M.Sc. / The establishment of conservancies and collaborative nature reserves is often promoted without understanding the impact that such initiatives have on the environment, the wildlife and landowners. This tack of knowledge has resulted in the landowners' non-awareness of the advantages and disadvantages of establishing such entities and often leads to disillusionment. A conservancy is established by informal agreement between various landowners to enhance the conservation status of a specific area without affecting the owners' individual rights. A collaborative nature reserve is established as a result of a format agreement between landowners to manage and administer their collective land as a single unit. The agreement typically addresses issues such as the management systems, the methods to be utilised for income generation, the distribution of surpluses amongst landowners and the rights and privileges applicable to the landowners. The scope of this study has been limited to the establishment of conservancies and collaborative nature reserves between game ranchers and existing game ranches. A literature study was undertaken to determine the advantages and disadvantages of establishing collaborative nature reserves, including a comparative analysis of large versus small conservation areas. Practical research was done to determine the implications, advantages, disadvantages and landowners' perceptions pertaining to the establishment of collaborative nature reserves. The practical research was done by personal observation methods as well as the use of questionnaires. An existing and successful collaborative nature reserve was studied intensively to meet these objectives. This reserve includes the land of twelve individual landowners and also forms part of a greater conservancy. The establishment of collaborative nature reserves can solve the problems created by separate game ranches, especially that of the compartmentalisation of grazing areas for game. Careful pre-planning can surmount the negative aspects of establishing collaborative !lature reserves and the advantages can be maximally utilised.

Five lions were reintroduced to the Welgevonden Private Game Reserve in 1998. These lions were studied to increase the limited knowledge of the ecology of reintroduced lions on small wildlife reserves, and to provide baseline data to the reserve management from which to develop management decisions. In the past, reintroduction attempts of felids have often failed because the animals failed to establish ranges in the new environment. During the current study, homing behaviour and range establishment of the reintroduced lions were studied and used as an indication of the success of the reintroduction attempt. The ease with which lions on Welgevonden established ranges indicated that they did not experience problems with adapting to their new environment The population dynamics of the reintroduced lion population were investigated. The population grew rapidly due to early breeding and short inter-litter intervals. The collected data were used to model the lion population using VORTEX population modelling software. Various potential management strategies to reduce the population growth were also modelled and discussed. The feeding ecology and predation patterns of the reintroduced lions• were investigated to give an indication of the predator-prey relationships on Welgevonden. These data were used in a model that investigated the effect of lion predation on the various prey populations of Welgevonden. The model was also used to test the influence of other factors on the prey populations, as well as the number of killing lions that can be supported by the prey population. The study has shown that reintroduction can be used successfully to establish a lion population on a small game reserve, but that certain management actions will increase the chances of success. However, continual monitoring and management will be necessary to ensure the long-term viability of the lion and prey populations. <p. / Dissertation (MSc (Wildlife Management))--University of Pretoria, 2006. / Centre for Wildlife Management / unrestricted

A founder population of lion (Panthera Leo) was introduced into a 70 km² privately-owned, wildlife reserve in the Waterberg area of South Africa. The lion and prey species' populations were monitored between 2001 and 2004. In this period, 452 kills were recorded at a mean kill rate of one kill every 2.43 days. The lions killed 11 common prey species. Eland, warthog, kudu, wildebeest and zebra comprised 75 % of the lion's diet. The lions consumed an average of 8 % of the available common prey species population per annum. Initially, the mean ungulate population growth rate was 30.9 %, but this rate declined to -0.8 % during the study period. Significantly more animals were killed in open habitats than in closed habitats. The loss in game value for the study period was over one million Rand. A formula was compiled to quantify the cost versus return aspects of introducing lion. / Nature Conservation / M. Tech. (Nature Conservation)

Balancing increasing elephant numbers with biodiversity conservation in small reserves has become a concern for many protected area managers. Elephants are considered important agents of disturbance creating heterogeneity and thus contributing to the maintenance of biodiversity. However elephants also damage vegetation through their destructive feeding habits, and this has led to pressure to reduce elephant populations in many reserves. Quantitative data on the impact of elephants on invertebrates, the main component of biodiversity at the species level, are lacking. The aim of this project was to assess the effect that habitat alteration by elephants has on the diversity of selected ground-dwelling invertebrates (ants, centipedes, millipedes, spiders, scorpions and termites) through the provision of logs and dung as a potential refuge niche for these invertebrate communities, and to determine the effect of spatial (vegetation types) and temporal (season and age of dung) variation on the invertebrates using these refugia. Variation in impacts was considered important because savanna is not homogenous and the impact of the refugia is likely to be dynamic in terms of seasonal trends in invertebrate populations, and in terms of changes in the environmental conditions offered by the refugia. Elephant impact on vegetation, quantity of refugia (logs and dung) produced and invertebrate diversity associated with refugia were determined for 115 transects within Madikwe Game Reserve in the North Western Province, South Africa. Invertebrate abundance, species richness and diversity were always higher under refugia than in areas without refugia. Vegetation utilisation, frequency of refugia production and invertebrate diversity showed strong temporal variation (seasonal); elephant impact and production of logs were higher in winter than in summer because elephants are more likely to feed on woody vegetation in winter when grass nutrient levels are low. Invertebrate diversity under the logs was higher in summer than in winter, and this probably reflected the higher abundance and diversity of invertebrates that are usually associated with the warmer, wetter summer months. The effect of adding refugia to three vegetation types on invertebrate diversity was tested experimentally at Makalali Private Game Reserve in the Limpopo Province, South Africa. Logs and elephant dung were set out in five plots each measuring 20m x 20m within Govender - iii mixed bushveld, riverine and mopane woodland. Significant differences were observed in invertebrate abundance, species richness and diversity between the refugia and control plots that lacked refugia and between the three vegetation types sampled. Similarity between invertebrate communities utilising the different refugia types and between the three different vegetation types were tested using the Jaccard similarity coefficient. The three vegetation types shared fewer than 50% of their species, as did the logs, dung and control sites. However the results obtained do illustrate a higher degree of similarity between the refugia substrates (logs and dung) than the control sites and between the more heterogeneous vegetation types (mixed bushveld and riverine) than the mopane veld. This indicated that invertebrate communities associated with refugia were not uniform, but were influenced by vegetation type. An experimental test of temporal changes in invertebrate community composition illustrated the importance of elephant dung as a microhabitat for different invertebrate groups over different ages of dung (three days, two, four, 12 and 32 weeks old). Colonisation of the dung, by dung beetles was immediate but as the microclimate of the dung changed with time, the new conditions were ideal for other invertebrate taxa. Over a period of eight months, the change of invertebrate communities utilising the dung included dung beetles, followed by millipedes and [mally ant and termite communities. The results of this study illustrated the importance of refugia (logs and dung) produced by elephants for ground-dwelling invertebrate species in the savanna environment. The extent of the influence of the refugia varied both spatially and temporally and this should be considered in future monitoring or in measuring impacts. While further research on a broader range of organisms and at larger scales is necessary, elephants do have a positive impact on at least some components of biodiversity, through the process of facilitation of refugia. / Thesis (M.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2005.

This Research investigates the potential impacts that free-ranging lions have within a small (<100 000 hectare), enclosed protected area, and it also investigates the subsequent challenges to the managers of areas such as these. A comprehensive literature review reveals that the smaller the protected area, the more intensively it needs to be managed via active adaptive management, because perimeter fences do not allow for immigration and emigration. The consequences of this are over-population; inbreeding depression; the decline of prey and other predator species; conflict with neighbouring communities as a result of break-outs; and, in some cases, the spreading of intra- and interspecies disease. Lions are very proficient breeders and, in all cases investigated, reserves exceeded their local carrying capacity within a relatively short period of time. A range of management interventions can potentially achieve short- and/or long-term reserve objectives. These interventions include relocation, contraception, hunting and artificial takeovers. These interventions are described in terms of the preparation required, the biological consequences and the sociological influences. / Thesis (M.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2007.

A founder population of lion (Panthera Leo) was introduced into a 70 km² privately-owned, wildlife reserve in the Waterberg area of South Africa. The lion and prey species' populations were monitored between 2001 and 2004. In this period, 452 kills were recorded at a mean kill rate of one kill every 2.43 days. The lions killed 11 common prey species. Eland, warthog, kudu, wildebeest and zebra comprised 75 % of the lion's diet. The lions consumed an average of 8 % of the available common prey species population per annum. Initially, the mean ungulate population growth rate was 30.9 %, but this rate declined to -0.8 % during the study period. Significantly more animals were killed in open habitats than in closed habitats. The loss in game value for the study period was over one million Rand. A formula was compiled to quantify the cost versus return aspects of introducing lion. / Nature Conservation / M. Tech. (Nature Conservation)

The reintroduction of lions, cheetahs and African wild dogs to Kwandwe Private Game Reserve in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa created the opportunity to study the biology and behaviour of these large carnivores in an enclosed system. The research focused on space utilisation and feeding ecology of the predators, using standard observational methods. Changes in the structure of the carnivore guild, and changes in the prey base that occurred during the study were used as natural experiments to examine factors affecting space use and diet. In general, the diets of the predators were similar to previous studies and prey abundance was more important than prey species size in determining prey selection. Changes in the abundance of certain prey species was matched by a dietary switch in lions from kudu to warthog and an increase in the proportion of springbok kills by the cheetahs. There was no significant difference in the proportions of prey species detected by ad hoc or continuous observations. Core areas occupied by the predators were significantly smaller than home ranges except when females were denning. Home ranges overlapped both within and between species, but there was very little overlap of core areas. An increase in the number of lion prides in the area during the study resulted in an increase in overlap of home ranges of lions and cheetahs, but did not result in a change in home range size. Space use by female cheetahs with cubs increased as the cubs grew older. The use of thicket vegetation by cheetahs decreased with an increase in the number of lion prides. Minimum Daily Energy Expenditure, energy intake and net benefit were calculated for the predators using data from continuous observations. All predators exhibited a large net benefit and the net benefit for single female cheetahs was greater than for the members of the coalition. Net benefit for the alpha pair of African wild dogs was lower than that of the pack.

The re-introduction of large carnivores into relatively small conservation areas that fall within the historic distribution range of the species is becoming an increasingly common occurrence. The success of such re-introductions depends very much on the quality of the information that is available to guide management decisions, but in many cases, little information is available. The re-introduction of lions and cheetahs to Sanbona created the opportunity to monitor the behaviour of re-introduced predators to a relatively large system that was characterised by a low ungulate stocking density and little standing water. The broad aims were to study the feeding and spatial ecologies of the lions and cheetahs, to collect standard base-line data, and to examine the effects of the low prey density and limited standing water on habitat selection, range size and diet. The diet (data collected from direct observation and faecal analysis) was similar to that reported in previous studies, and lions and cheetahs preferred greater kudu, black wildebeest and springbok. Lions preferred medium to large prey items, and cheetahs preferred medium to small prey items. The hilly and mountainous terrain of much of the reserve meant that only 50% of the total space was available to the predators. Home ranges of most of the predators were focused around the single large body of standing water. This is likely to have been a response to the water, the vegetation, and the prey that was attracted to these. Habitat selection was also influenced by inter and intra-specific interactions at least for a solitary male lion and female cheetahs. Range sizes were larger than on some other reserves and it is suggested that this was a result of the low prey density. These results form the basis for management recommendations including the importance of continuing to monitor the system and opening up additional parts of the reserve to the predators.

Shamwari Game Reserve was the first enclosed conservation area in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa to reintroduce free ranging lions, cheetahs, leopards and wild dogs back into their historic range. At that time (2000 – 2001), little information was available on the ecology and behaviour of these predators in the habitats of the Eastern Cape, and management decisions were based on assumptions and unfounded comparisons with extant populations but from quite different habitats. The aim of this study was therefore to obtain a better understanding of the feeding ecology and space use of the predator guild, and the carrying capacity of Shamwari Game Reserve to enable more informed management decisions. In addition, the reserve is a photographic based tourism venture and understanding both the ecological and financial sustainability of the predator guild was important. The diets of the predators were similar to those reported in other studies; larger predators killed a greater range of prey species than did smaller predators and a small number of prey species made up the majority of the kills. The larger predators had a higher mean kill mass than the smaller species and prey selection was influenced by prey size, prey abundance and prey habitat preference, and risk associated with hunting the species. Diet was flexible and responded to natural and management induced changes in prey abundance. There was a considerable overlap in space use by the lions, cheetahs and leopards with their core areas being centred on and around the Bushmans River. Space use was driven by resource distribution and landscape attributes, and by the presence of other predators of the same or different species. The long term viability of wild dog within the reserve was explored and the results confirmed that there was neither the required space nor the ecological processes and the wild dogs were removed from the reserve. A carrying capacity of the reserve for the predator guild was determined using the Maximum Sustainable Yield method to assess the potential prey species off take and a resultant density of 3.3 to 6.6 lion female equivalent units per 10 000 ha was established. The natural carrying capacity of the reserve with respect to predators will not sustain the tourism objectives and consequently prey supplementation was necessary to maintain predator density at levels high enough to sustain tourism. Under these conditions the large predator guild is still sustainable financially although careful, responsible management is needed to provide ecological sustainability.