African lions (Photo : Joe Murphy via Getty Images)
Wildlife researchers are lamenting the gradual decline of lions in Africa, fearing they are sliding towards extinction in an event that has gotten conservationists worried that total loss of lions would endanger the ecosystem and cause a change in the food chain.
Oxford biologist Hans Bauer and his colleagues published a new research in PNAS after analyzing 47 sites that have been surveying lion populations since 1990, discovering that lion populations are getting thinner everywhere in Africa except of course in Botswana, Namibia, South Africa, and Zimbabwe.
The researchers say the populations of lions in West and Central Africa would reduce to half within two decades under a 67% chance, and those in East Africa would decline to half their population under a 37% certainty. There used to be over 500 lion populations outside of southern Africa, but they are fast going under now and face risks of endangerment; this is occurring at a period when other large-sized herbivores on the continent are also reducing.
Conservation efforts to fence in the lions as can be seen at the Kruger National Park in South Africa has not been too helpful, even as just free wandering lions in the Serengeti and Masai Mara also face declines. Not to mention the fact that constructing and maintaining fences requires a lot of money and hard work, even in the face of keeping poachers out.
Research shows that about 24 individual lions make up a pride between 1885 and 1950, but this has now declined to about nine. Human hunting is to blame for this, but larger number of lions within a pride makes them easy to be spotted and hunted down, leading to artificial selection. But then this does not naturally lead to an increase in the numbers of larger herbivores on the continent.
The researchers advise that the governments of states where the animals live must take proactive measures to protect against exploiting these animals, and raising funds for conservation efforts that will keep poachers away. This will not only preserve the population of lions in Africa and beyond, it will also maintain a balance in the ecosystem and food chain for all animals within such habitats.
