They are mostly forgotten today, but Asiatic lions (
Panthera leo persica)
once roamed in vast numbers across the Indian subcontinent,
Mediterranean and Middle East until overhunting brought them to within a
hair’s breadth of extinction. By 1907, when an Indian prince finally
banned hunting and protected the last lions, only 13 members of the
subspecies remained. Today, after more than a century of conservation,
the population of Asiatic lions stands at a high of around 400 animals,
all of which live in and around the Gir National Park and Wildlife
Sanctuary in the Indian state of Gujarat, just a few kilometers from the
Arabian Sea. The animals are now so identified with their sole
remaining habitat that they are usually referred to as Gir or Gujarat
lions.
But the success in restoring the Gir lion population has brought new
challenges to conservation efforts. The lions have outgrown their
protected sanctuary and share their habitat with more than 100,000
people who live in the villages surrounding the forest. The lions
occasionally
kill livestock,
enter people’s homes
and, very rarely, attack or kill humans. More often, the lions
themselves are killed or injured when they come into contact with crude,
deadly electric fences built around farms or fall into any of the tens
of thousands of roughly hewn open wells in the region. Earlier this
month a female lion fell into a well and suffered broken teeth and other
injuries. (For more on these wells, see my article in the November 2011
issue of
Lion magazine.)
Because there is very little space for the lions to grow into, many
conservationists and the Indian government think the smart thing to do
is to transfer some of them elsewhere. Such habitat diversification
would serve to protect the Gir lions from a catastrophic disease
outbreak, fire or other natural event that could wipe the subspecies
out—a threat for any species that only exists at a single location. The
most frequently discussed destination for translocated lions is the
Indian state of Madya Pradesh (MP), where the recently restored Kuno
Wildlife Sanctuary contains ample habitat and prey for any relocated
predators.
Unfortunately, the idea of moving lions to Kuno doesn’t sit well in
Gujarat. Despite the occasional conflicts between humans and animals,
the people of Gujarat are fiercely proud and protective of their lions.
Many fear that MP will not adequately protect the cats. They may have
reason to worry: MP has an
extremely poor record of protecting its tigers,
with 453 deaths in the past decade. (India’s Bengal tiger population
dropped from 3,700 animals in 2002 to around 1,500 in 2011, mostly due
to poaching.) The two state governments have been arguing for a few
years and relations
hit a low point last week
when Madya Pradesh’s tourism department started using images of Gir
lions on its Web site, even though there are no lions in the state yet
and may not be for years to come.
Some lion advocates worry that MP is not serious about conservation. Kishore Kotecha, founder of the
Wildlife Conservation Trust of India,
which is dedicated to preserving Asiatic lions, says he used to think
that some lions should be moved to MP but now he isn’t sure. “Do they
really want it for conservation purposes or do they want it for
tourism?” he asks. MP, for its part, has invested millions of dollars
restoring the habitat of Kuno Wildlife Sanctuary for the flora and fauna
already there and says the lions, too, would be fully protected.
Luke Hunter, president of the wild cat conservation organization
Panthera,
thinks some of the objections to moving lions from Gir may come more
from pride rather than science. “Gujarat has done an extraordinary job
of saving the Asiatic lion,” he says. “They think no one else can do the
job they’ve done, and moving them would just increase the risk to the
lions.” But he says the lions have reached the threshold of what they
can do naturally at that location and have very little habitat in Gir
that they can recolonize.
Hunter,
who has two decades of experience moving African lions to new habitats,
says selectively removing some Asiatic lions from Gir would not affect
the population size in the forest. “We know enough from 20 years of
African translocations to selectively remove individuals from Gujarat
that would otherwise represent losses or mortalities,” he says.
“Whatever lions you remove just creates more space for the remaining
animals.” Panthera is not involved in Gir, but Indian experts
consulted with Hunter 16 years ago when they first started thinking about translocation.
Hunter says the experience gained in southern Africa, where more than
500 lions in more than 40 different populations have been successfully
relocated, shows that any translocation in India has a decent chance of
success, especially when combined with the knowledge gained in Gujarat
over the past century. “Gujarat needs to be congratulated, but now let’s
transfer their expertise and make sure that lions persist in India
regardless of how they do in Gujarat. There’s no good argument for not
looking at that second or third population site.”
But even as the two states debate the issue, Gujarat is making its
own efforts to create a second Asiatic lion population to avoid the risk
of any potential catastrophic events. “Gujarat already has started
development of another home for lions at Barda Wildlife Sanctuary, which
is about 200 kilometers away from Gir,” Kotecha says. As many as eight
lions are due at Barda
as early as August of this year, after the annual monsoon season.
Will that be enough? “This is very good, but what’s next,”
Divyabhanusinh Chavada, a member of the National Board for Wildlife in
India, told
Daily News & Analysis last month. “The lions are happily multiplying. Today, they are 411, tomorrow they’ll be 500. Where will they go next?”
That’s a good question. India’s human population hit 1.2 billion last
year, which doesn’t leave much room for big cats. But no matter what,
India remains passionate about its lions—and for now, they aren’t going
anywhere.
Photos © and courtesy of Kishore Kotecha. Used with permission
Source: http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/extinction-countdown/2012/05/22/last-400-asiatic-lions-need-more-room/
