Conserving wildlife in African landscapes : Kenya's Ewaso ecosystem /
Georgiadis, Nicholas.
Washington, D.C. : Smithsonian Institution Scholarly Press,
2011.
During the last two decades, conservation strategies in Africa have changed from an almost exclusive focus on large mammals in protected areas to an emphasis on conserving ecological processes at the level of entire landscapes and on the role of human communities. The papers assembled in this volume address diverse aspects of conserving the Ewaso landscape in northern Kenya, where concerted and prodigious efforts to conserve wildlife and natural resources have achieved substantial progress. Topics range from interpreting evidence for continuity and change in patterns of human settlement in the region to describing ecological interactions between wildlife, people, and livestock that are harmful or helpful; from the challenges of adapting livestock management in the presence of predators to legal mechanisms for conserving wildlife habitat on private land. In the final chapter, results of a strategic planning exercise are described for conserving essential elements in the entire landscape -- the first of its kind in Kenya. Today, national policy and political will are still insufficiently aligned with this landscape conservation imperative to effect the changes that are necessary to conserve Kenya's biodiversity. We hope this volume will help propagate awareness about the importance and threatened status of Kenya's ecosystems and promote confidence that a policy can be crafted that will reverse their decline.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Introduction: Conserving Wildlife in Kenya's Ewaso Landscape /  Nicholas J. Georgiadis -- An Outline of the Later Holocene Archaeology and Precolonial History of the Ewaso Basin, Kenya / Paul Lane -- Reassessing Aerial Sample Surveys for Wildlife Monitoring, Conservation, and Management / Nicholas J. Georgiadis, Nasser Olwero, Gordon Ojwang', and George Aike -- Ecological Importance of Large Herbivores in the Ewaso Ecosystem / Robert M. Pringle, Todd M. Palmer, Jacob R. Goheen, Douglas J. McCauley, and Felicia Keesing -- Pathways for Positive Cattle-Wildlife Interactions in Semiarid Rangelands / David J. Augustine, Kari E. Veblen, Jacob R. Goheen, Corinna Riginos, and Truman P. Young -- Living with Lions : Lessons from Laikipia / Laurence Frank -- Attitudes Toward Predators and Options for Their Conservation in the Ewaso Ecosystem / Stephanie S. Romanach, Peter A. Lindsey, and Rosie Woodroffe -- Conserving Wildlife on Private Land : The Legal Framework for Landownership and New Tools for Land Conservation in Kenya / Nyokabi Gitahi and Kathleen H. Fitzgerald -- Landscape-Scale Conservation Planning of the Ewaso Nyiro : A Model for Land Use Planning in Kenya? / Karl A. Didier, Alayne Cotterill, Iain Douglas-Hamilton, Laurence Frank, Nicholas J. Georgiadis, Max Graham, Festus Ihwagi, Juliet King, Delphine Malleret-King, Dan Rubenstei, David Wilkie, and Rosie Woodroffe.
During the last two decades, conservation strategies in Africa have changed from an almost exclusive focus on large mammals in protected areas to an emphasis on conserving ecological processes at the level of entire landscapes and on the role of human communities. The papers assembled in this volume address diverse aspects of conserving the Ewaso landscape in northern Kenya, where concerted and prodigious efforts to conserve wildlife and natural resources have achieved substantial progress. Topics range from interpreting evidence for continuity and change in patterns of human settlement in the region to describing ecological interactions between wildlife, people, and livestock that are harmful or helpful; from the challenges of adapting livestock management in the presence of predators to legal mechanisms for conserving wildlife habitat on private land. In the final chapter, results of a strategic planning exercise are described for conserving essential elements in the entire landscape -- the first of its kind in Kenya. Today, national policy and political will are still insufficiently aligned with this landscape conservation imperative to effect the changes that are necessary to conserve Kenya's biodiversity. We hope this volume will help propagate awareness about the importance and threatened status of Kenya's ecosystems and promote confidence that a policy can be crafted that will reverse their decline.
Wildlife conservation
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Conserving wildlife in African landscapes