Ground survey of red lechwe in the Linyanti swamps and Chobe floodplains, northern Botswana

Koedoe - African Protected Area Conservation and Science

 
 
Field Value
 
Title Ground survey of red lechwe in the Linyanti swamps and Chobe floodplains, northern Botswana
 
Creator Gadimang, Phemelo Masunga, Gaseitsiwe S.
 
Subject Wildlife Ecology; Wetlands ecology; Landscape ecology Aquatic ungulate; degradation; population dynamics; red lechwe; wetland; floodplain
Description A ground survey of red lechwe was carried out in the Linyanti swamps and the Chobe floodplains of northern Botswana in the dry and wet seasons of 2012 and 2013, respectively. We documented numbers, sex ratio and age structure of red lechwe within the linear strips of 25 km × 300 m along the Linyanti swamps and the Chobe floodplains. Results indicated a significant difference in the numbers of red lechwe between sites and seasons. About 66 and 755 red lechwe were estimated for Chobe in the dry and wet season, respectively, with 343 and 261 of them estimated for Linyanti in the dry and wet season, respectively. In Chobe, the red lechwe densities varied widely between seasons (9 red lechwe/km2 – 101 red lechwe/km2 ) compared with Linyanti, where the densities did not vary much between seasons (35 red lechwe/km2 – 46 red lechwe/km2 ). The lower densities of red lechwe in Chobe in the dry season when compared with the wet season suggest a possible seasonal shift in the distribution of red lechwe to the nearby Zambezi floodplains in Namibia.Conservation implications: The higher number of red lechwe in the Chobe floodplains in the wet season indicates the potential of the floodplains as a habitat for this species in that season. The dry season shift in the distribution of red lechwe in Chobe presents an opportunity for local communities in Namibia to engage in tourism, whereas the return of the red lechwe to the floodplains in the wet season ensures protection of the animals as well as boosts the tourism potential of the Chobe National Park.
 
Publisher AOSIS Publishing
 
Contributor University of Botswana's Office of Research and Development (ORD) and Department of Wildlife & National Parks
Date 2017-05-23
 
Type info:eu-repo/semantics/article info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion — Distance sampling method
Format text/html application/epub+zip text/xml application/pdf
Identifier 10.4102/koedoe.v59i2.1413
 
Source Koedoe; Vol 59, No 2 (2017); 6 pages 2071-0771 0075-6458
 
Language eng
 
Relation
The following web links (URLs) may trigger a file download or direct you to an alternative webpage to gain access to a publication file format of the published article:

https://koedoe.co.za/index.php/koedoe/article/view/1413/2036 https://koedoe.co.za/index.php/koedoe/article/view/1413/2035 https://koedoe.co.za/index.php/koedoe/article/view/1413/2037 https://koedoe.co.za/index.php/koedoe/article/view/1413/2024
 
Coverage Northern Botswana; Kavango-zambezi transfrontier conservation area; zambezi floodplains 2012-2013 Transect strip counts; population estimate; sex; age
Rights Copyright (c) 2017 Phemelo Gadimang, Gaseitsiwe S. Masunga https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
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