Zimbabwe Wild Dogs

Category: Gonarezhou National Park, Wild Dogs, zimbabwe | Date: Oct 31 2009 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi folks,

I realise I haven’t actually posted much about wild dogs recently.  This is by no means because there is nothing to report – I’ve just chosen to tell you about a few other things we’ve been up to recently instead.  (When you work in conservation in a place with such critical conservation needs as Zimbabwe and with so few people on the ground, you are bound to get involved in other conservation efforts from time to time).

Anyway, I just wanted to give you an update on the state of the wild dog population here in Zimbabwe’s lowveld.  Excitingly, evidence we found during the recent field trip to Gonarezhou National Park suggests there are more wild dogs there than previously thought, and the packs seem to be breeding well.  On one occasion we actually saw at least 10 pups, and in another area we saw tracks of a large pack with numerous adults and pups.

The wild dog population in the Save Valley Conservancy remains strong, and all packs are doing well.  Both the Teddy Pack and the new Raf pack lost their litter of pups to lions this year, but the survival of other litters has been good.  The Star Pack are all still present and correct – 6 adults and 8 pups, as is the Maera pack – 8 adults and 3 pups.  Our super-pack, the Bedford pack, numbers 42 individuals now – 24 adults and 18 pups!  The last sighting of the Mapari pack was only of 18 dogs – there should be 20 if all have survived – but there may have been more in the bushes!

Some individuals of the Maera pack, including the 3 pups

As for the south of the conservancy, there is certainly a lot more wild dog activity down there than we have seen for the past couple of years, which is extremely encouraging.  The new pack of three dogs I wrote about in an earlier post is by all accounts doing well – Rueben has named them the Delta Pack.  And our de-snared male Willy Wonka and his Mrs (Mavericks pack) have now got three pups, which is excellent news.  There was no breeding in the south of the conservancy last year, which was a big concern, so even a small litter is a positive sign of population recovery.  It is possible there is another pack of five dogs in the south as well – maybe a pack we know as the Impala pack, but we aren’t yet sure about that.

Delta dogs!

So, minimum (known) number of wild dogs in the conservancy now totals 105 individuals (64 adults and 41 pups), in eight different packs.  We do suspect there are maybe one or two additional packs as well.

In Gonarezhou National Park, there are at least 36 individuals in at least 2 separate packs, but I would not be surprised if there were 50 or more – we just need to do some more work in the area to confirm.

Malilangwe Trust, a private wildlife area situated between the Save Valley Conservancy and Gonarezhou National Park, also has wild dogs.  They currently have only one pack which numbers about 19 individuals. They used to have over 40 dogs in three packs, but these were unfortunately wiped out by rabies in 2007…

Unfortunately, most other areas in the south-east lowveld of Zimbabwe that used to support wild dogs no longer do, after having been re-settled during Zimbabwe’s fast-track land reform program.  One exception is Bubye River Conservancy which apparently hosts between 20 and 40 dogs.  Occasionally, there are (reliable) reports of wild dogs seen outside of any protected area, which is encouraging for dispersal and increasing genetic variation within the overall population.

Anyway, I just wanted to give you a summary of the situation here in terms of wild dog numbers.  Key protected areas are still supporting reasonable populations, but the story in much of the remaining landscape is bleak.  Snaring remains a constant threat to the dogs, both within and outside protected areas, as does rabies and other diseases which can be spread from domestic dogs.  However, increased anti poaching efforts in SVC and Gonarezhou should start to make a noticeable difference and efforts are being made by the Tikki Hywood Trust and AWARE Trust to vaccinate domestic dogs for rabies, which will also help to reduce that threat.

Anyhow, I will be taking some time off from tomorrow until the 13^th November, so this blog will be quiet for the next couple of weeks.  Unfortunately I don’t have anyone who can keep it updated while I am away, but I promise I’ll get back to you all as soon as I get back.

Rosemary

Tags: carnivore populations, Gonarezhou National Park, Wild Dogs, zimbabwe, Zimbabwe's lowveld

2 responses so far

Category: Carnivores general, Wild Dogs, zimbabwe | Date: Oct 22 2009 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi folks,

I’m back briefly from the first phase of field work in Gonarezhou National Park.  We just spent 12 days working in the south of the park, attempting to find and collar lions (to test for TB), and hoping that we may be lucky enough to find some wild dogs.  We were not specifically looking for hyenas, but got to see lots of them too!!

Our approach with the lions was to look for fresh tracks along the roads, follow the spoor for a while until we could guess where the lions might be resting up, and then that night go and play lion-attracting noises on loud speakers, along with setting up a bait, to try to lure the lions within darting range… The first night we tried we attracted a hyena, a civet and a large herd of elephants who were not best pleased by the noises of squealing pigs and dying buffalos, so we had to abort our efforts rather abruptly!

The following night, we had only been calling for about 15 minutes when a beautiful lioness stalked up.  Unfortunately she came over to my vehicle which was playing the sound, rather than over to the bait where the vets were waiting to dart her!  Eventually she got the idea and went towards the bait, but by this time a large clan of hyenas had been attracted to the bait and did a very thorough job of keeping her away!  Even had we had an opportunity to dart her, we could not have done so with so many hyeanas around, as they may have attacked her once she was too drugged to defend herself and before we could get to her.  So we contented ourselves with observing the interactions for a while and then packed everything up and left them in peace.

We didnt get many other opportunities to dart lions there - although we will be continuing to try over the next week or so - but did manage to track and find a pack of wild dogs which was MOST exciting!  We found fresh spoor early one morning and followed it for a few hours until we came across where the dogs were resting.  Unfortunately, as wild dogs tend to do (!), they saw and smelt us before we had a good look at them and bounded off.  Nonetheless, from the tracks and the number we actually saw, it seems to be a good sized pack - at least 15 adults and 10 pups.  It was also the first pack of dogs I have seen in the park and was thus doubly as exciting! 

Anyway, I’ll be heading back into the park on Sunday for another week or so, to continue to look for both lions and wild dogs and will post again when I’m back.  Hopefully I’ll have some more exciting pictures to show you then!

Rosemary  

Tags: call-ups, Gonarezhou National Park, hyenas, lions, spoor, Wild Dogs, zimbabwe

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Category: Random, Uncategorized, Wild Dogs, zimbabwe | Date: May 05 2009 | By: zimbabwewilddogs

Hi folks,

I just came back from a trip to Gonarezhou National Park; one of Zimbabwe’s biggest national parks and certainly the most wild and remote area in the country.  The purpose of the trip was to do a recce for a forthcoming spoor survey we intend to carry out to investigate the status of wild dogs (and other carnivores) in the park. 

 Our bush camp

I was with a lowveld local – Clive Stockil – who probably knows the park better than anyone else, and we really did some proper exploring!  Some of the tracks we used had only been mapped again last year after 30 years without being used.  And here I use the word ‘tracks’ in the loosest possible sense – I certainly couldn’t see any evidence of a route through the bush, but fortunately Clive seemed to know where we he was going and we ended up emerging unscathed at the other end of the park!

We also managed to cross the Runde river – one of the biggest obstacles to working in the park – and were the first vehicles across this season.

We were rewarded at the other side by views of the famous Chilojo cliffs – truly spectacular.

We were very excited to pick up on a good number of wild dog tracks in the park, as well as tracks and other evidence of lions, hyenas and many of the smaller carnivores.  It will be very interesting to see what we find when we start working there properly later this month.

Back soon,

Rosemary

Tags: Gonarezhou National Park, spoor, Wild Dogs, Wilderness, zimbabwe

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