This archive of reports of wildlife surveys in Namibia aims to:
Public access to information is a vital component of ensuring community engagement in prevalent issues. Wildlife surveys are critical to determine the health of wildlife populations and determine trends over time to guide conservation and management actions.
Wildlife surveys are done for different species using methods that are suited to counting them (e.g. by air or road) in their natural habitats. Such surveys need to be repeated over time to detect long-term trends and inform conservation managers. The Namibian government, non-governmental organisations and private reserves all conduct regular surveys covering different parts of Namibia and targeting different species. This archive will thus serve as a repository of our collective knowledge of the trends and status of a variety of species occurring throughout Namibia.
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Robust abundance estimates of wild animal populations are needed to inform management policies and are often obtained through mark–recapture (MR) studies. Visual methods are commonly used, which limits data collection to daylight hours and good weather conditions. Passive acoustic monitoring offers an alternative, particularly if acoustic cues are naturally produced and individually distinctive. Here we investigate the potential of using individually distinctive signature whistles in a MR framework and evaluate different components of study design.
The rapid improvement of camera traps in recent decades has revolutionized biodiversity monitoring. Despite clear applications in conservation biology, camera traps have seldom been used to model the abundance of unmarked animal populations. The goals of this review are to summarize the challenges facing abundance estimation of unmarked animals, present an overview of existing analytical frameworks, and provide guidance for practitioners seeking a suitable method.
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Abundance estimation of unmarked animals based on camera_trap data.pdf | 1.35 MB |
Knowledge of the occurrence and distribution of cetaceans is particularly important for conservation and management, but is still limited within Namibian waters. We collated 3211 cetacean records from the Namibian Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) for the period 2008 to 2016 and applied the principle of minimum cross entropy (MinxEnt) to predict habitat suitability. MinxEnt is a generalised form of maximum entropy modelling that allows incorporation of additional information such as sampling bias.
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Predicting large_scale habitat suitability for cetaceans off Namibia using MinxEnt.pdf | 2.91 MB |
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The ecology_behaviour and population dynamics of large predators at Etosha_Part 1 The lion.pdf | 39.23 MB |
Modern faunal communities in South West Africa/Namibia - A census of mammals in 16 districts in South West Africa/Namibia was undertaken by Joubert and Mostert. These were distributed in northern, central, and southern S.W.A., and varied in area from approximately 20 000 to 60 000 km². Despite the uncertainties and limitations of this census, the data provide useful information on distribution patterns, relative abundances and species diversity.