University’s Department of Wildlife and Animal Resource Management and study the complicated matrix of the human x livestock x wildlife interface. We have witnessed first-hand how lions in Queen Elizabeth National Park have been poisoned in revenge killings. It is not only lions. An entire clan of hyaenas was wiped out late last year, and vultures have virtually disappeared from the park. Where we saw hundreds in 2007, we saw only one in February this year. The cattle herders in the park have become adept at hiding their use of the poison and are alleged to now be using it preemptively. If a small calf is killed by being given a dose of Furadan orally, and then left to die in the open, any predator feeding on the carcass will also succumb. A recent example of this occurred in Kenya’s famous Maasai Mara when a poisoned hippo (a crop raider?) was partially consumed by lions. Four of them developed signs of poisoning, and two of them died.

There are lots more factors around this subject, but I hope that this note will stimulate you sufficiently to pick up on a possible story and highlight an increasing threat to conservation in Africa.

Another great investigative journalism show, well worth a listen whenever you get the chance, is the CBC's As it Happens. Go for it.

Treating the Individual lion

In his thought-provoking blog (which can be found here) ecologist Seamus Maclellan, who works in Kenya as part of the Kilimanjaro Lion Conservation Project team has raised the issue of dealing with individual animals, as opposed to being concerned about entire systems. Sometimes the answers are easy, sometimes very complicated. Here is an example of the former.

In 2003 veterinary students traveling with me in Uganda had the opportunity to treat an injured lion in Queen Elizabeth National Park. She had been badly beaten up in some sort of fight, and Dr. Ludwig Siefert took the students out late in the afternoon to see if they could find her. As the evening closed in the found her pride only a couple of kilometers from the village of Kasenyi, on the shores or Lake George. After some deliberation Ludwig decided to dart her, as there might not be a chance of finding her quickly the next day. There were some risks involved as she might not go down in an accessible spot before the rapid onset of dark that is typical of the tropics, especially so near the equator. The calculated risk paid off, she went down in the open, and examination revealed that she had deep puncture wounds and extensive skin tears on the insides of both hind legs. These photos of the incident appear on pages 277 & 278 of The Trouble With Lions.

With the moon not scheduled to rise for three hours dark soon overtook the crew, so they worked by the lights of the 4-WD while the game ranger kept a look-out for the rest of the pride, which never moved more than about 200 metres away. A ‘t’ shirt with a Canada flag logo was used to cover the patient’s eyes. Extensive debridement of the wounds and both short and long-acting antibiotics were administered and as the lion woke up the crew were finally able to leave her and get back to Mweya for a very late supper.

In this case the intervention by a veterinary team on an individual animal had positive results, and no negative impact upon the pride or the wider community (unless you argue that the now healthy lion would join in the pride’s hunting and eat her share of kob or buffalo). The ripple effect of the intervention had even wider results when the lioness, nick-named Canada because of the team, and for her temporary eye covering, delivered a litter of healthy cubs not long afterwards.

Wildlife blogs, wildlife poisoning, wildlife pictures

Been thinking about blogs, wildlife poisons and attempts to forestall or even reverse some of the trends that seem to be going on.

A major blog collector lies at a site called Saving Endangered Animals. Within the main home page are a large number of blog images, each one a mini-portrait of someone or something of relevance to the subject.

There are Quick Links and blogs galore – too many for me to count. Some that are relevant to my own books The Trouble With Lions and Wrestling With Rhinos are of course about those species, but also about the bigger problem of wildlife poisoning.

Two lion specific ones that tell how things have changed in Kenyan Maasailand, and give a glimmer of hope for the bigger picture in Africa are from the Kilimanjaro Lion Conservation Project - and its close relative the Lion Guardians.

The Furadan issue -a subject to which I have referred in previous blogs (see May 5th) comes up in several places. Furadan is the trade name of a carbamate poison developed as a crop insecticide, but happens to kill mammals and birds with seeming impunity - is a given plenty of coverage in a blog called Stop Wildlife Poisoning.
The authors are seeking as much information and input about poisoning incidents as they can possibly get. If I have a quibble with their opening statement of May 15th it is that they seem to restrict their search to Kenya. From my own experience, related in the opening sentence of The Trouble With Lions and in other stories in the text, I know that the stuff has been used in Uganda, and it would not surprise me at all if reports of its use turn up elsewhere.

Another general blog, which also refers to an upcoming article on poisoning with Furadan, is the East African Wildlife Society’s blog; neatly named The Water Hole. For those who don’t know it, the EAWLS publishes an enjoyable magazine called Swara (Kiswahili for antelope). It carries a wide variety of articles on wildlife subjects and does not shy away from appropriate commentary on controversies or comment on the behaviour of politicians when they ignore or actively try to damage wildlife initiatives.

From the Wildlife Conservation Society comes their “State of the Wild 2008-2009” announcement, which you can find here. This is a notice about their latest book on the subject. It consists of a series of important essays by well-known scientists and, right at the start of the web site, a marvelous series of photos of rare and critically endangered animals. All you have to do is click on the first image, a Sumatran rhinoceros, and up they come. If you think African rhinos look primitive, wait until you see this one.

Another taste of what if in store for me, when my copy arrives, and for those who care to get the book for themselves, lies in the advance praise written by natural history writer Carl Safina. He states

"This book delivers much more than the 'state of the wild.' It identifies the trends, trajectories, and principles that must organize our thinking. Think of it as an information handbook for the coming rumble over life on Earth. It's much less about what is—and much more about what's coming at us".

I have ordered a second copy for the library at the Western College of Veterinary Medicine and will ask for it to be put on reserve so that students who are to join me in Uganda in February next year will have some reading material.

A final fascinating titbit that came up on the BBC website this morning was also about rhinos, but not in Africa. Take a look at this film clip captured on an automatic infrared camera that is aptly titled Rarest rhinoceros wrecks camera. Six "R" sounds in four words. The headline writer must have enjoyed the alliteration in that one – virtually a no-brainer!

Response to comments about kob numbers

Thanks for your comments on my posting of May 19th Jeff. You are right about the kob migrations in the Sudan. I did mention this amazing sighting on pages 417 and 418 of The Trouble With Lions when I was searching for more hopeful signs about some of the disastrous effects that humans have had on wildlife populations.

The report came in from the Wildlife Conservation Society through their web site and was also featured by The National Geographic in a Internet report filed by Nick Wadhams titled Massive Animal Herds Flourishing Despite Sudan War, Survey Reveals at this web site

Michael Fay, a WCS biologist and National Geographic explorer-in-residence is quoted as follows in the National Geographic piece "Seeing thousands upon thousands upon thousands of white-eared kob streaming under the aircraft, day after day, was like I had died and was having the most unbelievable dream you could ever have."

Apart from my natural interest in the story, simply because it brings some measure of hope, one the folks involved in the finding was of particular interest. This was Paul Elkan, with whom I worked in Cameroon in 1996 when I helped out an overstretched Dr. Billy Karesh with his veterinary work on forest elephants, a one-month program described in The Trouble With Lions. Billy is the director of the WCS field veterinary program, and has written an entertaining book called Appointments at the End of The World: Memoirs of a Wildlife Veterinarian. For those who don’t know it, and are interested in conservation and the role of vets, this is one to add to your bookshelf. It was Paul, who is the WCS program director in Southern Sudan, who took the photo shown the article.

Anyway, back to the kob. There are three subspecies. The type species, the Western Kob is from northern savannah zones of West Africa are Kobus kob kob. The ones we have been working with in Uganda are K. k. thomasi. The lower picture shows two Canadian students together with Dr. Innocent Rwego of Uganda and Dr. Jacques Iyanya of the DRC working on an immobilized kob during our research studies. The kob in the Sudan are the white-eared kob, K. k. leucotis. It is numbers of the two former ones that have declined so sharply, but it is worth noting that Jonathan Kingdon remarks that population numbers of the species can fluctuate considerably. In his Field Guide to African Mammals, which contains a small spattering of his fantastic art work from the massive 7 volume major work to which I referred in my original blog Kingdon gives some more hopeful insights. His map on page 405 does show both the former and current ranges and he states “Despite having been eliminated from many areas (notably from all the shores of L. Victoria), kobs readily recover from near extermination.”

Wildlife Declines - not just lions

Sadly, yesterday’s announcements from the World Wildlife Fund and The London Zoo which can be found here about species disappearances and declines come as no surprise. It has been documented many times, in many ways. It forms part of The Trouble With Lions and within that text, excerpts of which are at here I have given very specific numbers and citations for the declines of many of Africa’s megafauna. In 1989 Ian Parker and Alasdair Graham- took the time to collate the information on thirty species that is scattered throughout Jonathan Kingdon’s seven-volume masterpiece East African Mammals: An Atlas of Evolution in Africa. Among those species is the Uganda kob (Kobus kob). In this case Kingdon documented a drastic decrease in the range of a species that was once seen all the way from West Africa to Uganda. He calculated that by 1990 their range had decreased by 89%. Kingdon’s map on page 368 of his 7th volume (IIIB) tells the tale as it has occurred in Uganda. The former distribution covered more than half the country.

In 1975 the range was limited to small pockets in three national parks, including Queen Elizabeth NP where we have been working for several years with Canadian and Ugandan students. The total area is probably no more than 1% of the country. Even inside the parks, the range has further declined under the constant pressure of poaching. We have seen very direct evidence of this near Lake George, where the stone sign shown here acts as a kob monument, rather than in its intended capacity as an information-cum-warning of the presence of large numbers of kob on their mating grounds. We have stopped at the sign and never seen a kob.

Kob are but one example. Rhino, elephant, lions, wild dogs, and a considerable variety of bushmeat species are all mentioned in the book. The latest “method-of-choice” for getting rid of unwanted species is the application of minute amounts of the insecticide carbofuran, sold in East Africa as Furadan. If the recent reports (see the blog posting of May 5th) of poisoned lions in the Maasai Mara are anything to go by poachers had better be very cautious how they use the stuff, which is cheap and readily available. In the lion case the animals succumbed after they ate the carcass of a hippo that had been poisoned. A poacher or his customers might suffer the same fate if he used Furadan to kill his prey and then ate or sold the meat.

reference:- Parker, I.S.C. and A.D, Graham. 1989. Elephant declines: downward trends in African elephant distribution and numbers (part II) Intern. J. Environmental Studies. 35.