Category Archives: Extinction

Fragmentation of lion populations: a global threat

Lions are one of the more numerous charismatic carnivores, merely ‘vulnerable’ according to the IUCN Red List.

However the real picture, aside from core populations in east Africa, is one of fragmentation. For most of their historic range lions are today only found either in isolated protected areas, the remnants of habitats from their former range (particularly in West Africa, Central Africa and India) or in fenced reserves (Southern Africa).

Their history of survival and decline elsewhere suggests this is a very poor situation. We see our surviving African and Indian populations suffering pressures for the last two or three decades but clinging on. This may not be sustainable. In North Africa (Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco) and the Middle East (Syria, Iraq, Iran, Turkey) the same situation held true from the 1880s through to the 1940s (even 1950s). Today few people would associate any of those countries with the lion.

Will we say the same about many of its current range states in the next ten or twenty years?

Reading:

Black, SA (2016) “The Challenges and Relevance of Exploring the Genetics of North Africa’s “Barbary Lion” and the Conservation of Putative Descendants in Captivity,” International Journal of Evolutionary Biology, vol. 2016, Article ID 6901892, 9 pages, 2016. https://doi.org/10.1155/2016/6901892 .

Black, SA, Fellous, A, Yamaguchi, N. and Roberts, DL (2013) Examining the extinction of the Barbary Lion and its implications for felid conservation. PLoS ONE, 8 (4), Article ID e60174

Bauer, H, Chapron, G, Nowell, K. et al., (2015) Lion (Panthera leo) populations are declining rapidly across Africa, except in intensively managed areas. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 112 (48), pp. 14894–14899.

A. E. Schnitzler, AE (2011) Past and present distribution of the North
African-Asian lion subgroup: a review. Mammal Review, vol. 41, no. 3, pp. 220–243.

Lion in Gabon may be the last of his kind…

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In 2016 a camera trap caught the presence of a male lion in Gabon, in the Plateaux Batéké National Park (PBNP) in southeast Gabon – the first seen in the country for 20 years.

It was thought that no free-ranging lions were left in Gabon to the point that lions were listed as locally extinct in Gabon, at a regional workshop held to define the current status and conservation strategies for the lion in West and Central Africa (IUCN 2006). One notable outcome of this consensus on the presence of lions is that the species is also no longer considered by national legislation in Gabon.

One question with the Gabon animal was where had it come from? How could this individual – a large, easily recognisable and generally visible species – have appeared in the area. Was it locally present or had it arrived from outside Gabon?

Fortunately some hair samples were collected from the vicinity when the camera trap sighting was made and these have been made available to researchers examining genetic origins of lion populations. The subsequent genetic study just recently published by Barnett et al (2018) which has revealed that indeed the animal is related to the historic population of the Batéké region of Gabon. As a long lived species, this animal has been able to survive persecution, but this single male may be the very last individual from that population.

The whole episode reminds us of a few stark realities which conservation planners, species specialist groups and legislators need to be kept aware of in their deliberations and decisions.

Lions are long lived and can to some degree adapt to solitary (or non-pride) lifestyles, including nocturnal habits which enable them to evade detection for long periods
One-off sightings (or other evidence such as tracks or calls) of individual animals should not be discounted even if considered unlikely
The Precautionary Principle should be applied when considering declarations of extirpation, down-listing or de-categorising of species either locally or globally.
Despite all our wisdom, rationality, and understanding of probability, if a species seeks to survive, adapt and find means to do so (that may not make sense to us as humans), it will.

Barbary lions survived in Morocco for over twenty years beyond when they were commonly thought extinct. They also survived in Algeria for perhaps 60 years longer than once thought. Now, nearly 100 years later, and with 21st century technology and conservation biologists and wildflife professionals working across Africa, we find lions in Gabon surviving for 20 years unnoticed. Other examples of the species’ survival undetected for more than a decade include hidden populations in Ghana where presence is still under debate (Angelici and Rossi 2017).

The real question is – will we use this knowledge to shape our strategies and actions to save a species which has seen perhaps a 50% population decline in the past decade?

Reading:

Angelici, F.M. and Rossi, L. (2017) Further lion, Panthera leo senegalensis Meyer, 1826, sightings in Mole National Park, Ghana, and possible first serval Leptailurus serval Schreber, 1776 record after 39 years (Mammalia Felidae). Biodiversity Journal, 8 (2): 749-752

Barnett, R., Sinding, MH.S., Vieira, F.G. et al. 92018) No longer locally extinct? Tracing the origins of a lion (Panthera leo) living in GabonConserv Genet . https://doi.org/10.1007/s10592-017-1039-2

Hedwig D, Kienast I, Bonnet M, Curran B, Courage A, Boesch C, Kühl H, King T (2017) A camera trap assessment of the forest mammal community within the transitional savanna-forest mosaic of the Batéké Plateau National Park, Gabon. Afr J Ecol (in review)

Saul H. (2016) Male lion filmed roaming in West African nation of Gabon for the first time in 20 years. The Independent http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/male-lion-filmed-roaming-in-west-african-nation-of-gabon-for-first-time-in-20-years-10152290.html

Occasional sightings suggest lions cling on in West Africa

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Currently the West African populations of lions are Critically Endangered (Henschel et al., 2014) and currently occupy only 1% of their historical range. The presence of lion in Ghana is therefore very important, although it is known that many west african sub-populations cling on in single figure numbers.

A recent paper (Angelici and Rissi, 2017) suggests a recent sighting 11 years since the last confirmed lion presence in Mole National Park. If present the small number of individuals (perhaps as few as two or three) suggested by the sightings reported in the paper, might appear insignificant. Neverthless many populations in West africa are of this size, totalling perhaps less than 200 across the entire region – the ast wild representatives of the IUCN’s newly designated northern subspecies of lion Panthera leo leo (the rest are in India).

The few individuals in Mole are a sub population of a tiny population across Senegal, Burkina Faso, Benin, Niger and Nigeria (Henschel et al., 2014), which itself is a tiny population of Panthera leo leo globally (probably less than 2000 animals including in captivity).

Although we rarely consider individual animals in conservation, with lions it has reached that stage. If a few individuals can be conserved in Ghana, they might provide hope for continuation across the region and for the northern sub-species Panthera leo leo as a whole.

References:

Angelicic, F.M. and Rossi, L. (2017) Further lion, Panthera leo senegalensis Meyer, 1826, sightings in Mole National Park, Ghana, and possible first serval Leptailurus serval Schreber, 1776 record after 39 years (Mammalia Felidae). Biodiversity Journal, 8 (2): 749-752

Henschel, P. et al. (2014) The lion in West Africa is Critically Endangered. PLoS ONE, 9: e83500. Doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0083500

Lions in the Rif of northern Morocco

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Leopards were commonly hunted in Morocco well into the 20th century.

A colleague recently visited the national park of Talassemtane in the Rif mountains touring the area with a local guide. The guide told them that these mountains, near Chefchaouen, still retained dense fir forests up until after the second World War and that only shepherds visited the summits because people who lived in the towns and villages of the valleys were afraid of the wild landscape and the possible presence of lions. According to the guide, researchers from the Ceuta, believed that the lion was still present during the 20th century up until the time when mountains of the area had been deforested. Do these observations have any basis in fact?

Certainly there were lions in Morocco up to and including the second world war, although they were seen further south. One was shot in the High Atlas Mountains as late as 1942 in the Tizi‐n‐Tichka pass, and a few years before a pair were seen south of the Atlas ranges on the Saharan fringes, with a further group seen in the same area in the mid 1930s. All of the known 20^th century sightings were south of Fez, often in the areas around Ifrane, Azrou, Kenifra and further south around Toubkal or further south again beyond Assa.

The last known sighting in the north (the Rif Mountains and up towards Tetouan) was of a lion killed in 1895. However this does not rule out lions holding on in that region much later in small groups, especially if areas were not visited by people. For comparison, in Algeria several small lion populations were known up to the 1930s and up to the late 1940s, even though many sources suggest the disappeared by the 1890s. The last known sighting in Algeria was in 1956.

Extinction models show that, accounting for the frequency and spacing of sightings, lions could have persisted in both Morocco and Algeria up to the early 1960s (Black et al 2013; Lee et al, 2015). Only the destruction of habitat along the Mediterranean coast during the French-Algerian War suggests that lions might have disappeared earlier, perhaps by 1958.

Of course fear of lions (real or imagined) only tells part of the story of concerns by local people in the Rif Mountains in the 1940s. The other factor which may have concerned people in the area would be leopards. They still persist in Morocco today and would have been an important threat to livestock and, as we know from other regions, also a threat to people.

WARNING: history shows that survival in micro-populations belies the inevitable, eventual crash to extinction for lions

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Documented lion sightings since the middle ages across the Maghreb biome of the southern Mediterranean (light grey shading) north of the Sahara in North Africa (AD1500–1960). Open circles depict locations of general historical observations documented before 1800, adapted from [2]. Details can be sourced from [2, 8, 15]. Asterisks denote the locations of the various named major human population centres.

Lion sightings since the middle ages across the Maghreb biome (grey shading) of North Africa (AD1500–1960). Open circles depict locations of general historical observations documented before 1800. Details can be sourced from Lee et al (2015), Black et al (2013) and Yamaguchi and Haddane (2002). Asterisks denote locations of the major named human population centres.

This post does not predict the imminent demise of lions but it sends out a clear warning. Despite the 20-30,000 wild lions (mostly in Eastern and Southeastern Africa) let’s examine the circumstances of their survival very closely.

Lions are a relatively long lived species in the wild, so even if rarely-noticed may persist and be re-sighted on an occasional basis, even as individual animals. This appears to have been the case in some recorded sightings of individual lions near the Biskra in Algeria in the early 20th century for instance, with individual animals well-known to locals.

Micropopulations of the animals were identified by Guggisberg (1963) from historical accounts, but these had all disappeared by 1960. The small populations had persisted, but had not bred successfully. The next generation of animals simply failed to materialise.

When we hear of small populations being re-discovered in the Gabon or Ethiopia, we must take this reality into account.

Reading:

Black, S. A. Fellous, A. Yamaguchi, N. and Roberts, D. L. (2013) “Examining the extinction of the Barbary Lion and its implications for felid conservation,” PLoS ONE, vol. 8, no. 4, Article ID e60174.

Dybas C.L. (2016) African Lions on the brink: a conversation with lion expert Craig Packer. National Geographic http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/2016/10/11/african-lions-on-the-brink-a-conversation-with-lion-expert-craig-packer/#.V_-y5k2J-to.twitter

Guggisberg, C. A. W. (1963) Simba: The Life of the Lion, Bailey Bros. & Swinfen Ltd, London, UK.

Lee, T. E. Black, S. A. Fellous, A. et al. (2015) “Assessing uncertainty in sighting records: an example of the Barbary lion,” PeerJ, vol. 3, article e1224, 2015.

Yamaguchi, N. and B. Haddane, B. (2002) “The North African Barbary lion and the Atlas lion project,” inInternational Zoo News, vol. 49, pp. 465–481, 2002

Importance of recent historical records of lions

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Lions have enjoyed significant protection in Gujarat’s Gir Forest in India. There are accounts of colonial and local hunters shooting animals outside the state in the late 19th century.

Lions are in severe decline across sub-Saharan Africa, most particularly in West and Central African countries. Even in Eastern or Southeastern Africa many populations are now isolated by geography or fences. The decline of the species across Africa is worryingly similar to the historical disappearances of lions from other regions.

Recent collation and analysis of historical records have given insight into the range of the Barbary lion in North Africa, providing important insights into how lion populations are in decline, the point at which they are most vulnerable to extinction and what the animals tend to do under extreme persecution.

For example, Black et al. (2013) confirm that the range of lions reached far further south into the Saharan Atlas of Algeria than was ever known, even in the mid 1800s when numbers were higher and lion hunting was common in the region. Individual animals appear to have ranged across a wide expanse of arid habitat. This mean that the populations across Algeria could be considered contiguous with populations in the high atlas of southern Morocco.

In India similar reports from 19th century colonial India include hunters taking lions in the Jahore and Marwar districts of Rajasthan in the 1870s, well north of their stronghold in the Gir forest, Gujarat state the last significant home of Asiatic lions over the past 100 years. In 1872 a professional hunter (Bhil Shikari) associated with a Mr. T. W. Miles brought in the skin of a full-grown Asiatic lioness which he had shot on the Anadra side of Mount Abu, the last met with in Sirohi districts. Around the same year a Colonel Hayland bagged four lions near Jaswantpura, in Marwar. These were apparently the last lions seen across the Kutch border into Rajasthan (Adams, 1899).

Lions are a long-lived species, so if isolated individuals range to less-threatened areas they are able to survive for prolonged periods, perhaps giving the impression of a population being maintained. This may not be a reality of persistence, but instead an indication of a single wandering, isolated individual as is suspected today in the recent lion sighting in Gabon.

From a conservation perspective, it is important to separate these exceptional ‘one-off’ sightings, from the true indicators of surviving micro-populations, the latter of which require careful systemic attention. For example, tiny populations of lions were thought to have survived in the remote Saharan Atlas mountains for decades after the species was considered extinct from North Africa (Guggisberg, 1963; Black, 2016). As for the exceptional one-off sightings – well they offer hope*; hope that a suitable habitat can be utilised for future lions population to find genuine refuge.

*Note: the recent unexpected sighting of a Spix Macaw in the wild, not seen in the area since the last known specimen disappeared in 2000 is a good example of an exception. No one believes the animal has been kept hidden for sixteen years – this individual it is most probably a recent captive release. However the learning point is – can this animal survive in the remaining habitat, does it display survival behaviours and would in situ conservation of the species be a viable proposition that can be taken forward seriously?

Reading:

Adams, A. (1899) The Western Rajputana States: A Medico-topographical and General Account of Marwar, Sirohi, Jaisalmir. https://books.google.com/books?pg=PA168&dq=%22marwar%22+lion+tiger&id=6ohCAAAAIAAJ&output=text

Black SA, Fellous A, Yamaguchi N, Roberts DL (2013) Examining the Extinction of the Barbary Lion and Its Implications for Felid Conservation. PLoS ONE 8(4): e60174.doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0060174

Black S.A. (2016) The Challenges of Exploring the Genetic Distinctiveness of the Barbary Lion and the Identification of Putative Descendants in Captivity, International Journal of Evolutionary Biology. vol. 2016, Article ID 6901892, 9 pages. doi:10.1155/2016/6901892

Guggisberg C.A.W. (1963) Simba: the life of the lion. London: Bailey Bros. and Swinfen

Dwindling ecology of the Sahara: large animals in decline

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A view of the Sahara desert in Algeria – the last Algerian lions survived on the fringes of the Sahara into the 1940s with others surviving in northern coastal forests into the 1950s. (Photo by Florence Devouard)

The Bubal hartebeest is extinct, the dama gazelle and addax survive in only 1% of their former range, and various other hoofed animals from the region are extremely threatened: the Nubian Ibex clings on in parts of Algeria whilst the Barbary sheep fares a little better.

Of the major predators, the Barbary Lion has certainly been extinct in the wild for 50-60 years (assuming some of its ancestors still survive in a handful of zoos). The African wild dog no longer inhabits the Sahara desert (and was only present in southern fringes. The Saharan cheetah only inhabits 10 per cent of its former range, surviving largely unnoticed in southern Algeria. Similarly a small leopard population is known to survive in the southern Algerian Sahara, but is lost from 97 percent its historic range.

However there are opportunities for recovery: the scimitar horned oryx is extinct in the wild, but controlled releases in fenced reserves in Tunisia and Chad are looking to re-establish the wild population. Similarly the Addax has been reintroduced in fenced reserves in Morocco and Tunisia. The leopard was thought extinct in the late 1990s, but a small population appears to survive in the Atlas Mountains. Do these examples of experimental reintroductions and relic populations offer hope for wider recovery of North African and Saharan ecosystems?

Reading:

Anon (2013) Sahara Desert’s large mammals Slipping Into Extinction. Environmental News Service. December 5, 2013 http://ens-newswire.com/2013/12/05/sahara-deserts-large-mammals-slipping-into-extinction/

Busby et al (2009) Genetic analysis of scat reveals leopard (Panthera pardus) and cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus) in Algeria. Oryx, 43(3), 412–415

Wildlife Conservation Society. “Critically Endangered Cheetahs In Algeria Snapped With Camera Trap.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 27 February 2009. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/02/090227082603.htm>.

More on the Northern (near) extinctions

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The demise of lions from northern regions (above the Sahara) followed a sequence starting in Europe in ancient historical times, central Asia and Egypt and along the North African coast, then a slow shrinkage from the eastern Mediterranean countries.

Small populations of Asiatic lion (Panthera leo persica) clung on in Syria, Iraq, Iran and Pakistan to the end of the 19th Century and some micro populations continued in the latter three countries into the 20th century, but have only remained in the Gir forest in India since that time.

The Barbary lion (Panthera leo leo) disappeared from coastal Morocco in regions near the larger human population centres in the 19th century, but survived in remote areas of the High Atlas of Morocco and the Saharan Atlas (north central Algeria) and Aures mountains in northeastern Algeria into the second half of the 20th century.

Reading:

Bartosiewicz, L. (2009) A lion’s share of attention: Archaeoogy and the Historical Record. Acta Archaeologica Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae. DOI: 10.1556/AArch.59.2008.2.2

Black SA, Fellous A, Yamaguchi N, Roberts DL (2013) Examining the Extinction of the Barbary Lion and Its Implications for Felid Conservation. PLoS ONE 8(4): e60174. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0060174

Insights into late survival & extinction of the Barbary lion

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Late sightings of lions in North Africa may seem surprising and certainly some of the stories have oddities about them (Black et al. 2013). What should not be forgotten, however, is how distinguishable a lion is from other similar species in the region – the chances of people mis-identifying a lion are relatively slim.

Even among the most recent sightings of Barbary lions in Morocco and Algeria the variation of circumstances when people see the animal is huge – for example one sighting is a photograph taken while flying over the Atlas mountains, another is lion observed by locals on a bus, whilst several others occur when the animal was shot (Lee et al. 2015).

Assessment of historical sightings by expert panel reveled the reliability of these sightings is generally high, so varied sources can be sensibly used to map out the story of the species’ decline.

Observations of lions in North Africa 1895 – 1960 Grey shading indicates Mediterranean scrub land. Triangular markers indicate lion sightings; (sightings 7–21) in Morocco (western Maghreb) and sightings 133-149 in Algeria (eastern Maghreb). Black circles denote human population centers. Dashed lines indicate national boundaries.

Further Reading:

Black SA, Fellous A, Yamaguchi N, Roberts DL. 2013. Examining the extinction of the Barbary lion and its implications for felid conservation. PLoS ONE 8(4):e60174

To worship the lion

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Dr Ross Barnett (@DeepFriedDNA)

Marie Curie Fellow at the Centre for GeoGenetics, Copenhagen

Sketch of a pride of Cave lions. Note the lack of manes on the big standing male. Art by Tabitha Paterson (@TabithaPaterson)

We think of lions, today, as African animals. This is mostly true. However, there is still a tiny refugium of non-African lions, isolated in the Kathiawar peninsula of India, and centred on the Gir forest reserve. Here, 400 or so Asian lions eke out an existence, beset on all sides by people and farmland, the last remnants of an empire that once spread from Tunisia via Turkey to the Tigris and beyond. But, even this is only a fraction of the range that lions once held.

During the Pleistocene, highly differentiated lion subspecies (or perhaps separate species, opinion is divided) roamed from Spain to Siberia, through the steppes of Beringia, and into the Americas as far south as Mexico. Their fossils are surprisingly common in Britain too. In fact, excavation of the site of Trafalgar square uncovered a number of lion fossils where now their equally impressive bronze cousins lie today. The cave lion (Panthera spelaea) occupied all of Eurasia and Beringia. The closely related American lion (Panthera atrox) was found over the contiguous lower 48 states.

Range of lions since the Pleistocene. Image by Ross Barnett

The cave lion is, and was, a pretty special felid. Considerably larger than modern lions, it was the apex predator of the Pleistocene food web (with perhaps some competition from Homotherium). As it lived in Europe at the same time as anatomically modern humans, it has been depicted in numerous pieces of parietal and portable art. The cave walls of Chauvet and Lascaux contain brilliantly realistic images of this extinct animal, showing that it lived in prides, and that males were maneless. We know this because in a few images, the adult male scrotum is obvious, and the mane is absent.

Pride of cave lions from Chauvet cave. Public domain image.

It also seems that early Europeans had some kind of cultural affinity for the cave lion. One of the most amazing pieces of art to come from this period, exquisitely crafted from mammoth ivory, shows a half-lion, half-human chimera. This löwenmensch, as it is known in german, testifies to some kind of ritual or mythic importance for the cave lion in the culture of the time. Like the venus figurines, löwenmensch, have been found at multiple sites, showing that the idea was not just an isolated one but shared amongst communities.

Löwenmensch from Hohlenstein-Stadel. Image by Dagmar Hollmann via Wikimedia Commons. License: CC BY-SA 3.0

Further reading:

Nice piece by the Telegraph, featuring our very own Ross Barnett: ‘Super-sized lions’ roamed UK in Ice Age.

Barnett, R., et al. (2014), ‘Revealing the maternal deomgraphic history of Panthera leo using ancient DNA and a spatially explicit genealogical analysis’, BMC Evolutionary Biology, 14, 70. [Full Article]

Barnett, R., et al. (2009), ‘Phylogeography of lions (Panthera leo ssp.) reveals three distinct taxa and late Pleistocene reduction in genetic diversity’, Molecular Ecology, 18 (8), 1668-77. [Abstract]

Conard, N. J. (2003), ‘Palaeolithic ivory sculptures from southwestern Germany and the origins of figurative art’, Nature, 426 (6968), 830-32. [Abstract]

Franks, J. W. (1960), ‘Interglacial deposits at Trafalgar Square’, The New Phytologist, 59, 145-150Montellano-Ballesteros, M. and Carbot-Chanona, G. (2009), ‘Panthera leo atrox (Mammalia: Carnivora: Felidae) in Chiapas, Mexico’, The Southwestern Naturalist, 54 (2), 217-22. [Abstract]

Montellano-Ballesteros, M., and G. Carbot-Chanona (2009). ‘Panthera Leo Atrox (Mammalia: Carnivora: Felidae) in Chiapas, Mexico.’ The Southwestern Naturalist 54, no. 2 , 217-22. [Abstract]

Packer, C. and Clotte, J. (2000), ‘When Lions Ruled France’, Natural History, 109, 52-57. [Full Article]

Posted on BarbaryLion with thanks to Ross Barnett and colleagues at TwilightBeasts: Jan Freedman (@janfreedman), Tabitha Paterson (@TabithaPaterson), and Rena Maguire (@justrena).

Article originally posted on July 4, 2014 by twilightbeasts :

https://twilightbeasts.wordpress.com/2014/07/04/to-worship-the-lion/