Assessment of Elephant Management in South Africa

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Assessment of Elephant Management in South
Africa

• Bob Scholes

On behalf of the 63 authors of the
Assessment Brandon Anthony, Graham Avery, Dave
Balfour, Jon Barnes, Roy Bengis, Henk
Bertschinger, Harry C.Biggs, James Blignaut,
André Boshoff, Jane Carruthers, David Cumming,
Warwick Davies-Mostert, Yolande de Beer, Willem
F.de Boer, Martin de Wit, Audrey Delsink, Holly
Dublin, Saliem Fakir, Sam Ferreira, Andre
Ganswindt, Marion Garaï, Angela Gaylard, Katie
Gough, C.C. (Rina) Grant, Douw G. Grobler, Rob
Guldemond, Paul Havemann, Michelle Henley, Markus
Hofmeyr, Lisa Hopkinson, Brian Huntley, Tim
Jackson, Jessi Junker, Graham I.H. Kerley, Hanno
Killian, Jay Kirkpatrick, Laurence Kruger,
Marietjie Landman, Keith Lindsay, Rob Little,
H.P.P. (Hennie) Lötter, Robin Mackey, Hector
Magome, Johan H. Malan, Wayne Matthews, Kathleen
Mennell Pieter Olivier, Teri Ott, Norman
Owen-Smith, Bruce Page, Mike Peel, Michele
Pickover, Mogobe Ramose, Jeremy Ridl, Bob
Scholes, Rob Slotow, Izak Smit, Morgan Trimble,
Wayne Twine, Rudi van Aarde, JJ van Altena,
Marius van Staden, Ian Whyte.
25 February 2008 Presentation to media
representatives
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What are assessments?

• A social process by which scientific information
  is made available to policymakers
• Works best for
• Complex issues
• Multi-, inter-, or transdisciplinary
• Residual uncertainty, but decision making needed
• Highly polarised issues of societal concern

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The elephant assessment process

• 45 institutions
• 62 authors
• 3 review eds.
• 73 reviewers
• 1 year
• 3 drafts
• 2 reviews
• Overseas
• participation
• difficult

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The nature of the issue

• In South Africa elephant recovered from
  near-extinction in 1900 to 18000 now
• Current trends
• 300 000 in Southern Africa and rising
• 600 000 in Africa - stable
• Highly reduced range, therefore impacts on
  vegetation, livelihoods and lives
• Elephant-ecosystem interaction has slow
  dynamics
• Decisions needed well before moment of crisis

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Recent history of the issue

• 1968-1994 culling in KNP
• 1995 Moratorium on culling
• 2002 Berg-en-Dal Elephant forum
• 2004 Luiperdskloof science meeting
• 2006 Ministerial SRT on elephants
• 1 Little evidence of urgent need to cull in KNP
• 2 Differentiated solutions needed
• 2007 Elephant assessment

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Why elephant warrant special management

• Megaherbivore
• Slow dynamics low birth rate, long life
• System engineers
• Large home range
• Exhibit complex social behaviour
• Large and complex brain
• Lifetime persistence of extended family ties
• May be conscious of suffering of other elephants

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Key findings of the Assessment1. Elephant-human
interactions

• Frequency and severity of negative direct
  Human-Elephant Conflict is low in South Africa
• Effectively separated by fences
• Most incidents are inside protected areas or
  under captive conditions
• Even low levels of HEC lead to negative
  perceptions of elephants and conservation
• No definitive surveys on the size of the various
  stakeholder groups, nor a description of their
  values/opinions

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2. Ethics

• Higher than animals, lower than humans
• Based on brain, behavioural repertoire, evidence
  of empathy
• Individual elephants can be killed if
• Human life or livelihood is threatened (almost
  all agree)
• The individual is a persistent damage-causer
  (most agree)
• Culling is justified if
• Other species are threatened with extinction
  (almost all agree)
• Other options have been considered and rejected
  (all agree)
• Non-interference also has ethical consequences
• Do elephant have rights?
• e.g. to non-harassment

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3. Controlling distribution

• Indirect costs of breakout cost of
  fencing
• Fencing
• Ordinary game/livestock fencing not effective
• Electrified fences _at_ R120 000/km breakout/km/year
• Strong mechanical fence - virtually no breakouts
  
• Min legal requirement _at_ R34 000/km
• Behavioural control
• Promising but poorly proven
• Water distribution control
• Possible but of limited applicability

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4. Elephants and biodiversity

• Self-regulation occurs at densities level of
  dramatic vegetation structural transformation
• Sparse evidence for density dependent growth rate
• No known extinctions have resulted from high
  elephant densities
• Extripations (local loss) have occurred in
  succulent thicket

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Elephants and trees

• Other photo pairs show little change in woody
  cover, and some show an increase. On average tall
  tree cover has has decreased in the KNP since the
  1970s. This loss cannot be directly and
  unequivocally attributed to elephant impacts.

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Elephants and ecosystems

• Elephant-tree coupled system has long time lag
• In large protected areas, the main ecological
  concern is slow plant recovery eg Baobabs, tall
  nesting and shade trees
• Impacts depend on
• Local intensity x spatial extent x period they
  persist
• Mosaic of light and moderate impacts could
  enhance regional biodiversity

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5. Will elephant numbers regulate themselves?
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6. Setting management targets

• Limits for maximum elephant/km2 are unfeasible at
  national scale
• Ecological circumstances and management
  objectives vary greatly across the country
• Evidence is inadequate to estimate limits
  rigorously
• Manage elephant populations on a case-by-case
• In relation to land use objectives
• Use thresholds of acceptable change rather than
  an elephant density limit
• Apply a learning approach Adaptive Management

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7. Increasing elephant range

• 3 mechanisms
• Addition of land to existing protected areas
• Creation of transfrontier conservation areas
• Translocation of elephant into new areas
• These strategies delay the onset of local
  elephant impacts, but do not reduce the overall
  elephant population growth rate.

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Spatial management

• Metapopulation management
• Genetic conservation advantages
• No known long-term population control benefits
• Simulating dispersal source-sinks through local
  capture/culling within smaller protected areas
• Low-impact zone created
• No advantage over non-localized removal

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8. Translocation

• Current techniques are safe mortality is low
• Stress on elephants can be reduced by
• Selecting habituated elephants
• Ensuring suitability of the receiving environment
• Removing family groups together
• Acclimatization in a special holding pen
• Translocation does not cure bad behaviour

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When is translocation indicated?

• Management interventions should focus on genetic
  diversification
• Lack of new receiving areas is the greatest
  limitation
• Cost and logistic constraints limit the
  applicability to relatively small populations
• Viable tool where intervention is urgent

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9. Reducing the birth rate

• Immuno-contraception vaccines
• Effects appear reversible, but progressively
  slower
• pZP ? only, effective and viable, no know side
  effects
• One shot and GnRH ? ?, no field trails yet
• Unacceptable levels of aggression from
• Hormone-based contraception (?)
• Castration (?)
• Vasectomies are effective but expensive

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When is contraception not useful?

• When elephant numbers need to be reduced within a
  few years
• i.e., Elephant impacts already unacceptable

Suggestion All translocated female elephants
should be pre-sensitised to immuno-contraceptives
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10. Lethal Management

• Only option where intervention is urgent
• For immediate reduction in numbers/impact
• When human life is threatened
• Like all hard-to-reverse, high impact actions,
  culling should be undertaken only once all
  management options have been evaluated, and
  culling found to be the best based on a balanced
  assessment of all considerations

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The down side of culling

• Population consequences
• Allows intrinsic population growth rate to remain
  high
• Once culling is adopted it must be continued
  indefinitely or until replaced by another method
• A distorted population structure could be more
  prone to overshoot its resource limitations
• Behavioural consequences
• Uncertain but probably substantial
• Economic consequences
• Tradeoff between tourism and direct harvest
  benefits?

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Current Best Practice on Culling

• Single lethal shot to the brain delivered by
  skilled marksman from helicopter
• Entire family group should be culled at once
• Should not be carried out in the near proximity
  of other elephants

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11. Elephant economics

• Elephants are worth much more alive than dead!
• More elephants ? increased net economic value

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11. National law

• Res nullius (Roman Dutch common law) is out of
  step with national and international social
  perceptions and laws regarding wildlife as common
  heritage
• Responsibility for escaped animals is undefined
• Not dependent on ownership, but dependent on
  anticipation of consequences

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12. Managing systems with elephants

• A single set of policies and management rules
  cannot be applied to all situations
• Consider each set of unique social and ecological
  factors
• Current best practice approach is active
  adaptive management

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What do we still need to know?

• The trends and societal distribution of human
  value systems
• The economics of elephant in South Africa
• Ways of ensuring that benefits from elephants
  reach those with the greatest need
• The strength of the trade-off between use values
  and non-use values
• The long-term consequences of contraception
• The practical implications of contraception in
  large populations

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What do we still need to know?

• The importance and persistence of stress
  following culling or translocation
• Examining stress, behaviour and demographic vital
  statistics in elephant populations at differing
  densities
• The potential to control elephant distribution by
  behavioural modification
• The feasibility and consequences of achieving
  elephant population self-regulation

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Way forward

• National and international publication of
  Assessment with WUP and CUP
• Research programme
• Re-assessment in 5-8 years

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• The full Assessment can be accessed at
  www.elephantassessment.co.za
• Queries can be sent to KMennell_at_csir.co.za