[FEL-L] Lions Making a Comeback on Kenya Ranches

[BigCatSimba at aol.com]

Lions Making a Comeback on Kenya Ranches
John Roach
for National Geographic News
 
( More Posted on Web Site )
 
 
April 10, 2007
Conservation efforts on a ranch in southern Kenya have led to an "extremely 
encouraging" rebound in the lion population there, an African predator expert 
said. 
 
The positive trend is a bright spot in an otherwise dismal situation for 
lions in the shadow of Mount Kilimanjaro, said Laurence Frank, a wildlife 
biologist at the University of California, Berkeley. 
 
Less than a year ago, Frank reported that Maasai warriors appeared poised to 
obliterate southern Kenya's lion population. 
 
(Read: "Lion Killings Spur Fears of Regional Extinction in Kenya" [May 22, 
2006].) 
 
The big cats are speared as part of a manhood ritual and poisoned to prevent 
livestock predation, he explained. 
 
In 2006 a total of 32 lions in the region were killed. 
 
But a compensation program, combined with a newfound passion for 
conservation, has allowed the lion population on one communally owned ranch to increase 
from 15 to 25, or about 67 percent, in the midst of the surrounding slaughter. 
 
"We've made remarkable progress in a short time," said Frank, who directs the 
Living With Lions project in Kenya. 
 
"The lions seem to be doing better where we and our partners are working." 
 
(Frank's research has been funded in part by the National Geographic 
Conservation Trust. The Conservation Trust and National Geographic News are both 
divisions of the National Geographic Society.) 
 
Compensation and Pride 
 
The project seeks to reverse the dramatic decline in lion populations outside 
the African country's national parks and game reserves. It works closely with 
several groups in southern Kenya. 
 
_http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/04/070410-lions-kenya.html_ 
(http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/04/070410-lions-kenya.html) 





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