This year, during the denning season, we want to attach radio collars to as many packs as possible.
This will be crucial in terms of enabling us to determine the home range size of the dogs, and also to keep a close tab on how the wild dogs are doing. If we can keep a close tab on the dogs, we would be much more able to pick up on threats such as an outbreak of disease, and to get a clearer idea of how the dogs are being affected by other threats such as snaring. Disease is a big worry, as the population in the neighbouring Malilangwe Trust wildlife area was wiped out with rabies last year. Similarly, wild dogs are often caught in snares. Mostly, when dogs are caught in snares, they are killed. Snares are made of steel wire making it almost impossible for the dogs to escape. A dog caught in a snare typically pulls to escape, which causes the snare to tighten like a noose around its neck, leg or waist.
The dog in this photo was killed in a snare, and didn’t manage to escape…
Sometimes though, the dogs manage to bite through the snares, enabling them to escape. The problem though, is that the noose part of the snare normally stays tightly bound around the animal’s neck, making it impossible for it to eat and cutting into the flesh. On several occasions we have seen terribly emaciated dogs with snares on their necks. Recently, we managed to purchase a dart gun and so we will now be able to dart dogs with snare wounds, remove the snare and apply anti-biotics.
The dog in this photo was caught around the leg by a snare, which we managed to remove, giving it a chance.
However, if we can put collars on more packs, we will be able to keep a much closer eye on them and pick up much more quickly if a dog gets caught on snares, giving us more of a chance to dart the animal and remove the snare.
To attach collars, means that we need to raise money to buy them. There are two kinds that we are looking at, one is a simple VHF collar that transmits a signal that is picked up by a hand held receiver. The other is a GPS satellite collar which takes multiple GPS locations per day, which are then stored on board the collar. If we get to within 50 metres of a dog with a GPS collar on, we can then download the data. GPS collars are extremely useful in terms of enabling us to see where the dogs move at night (when we are unable to follow them) and the extent to which they use land occurring outside of the conservancy. When the dogs leave their regular haunts, it is sometimes very difficult to find them using a VHF collar, as the signal can only generally be picked up from 1-2 km. With a GPS collar however, the positional data stored on the collar will tell us if the dogs have moved outside of their normal range. VHF collars cost about 500 US, whereas GPS collars are around 2,500 US. This year, we hope to attach at least two collars per pack, or 18 collars in total. Of these, we would like to have at least 5 GPS collars. This means, that we need to raise in the order of $19,000 for collars. So…any donations to help us buy a collar, or collars would go a long way towards helping us keep up with the dogs and would be hugely appreciated..
Donations made here are
Mar 15th Cathy A USD 80.00
6 Comments
Sorry to hear about wild dogs trapped in such snares. I hope that you can work with the GPS collars because of its versatility and practicity in the field. This is the type of collar that we use in radio tracking studies in the ACWP here in America, very different from that we use to work with years ago, the old VHF deve-tron models with receptors with multiple channel capacity, one signal for each channel, (like the satellite version of the GPS) but otherwise, they are good in the field, but you must to be there all the time! You are doing an excellent work!
Peter, I pledge my tax return for a VHS collar. I wish there was funding available for rabies vaccinations for these dogs ( one pack at a time, through your tracking program). There is a rabies vaccination that is good for 3 years. Anyway, I’m glad to hear their snare wounds are treated, when possible. Are their patrols for the snares?
Peter, I’m so sorry to see the dead dog, I have been writing about snaring in the Maasai Mara – it’s in the baraza blog wildlifedirect.org
Hi Theresa,
Many thanks for your comment. If you did want to make a donation towards a radio collar, we would be most grateful. Details on how to donate are listed on our website, http://www.africanwildlifeconservationfund.org.
The snare wounds are treated when possible. This year, we will be particularly alert during the denning season, and will monitor dogs coming back to the den. If we see any with snares, we will try to dart them and provide treatment.
Often though the dogs are killed outright in snares. The conservancy has no fewer than 196 anti poaching game scouts and so there are people out there scouring for snares every day. The problem is just that the snares are so difficult to find. Still, the scouts do find a lot of snares and save a lot of wildlife that would otherwise be killed.
Hi F.J.,
Yes, GPS collars are definitely preferable. I think that in the long run they are cheaper, as a lot of fuel is spent looking for dogs with VHF collars! Also, they provide much more and more fine grained data. We hope to be in a position to buy some GPS collars this year. That will really increase our understanding of where the dogs go when they leave the sanctuary of the conservancy, and what threats they face outside.
Hi Paula,
IM having problems loading the link you sent me, but will keep trying. Snaring is a huge problem in many parts of Africa. I believe that the scale of the threat posed by the bush-meat trade is still not understood or acknowledged adequately.
The other day you asked how things were in Zim. Things are going OK, trundling along. Logistically the place is difficult to work in, but it feels safe and that is what is most important. How are you in Kenya? Most worrying news coming from your country!! I do hope you are OK.