|
|
|
||||||||||||||
|
|
News Update March - May 2008. AWDC is now well into this year's field season and off to a great start. A few packs of dogs have been seen regularly in the main safari area over the last few months, including some dogs new to the area, and with the roads finally drying out and increasing access to the park, it was time to start collaring.
Having a collared study population is essential for researching dog dynamics within the park and surrounding corridor areas, and Dr Ian Parsons, the veterinarian who assists with the darting, was first available for 6 days in mid-April. True to form, the dogs rapidly disappeared as soon as the vet arrived! All of the AWDC staff were busy with pre-dawn 4.30am starts and full days of driving, essentially looking for a needle in a haystack, except with the added complication that the needle was moving. The dogs were sighted briefly a couple of times but rapidly disappeared into thickets. Ian's flight back out was booked for Sunday afternoon. By Sunday morning, after a hectic week of searching, expectations were very low and everyone was exhausted, and the departure deadline was looming large! The week had been full of wildlife sightings of lions with cubs, servals, hyaenas, a leopard and cub out in daylight, an elephant carcass covered in screeching vultures, honey badgers, black-necked spitting cobras and, so it seemed, just about everything but wild dogs!
That morning, Claire and Egil picked up some dog tracks heading to Lupunga Spur and shortly after came an excited radio message from them that they had found a pack of five dogs, but the dogs were looking hungry and getting ready to move! The two AWDC vehicles took off in pursuit of the dogs who were now hunting and moving fast across the rivers and through thick bush. The Hilux got to stretch its legs with a run up the Mushilashi River bed, until we hit an elephant road block - a breeding herd of elephants spread across the river bed who had settled in and showed no signs of moving off in time to catch up with the dogs. The other AWDC vehicle was looping around to hopefully catch the dogs appearing on the other side, but then came a call from a Kapani Lodge Guide who'd seen the dogs come out up-river on Wambilombe, on the open flood plains (Thank You Kapani!!). The dogs settled down in the shade and finally provided the perfect darting opportunity! We were able to drive right in and dart from less than 10m, with minimal disturbance to the pack. The dogs were then fitted with their new collars, blood samples taken for disease tests and DNA, measured and weighed, and then the drugs were reversed. The new drug regime was perfect, and after just 10 minutes from drug reversal, the darted dog was up and within a minute was back with the pack being greeted by the other pack members. One male and one female were each fitted with a new satellite / VHF collar, which will email in regular locations to us three times a week and allow us to radiotrack them from the ground and air using a handheld antenna and receiver.
There was evidence of a snaring injury on the male we darted and collared, but thankfully the snare had come off and the wound had already healed up nicely. Unfortunately this is more evidence that illegal snaring is still a key threat to the wild dog population in this area and further supports an exciting new collaboration with South Luangwa Conservation Society (SLCS): the formation of the first African Wild Dog Anti-Snaring Team. The snaring team is trained and employed by SLCS and uses AWDC wild dog data to identify high-priority areas for snare removal. The four team members are currently in the field working, but we will have bios and pictures shortly on a webpage which is currently being constucted! Don't forget to check back and read all the exciting details about the African Wild Dog Anti-Snaring Team! Following the darting, the pack has been observed regularly in the main safari areas, with the dominant female showing early signs of pregnancy. In addition a dispersing group of sibling females were collared shortly thereafter and are being closely monitored as they look for new males with which to form a new pack. With the new season also comes a new AWDC staff member. Project Manager Matt Becker joined the team in April, working intensively with Kellie during handover to learn all the ropes of the job, and is starting to settle into warmer temperatures again. He has joined us from the Rocky Mountains in the USA, having spent several winters researching wolves for his Ph.D., and prior to this worked on African wild dogs in addition to a variety of other large mammal species. Please see our home page for Matt's bio. We all look forward to working with him as he leads AWDC's expanding research and conservation work. Thank you for your continuing support, Matt, Claire, Egil and Kellie - The AWDC Team!
|
||||||||||||||
