Seminar: Wildlife-livestock coexistence in Laikipia, Kenya

Abstract:

Much of the world's land surface is used for grazing livestock, including some of the world's best remaining habitat for large mammals. Assessing the influence of livestock on wildlife (and vice versa), and developing pathways for wildlife and livestock to coexist on shared landscapes, is therefore vital to conservation and human development over the next century. This is particularly true in Africa, where a growing population and rising incomes are expected to increase demand for meat, even as climate change increases the frequency and duration of drought. In this presentation, I present preliminary data on how wildlife influence spread of an invasive species unpalatable to wildlife, how environmental conditions shape predation on livestock by large carnivores, and how rainfall may mediate disease transmission between herding dogs and large carnivores.