Title:

Seasonal pattern of springbok fence related mortalities in southern Namibia

Author(s):
Publication Year:
2025
Abstract:

Analysing a decade of records on fence-related springbok mortalities at an 8000ha farm with 36km of internal (height: 1m) and 48km of boundary fences (height: 1.4m) resulted in an average mortality occurrence of 0.25 and 0.61 mortalities/km (over the 10 years period) for boundary (1.4m) and internal (1m) fences, respectively. Male mortalities occur mainly during summer (hot/ wet season) with equal numbers killed in internal and boundary fences, while female mortalities are mainly associated with winter (cold/dry season) and internal fences. Mitigations to minimise mortalities include varying the width of the upper fence strands and leaving camp gates open when livestock are not present to facilitate the movement of springbok.

Publication Title:
African Journal of Ecology
Volume:
63
Number:
e70114
Item Type:
Journal Article
Language:
en