DOI: 10.5061/dryad.s1rn8pkf9
title: Elephant population survey counts across southern Africa protected areas

description: The influence of protected areas on the growth of African savannah
 elephant populations is inadequately known. Across southern Africa,
 elephant numbers grew at 0.16% annually for the past quarter century.
 Locally, much depends on metapopulation dynamics — the size and
 connections of individual populations. Population numbers in large,
 connected and strictly protected areas typically increased, were less
 variable from year to year, and suffered less from poaching. Conversely,
 populations in buffer areas that are less protected but still connected
 have more variation in growth from year to year. Buffer areas also
 differed more in their growth rates, likely due to more threats and
 dispersal opportunities in the face of such dangers. Isolated populations
 showed consistently high growth due to a lack of emigration. This suggests
 that “fortress” conservation generally maintains high growth, while
 anthropogenic-driven source-sink dynamics within connected conservation
 clusters drive stability in core areas and variability in buffers.
  
description: Data collated from the African elephant database and additional
 literature. Full list of sources provided in Supplemental Material
 3.
description: # Elephant population survey counts across southern Africa protected areas
 Repository for data and
 supplemental material from "Protecting and connecting landscapes
 stabilises populations of the Endangered savannah elephant".
 Materials include individual survey counts, calculated growth rates, data
 sources, and detailed descriptions of elephant populations within each
 cluster (regional grouping). ## Description of the data tables *Survey
 Estimates.csv:* Full list of extracted survey estimates of elephant
 populations from 1995-2020 * Cluster No: Cluster ID (see Fig 1A and Table
 1 of main text) * Cluster: Cluster name * Population: Name of protected
 area * Year: Year of survey * Structure: Core/Buffer/Insular (see main
 text for definitions) * Estimate: Reported population size *
 Upper/Lower.95CL: Upper and lower confidence limits (if provided) (NA
 indicates data not provided by source) * Survey Area: Reported area (NA
 indicates data not provided by source) *Population Summary.csv:*
 Aggregation of population calculations for each protected area * Cluster
 Number: Cluster ID (see Fig 1A and Table 1 of main text) * Cluster:
 Cluster name * Population: Name of protected area * IUCN: IUCN protected
 area category (I-VI, NA) * Size_km2: Area (km2) provided by World Database
 of Protected Areas (NA indicates area discrepancies in boundaries between
 WDPA and reported boundaries) * Year: Most recent survey year * Estimate:
 Most recent estimate * CL: 95% Confidence limit distance * Survey Area:
 Reported area from most recent survey (NA indicates data not provided by
 source) * Density: Elephant density (Estimate/Size_km2) (NA when no area
 available) * Period: Range of years surveyed * Structure:
 Core/Buffer/Insular (see main text for definitions) * Protected: Primary
 (IUCN categories I-IV)/Secondary (IUCN categories V, VI, NA) * Connection:
 Connected or Insular (see main text for definitions) * Category: Large
 Core/Small Core/Large Buffer/Small Buffer/Insular (see main text for
 definitions) * n: Number of surveys * MeanEst: Average Population Size
 across surveys * SDEst: Standard deviation of survey estimates * Growth:
 Annual population growth rate * SDLam: Standard deviation of annual
 population growth rate * F: F-statistic of model fit * df: Degrees of
 freedom * p: p-value of model fit *Data Sources.xslx:* List of data
 sources organized by cluster ## Sharing/Access information Links to other
 publicly accessible locations of the data: *
 Data was derived from sources
 listed in *Data Sources.xslx*