Leopards have long been hunted for their skins, used as ceremonial attire in the region.īushmeat poachers have targeted the lions' grass-eating prey, leaving too little behind for the park's 200 or more of these hungry carnivores. That's a sign that adult survival is improving because as females live longer, "they're more likely to give birth to cubs," said Panthera lion program director Andrew Loveridge.Ī half-century of intensive poaching has decimated wildlife populations in Africa's third-largest national park, as it has across much of the continent, with Kafue's free-roaming big cats among the victims. In the recent assessment, scientists found that more lion cubs were born into Kafue prides from 2018 to 2021. While a dearth of historical population data makes it difficult to track changes over a longer time period, since 2018 scientists are "starting to see strong indications that those populations are trending upwards now in areas where we have been investing in protection support," said Kim Young-Overton, director of Panthera's Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area program, which includes Kafue. Lion and leopard populations in Zambia's Kafue National Park are showing signs of a modest comeback following decades of poaching, helped by expanded protection strategies, including an innovative vulture early-warning system.īig cat densities across Kafue, measured broadly for the first time by global conservation organisation Panthera, remained stable and in some cases increased from 2018 to 2022, according to a new report shared exclusively with Reuters. June 1 (Reuters) - (This June 1 story has been refiled to clarify the headline)
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