African Parks Embarks on Chad Elephant Protection Programme

Staff from Zakouma National Park, SOS Elephants and Chadian National Parks have conducted a collaring operation as part of the planned national conservation programme for the protection of Chad's remaining elephant populations. So far nine satellite collars have been placed on animals from seven different elephant populations in the western half of Chad.

This unique elephant population of the arid Sahelian-Saharan zone on the eastern shore of Lake Chad is one of the northern-most populations in Africa. This breeding herd lives in close proximity with people. They are totally relaxed - almost certainly meaning they are not being poached.

Shortly after taking up his position as Minister of Environment and Fisheries Resources in Chad, Mr Mahamat Halakimi was in the field following up on the elephant massacre which took place during March 2013 in south-west Chad. This latest massacre was widely publicised as were the previous ones in 2012 and 2011. Mr Halakimi’s desire to do something positive resulted in African Parks being requested to assist with the development of a national strategy to protect Chad’s unique elephant herds – unique because these savannah elephants are amongst the last remaining herds north of the rain forests of Central Africa.

Accurate knowledge is essential for safeguarding elephant herds and therefore it was decided to tag some animals with satellite GPS collars in order to gather more information on their movements (wet and dry season), migration routes, interactions, etc. Three satellite collars had already been fitted as part of the Zakouma National Park collaring procedure in March – two at Lake Chad and one in the south-west (this animal sadly later died of unknown causes). However, following the government’s request, urgent funding was sought (kindly provided by Mr Ron Ulrich and the Abraham Foundation) and a further 10 satellite collars were ordered from African Wildlife Tracking in South Africa. With the onset of the rains imminent time was running out. The first ground team was mobilized to southern Chad under Dr Malachie Dolmia towards the end of April to determine exact locations of elephant herds for collaring. With a second vehicle heading for Lake Fitri and veterinarian Dr Pete Morkel arriving in early May, the operation was in full swing. Two aircraft were used; the African Parks Cessna 180 piloted by Zakouma Park Manager Rian Labuschagne and a Cessna 182 belonging to the Wildlife Conservation Society piloted on rotations by Gary Roberts and Artur Karst. Both aircraft are fitted with large wheels allowing for landing in open areas in the bush as few airstrips were available in the areas visited.

The Cessna 180 taking off from a cattle track in the Birket area. The local communities assisted us enormously in finding the elephant herds. Despite almost two hours of flying to guide the ground team in, a herd of seven animals in this area could unfortunately not be collared due to the incredibly thick vegetation and the skittishness of the elephants.

Lake Fitri in central Chad (a RAMSAR site) was chosen as the first area because there was a known population of elephants on the western shore. Our modus operandi was to consult with the local government officials and communities to get up to date information on the location of the herds. This was followed by the vehicles searching for fresh sign on the ground and the aircraft from the air. Once the herd was located (usually from the air) the ground team was guided in by the aircraft; the vehicles had VHF air band radios which allowed for direct communication between pilot and vehicle. All darting was done from the ground; Pete Morkel together with an armed local wildlife officer and Markéta Antonínová (in radio contact with the aircraft) would go in on foot and once the dart was in (firing distance is about 30m) the aircraft would follow and monitor the herd closely to identify the darted animal and see where it went down, after which the ground team was guided in quickly for the fitting of the collar. The bull collared at Lake Fitri was part of a herd of about 70 animals, with numerous calves present. Some days after this collaring and following heavy rain, the herd started moving to an area 120km away so we were extremely lucky. This was to become our routine over the next three weeks, camping wherever we could land the plane near a targeted elephant herd (a field, a clearing in the bush, a pan, a dry floodplain…) with some days frustrating, many days exciting, a few days nerve wracking but most fulfilling - and in the end all successful with nine satellite collars now on animals from 7 different elephant populations in the western half of Chad. Photographs were taken and as much information gathered as possible and for the first time in many years Chad has a better idea of the status of their elephant herds outside of the well monitored Zakouma National Park population.Zakouma currently has 16 collared elephants meaning there are now 25 tagged elephants in Chad providing a GPS position every four or eight hours. We are convinced that through the monitoring of the tagged animals more herds will be found and if this is the case we will undertake a third field trip to collar at least one individual in each of the new herds found.

This collaring operation was part of phase one of the planned national strategy – phase two is to set up a National Elephant Monitoring Control Centre in N’Djaména where all information is consolidated and analysed; from the satellite collar data to information received from local communities on elephant herds, human-elephant conflict and potential threats. This information will be assimilated and form an early warning to the Ministry of Environment which will enable them to react accordingly on a specific threat to an elephant population. Phase three is the anti-poaching and intelligence gathering strategy needed to protect the widely spread free-ranging elephant herds. This phase, although already initiated by the government, will be work in progress for many months as more information is obtained on the dynamics of the herds. The regular elephant massacres in Chad, in which hundreds of animals are sometimes killed, will hopefully soon be something of the past.

A very healthy breeding herd – unlike the elephant herds in Zakouma National Park, all the herds seen during the operation had a good number of calves. Zakouma’s elephants are almost certainly still traumatised from almost 10 years of heavy poaching. The recruitment rate is just above 0% but with a lot less poaching since African Parks took over management it is hoped that this will soon change.