Wildlife

Serengeti Mass Migration

The wildebeest migration in Tanzania’s Serengeti National Park is back in full force, thanks to the removal of herds of livestock that had encroached into the reserve.

Spokesman Susuma Kusekwa of the country’s National Parks Authority says there has been a significant increase in the number of the migratory animals in parts of the park following the livestock eviction.

An estimated 1.4 million wildebeest, as well as a half-million Thomson’s gazelles and about 200,000 zebras, travel north and south between Kenya’s Masai Mara and the Serengeti as they follow seasonal rainfall patterns that provide lush grazing lands for the animals.

Vaquita War

An anti-poaching drone being used to protect the critically endangered vaquita porpoise in the northern Gulf of California was shot down by poachers just before the New Year.

The conservation group Sea Shepherd said the drone was being used in conjunction with its two ships that were patrolling the Upper Gulf of California Biosphere Reserve.

Live video streaming from the drone showed a fisherman firing repeatedly from a speedboat before the video feed cut out.

Illicit net fishing in the vaquita’s habitat has devastated the tiny porpoises’ population by inadvertently snaring and drowning the animals. Only about 30 of the marine mammals are believed to still be alive.