Search results

In 2022, an aerial survey for African savanna elephants (Loxodonta africana) was conducted over the Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (KAZA) in southern Africa. KAZA is a 520,000-km² network of protected areas in Angola, Botswana, Namibia, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. The aerial survey found that KAZA holds ~228,000 elephants, confirming that this is the world’s largest population of savanna elephants and a critical stronghold for this endangered species.

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.

In 2011, the Ministry of Environment and Tourism conducted a questionnaire to various stakeholders to determine relative abundance of large carnivores throughout Namibia. The results of this questionnaire were quantified and mapped to establish the current range and relative abundance of the six Namibian large carnivores. Recent population estimates for leopards are used here, however, the remaining species we used estimates from the previous Atlas as our best estimates to date.

This report presents the results of the third fixed-wing aerial wildlife census of the Caprivi River systems in Namibia conducted during September 2009. The purpose of this survey is to provide recent information on the distribution, abundance and trend of wildlife species including comparisons between protected areas and conservancies. The report compares the results of this survey with earlier fixed-wing aerial surveys conducted in September 2007 and August 2004.

The Okavango River in Namibia, from the Angolan border just northwest of the bridge on the Trans-Caprivi highway south to the Botswana border; the entire length of the Kwandu-Linyanti-Lake Liambezi-Chobe system, including the whole Mamili National Park; and the Zambezi River for its entire length on Namibia's border, including parts of the adjacent East Caprivi floodplains, were survey from the air in September 2007.