October 2000

Newsletter, October 2000

Welcome to the end of season newsletter. It's been a hectic and frustrating three months, with good news and bad for the Lower Zambezi wild dogs. At the end of the last newsletter I left you hanging on the edge of your seats, with two pregnant females in the Mushika pack about to give birth - an unusual situation for a wild dog pack, where typically only one female will breed. The Mushika pack are now the proud owners of eight new pups, currently eleven. weeks -old. The litter belongs to Port, the alpha female. The other pregnant female, Hatrick, lost her litter some time in the first three weeks, when the den was inaccessible. It is quite possible the alpha female killed them, as she shifted dens to the area where Hatrick had been. This was not unexpected, as it would be very difficult for the pack to feed two litters of this size, especially once they reach about 1 0 weeks old. The pups are being named mainly by their coat patterns, and I have managed to spot a "Riddler' with a question mark on his back, and Penguin in a white shirt front, to go with the adult Batman.

The dogs stayed in one den for 6 weeks, in which time they overcame their camera phobia to some extent. We had a visiting film crew who were keen for some footage at the den site, but the yearling wild dogs would have none of it when it came to cameramen on foot near the pups. We did a test run with a makeshift 3 sided hide, made of chicken wire, green mosquito netting, an old khaki poncho and some grass. We moved it into place about 25m from the den beside a big termite mound, where the dogs were used to seeing the vehicle. The yearlings immediately barked and ran a wide circle through the bush, moving around the back of us to see what was behind the hide. Wild dogs obviously have a higher IQ than researchers and camera crews.

Plan B was "doggie cam". We bought a 4WD remote controlled toy car, and strapped a camera to the back of it. It was driven into the den area and left for 24 hours, initially without the camera on it to avoid embarrassing insurance claims about wild dogs eating the camera. A day later it was still in one piece and we were in business. It took only three attempts for the dogs to get used to doggie- cam and ignore its movements, so the crew captured some great footage of the puppies.

On the poaching side of things, it has been a tough year for the Lower Zambezi and other Zambian National Parks. The transition from Zambian National Parks and Wildlife to the Zambian Wildlife Authority (ZAWA) has been a massive undertaking, with necessary cost cutting and staff reductions. Unfortunately it has also resulted in very little scout presence in the park throughout the season, and a drastic increase in snaring by commercial meat poachers, as well as ivory poaching.

Due to the large distances travelled by wild dogs they seem to pick up wire snares more often than other predators. To date, five of the fifteen adult wild dogs in the LZNP have had neck snares in the last nine months, at least two of which kept tightening resulting in bad wounds and would have killed the dogs if left unattended. Fortunately, the film crew came with their own plane which was swiftly commandeered for aerial tracking. After a week's flying we managed to locate the dogs resting after a hunt before they had returned to the den, and darted and removed a snare from Blacksaddle, a beta male in the Mushika pack. We also removed two wires from a female in the uncollared Jeki pack by sheer luck, as they have shifted home ranges and are only being sighted briefly every six weeks on average. Ian Stevenson, manager of Mwambashi Lodge, has recently completed the animal immobilisation course, so was available on the spot to dart the dogs instead of having to call a vet in.

The Mushika pack has moved dens now and is back in an inaccessible area. At the last sighting Art, the alpha male, had picked up another neck snare. It will either come off or slowly tighten. Hopefully the dogs will return to the open winterthorn woodlands in the next three weeks when the pups are old enough to follow the pack, and if Art is still alive and carrying the snare we will dart him and remove it. This is a very frustrating process and does not solve the problem of snaring, which constitutes an immediate and critical threat to the survival of such a small wild dog population. There is no way of tracking the dogs during the wet season to monitor and remove snares, as the park is inaccessible by road or air.

On the bright side, the National Park has an excellent new warden who recognises the severity of the situation and is addressing it. Next year could see an improvement in the situation if sufficient funds and resources are secured.

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