Modelling Multi-Species Connectivity at the Kafue-Zambezi Interface: Implications for Transboundary Carnivore Conservation

Robin Lines,Panteleimon Xofis,Dimitrios Bormpoudakis,Joseph Tzanopoulos

doi:10.3390/su132212886

Robin Lines, Panteleimon Xofis + Show 2 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/su132212886

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Abstract

Linking wildlife areas with corridors facilitating species dispersal between core habitats is a key intervention to reduce the deleterious effects of population isolation. Large heterogeneous networks of areas managed for wildlife protection present site- and species-scale complexity underpinning the scope and performance of proposed corridors. In Southern Africa, the Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area seeks to link Kafue National Park to a cluster of wildlife areas centered in Namibia and Botswana. To assess and identify potential linkages on the Zambian side, we generated a high-resolution land cover map and combined empirical occurrence data for Lions (Panthera leo), Leopards (Panthera pardus) and Spotted Hyena (Crocuta crocuta) to build habitat suitability maps. We then developed four connectivity models to map potential single and multi-species corridors between Kafue and the Zambezi River border with Namibia. Single and multi-species connectivity models selected corridors follow broadly similar pathways narrowing significantly in central-southern areas of the Kafue-Zambezi interface, indicating a potential connectivity bottleneck. Capturing the full extent of human disturbance and barriers to connectivity remains challenging, suggesting increased risk to corridor integrity than modelled here. Notwithstanding model limitations, these data provide important results for land use planners at the Kafue-Zambezi Interface, removing much speculations from existing connectivity narratives. Failure to control human disturbance and secure corridors will leave Kafue National Park, Zambia’s majority component in the Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area, isolated.

Highlights

Expanding human pressures on natural resources and conversion of wildlife habitats to farmlands and rangelands are driving rapid fragmentation with often detrimental effects to native wildlife species, due to population isolation and decline [1,2]
Native large carnivores are sensitive to anthropogenic pressures due to their dependence on prey availability and exhibit elevated extinction risk with population isolation [3,4]
Maintaining free-ranging large carnivore populations is contingent on provision of sufficient habitat and prey species and limiting the deleterious effects of human disturbances [6]

Summary

Introduction

Expanding human pressures on natural resources and conversion of wildlife habitats to farmlands and rangelands are driving rapid fragmentation with often detrimental effects to native wildlife species, due to population isolation and decline [1,2]. Given the importance of maintaining structural and functional connectivity between wildlife managed areas, large scale conservation networks, including Transfrontier Conservation Areas, are being developed to address issues surrounding fragmentation and isolation of wildlife populations [7,8]. These initiatives have important implications for many large carnivore populations [9], the ecological functionality of the landscapes within which they reside [5], and the development of wildlife-based land uses and economies [10]

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