Do Observations during Patrolling Trips Detect Changes in Wildlife Presence & Diversity in National Parks? ()
1. Introduction
Protected areas are foundations for almost all national and international conservation strategies that are essential for preserving natural ecosystem functions and conserving biological diversity in such ecologically rich regions [1] - [10] . The ecosystems of Sudan are richly endowed with diverse resources plants, animals, and microbes reflected in diverse socio-cultural and economic ecosystem services. Despite these great values, unfortunately, Sudan’s ecosystems and inhabiting populations are facing many threats including conflicts and wars, habitat destruction and large-scale deforestation, urbanization, agricultural expansion, and climatic hazards just to name some [11] [12] [13] [14] .
Perhaps the country is doing its best to deal with these threats but also making an effort to conserve these vital resources. Among the many conservation interventions that the government took was to establish protected areas [15] . Many of these protected areas were gazetted as far back as 1935, while others were recently established such as Jebel-Eldair National Park (JENP) in 2010 and El Gazali in 2016 [13] [16] . These areas have been classified into three types according to the level of protection and restrictions on human (community) activities such as; National Parks (NP), Game Reserves (NR), and Game Sanctuaries (GS) [17] [18] (Table 1).
Generally, apart from human activities, climatic changes have been reported to have a negative impact on wildlife and their habitats in protected areas [15] [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] . In recent decades, drought incidences and short rainy seasons have been frequently observed, especially in protected areas in savannas and semi-arid regions including Jebel El-Dair Natural Reserve. Other threats to PAs of Sudan include tribal conflicts civil wars and political instability [24] [25] [26] [27] [28] . Consequently, there were many tribes displaced from Western Sudan due to the Darfur war and settled in more than 40 villages in and around Dinder National Park in 2003 which led to an increase in poaching and illegal trade in wildlife products [14] [24] [29] .
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Table 1. Protected areas in Sudan [13] [24] .
Keeping in view, in Sudan the agricultural expansion is considered one of the greatest threats to the biological diversity and ecosystems in the country [24] [30] . Moreover, gold mining, the petroleum industry, conflicts, and low funds allocated for the protected areas conservation were also affecting the development and sustainability of wildlife and biodiversity conservation programs [31] In this regard, the USAID report of 2012 stated that the protected areas of Sudan are facing considerable pressure from degradation, poaching, and livestock encroachment. Later, the same agency added land-use competition among rural communities as another detrimental factor affecting protected areas [32] . The literature characterized the rural communities’ life patterns where they are largely depending on natural resources (e.g., forest products and bush meat). These resources in most time limited to meet the needs of the increasing population rate, which will eventually lead to conflicts and many other negative factors including wildfire, wildlife animal migration, and diversity loss [33] .
In the light of best monitoring and biodiversity conservation, the report of the World Conservation Monitoring Center of 1996 revealed that assessing wildlife diversity provides information about threatened species, endemic species, and geographic distribution of rich and rare species and hence will boost the biodiversity conservation and management efforts [34] . These kinds of information are essential to support decision-making and provide comprehensive indications for long-term monitoring and conservation planning [18] [35] [36] . Raising concern about the effectiveness of the protected areas system is emerging from increased interest in the status of many protected areas in the world. Accordingly, the Sudan government calls for frequent assessment and revision of all protected areas to make sure that they are effective in meeting the reservation goal and the other values for which they were established. While we have data deficiency and limited information on the status of protected areas in Sudan, cumulative evidence recommends that many are under pressure or are experiencing degradation and continuous loss of their biodiversity [13] .
On the other hand, regular wildlife monitoring programs in protected areas of Sudan are very limited due to the absence of rigorous and prescribed management plans, funding, and trained staff [18] . For instance, standard wildlife monitoring methods such as transect surveys; distance sampling, capture-mark-recapture methods, and camera trapping are all associated with many logistical burdens and thus have not yet been implemented in documenting wildlife populations in these protected areas. However, there were recent attempts to utilize road-encountered wildlife observations during patrolling missions inside the parks as wildlife survey methods. Despite the appeal of this method but has not been utilized in monitoring changes in wildlife populations in protected areas, particularly in JENP. Therefore, this study aims to evaluate changes in wildlife diversity in Jabel-Eldair National Park in Sudan’s savanna zone using patrolling observation records to determine changes from 2010 compared to 2018 and discuss the validity of using patrolling visits to assess wildlife change.
2. Materials and Methods
2.1. Study Area
The study was conducted in Jebel El-Dair National Park (JENP), Northern Kordofan State which is considered one of the important mountainous parks in Sudan. It was reserved in 2010 for the conservation of flora and fauna of the area. It covers an area of 314.45 Km2 which lays between 12˚21'N-12˚32'N and 30˚35'E-30˚35'E (Figure 1).Climatologically, JENP is located in the low rainfall woodland savanna on clay soil where the rainfall varies from 300 - 400 mm/year and the average summer temperature reaches 48˚C in March and April. Regarding the flora, the area lies in Acacia mellifera thorn land, where species composition is dominated by Acacia mellifera that stretches across a belt between Kassala and Gadarif westwards to Abu Habil clay basins and northern piedmonts of Nuba Mountains. Shrubs such as Cadaba glandulosa and Cadaba rotundifolia are common, while Boscia senegalensis, Balanities aegyptiaca, and Dichrostachys Cinerea are less common. The fauna of JENP is characterized by wild animal species that mainly consist of measo and small mammals including lesser kudu (Tragelaphus imberbis) which is considered one of the most threatened species around the globe in general and in Sudan in particular.
2.2. Data Collection and Analysis
This study was conducted using two types of data collection methods including:
1) review and analysis of patrolling reports and 2) interviews with wildlife experts using structured questionnaires. These methods were used to obtain necessary data and information on the status of JENP wildlife diversity and changes along with their drivers. On one hand, the patrolling reports of the park’s authority for the dry season (January-June) of the years 2010 and 2018 were identified, and reviewed, and observations (i.e. presence and number of individuals) for each species seen along the patrolling route were recorded. Eventually, these abundance data were extracted and analyzed, and changes in species richness, percent change in relative abundance, and abundance trend were derived. On the other hand, the interviews targeted wildlife experts & officers who have recently worked in or visited the park, researchers from the Wildlife Research Center, and wildlife officers from the Wildlife Protection Administrative Headquarters in Khartoum. Subsequently, the interviews with 20 wildlife officers and other researchers were conducted using a structured questionnaire which was developed to validate the patrolling reports regarding the presence and abundance of wildlife species in the park in 2010 and 2018 and to elucidate the threats.
3. Results
3.1. Current Status of Wildlife Groups in JENP
A total of 22 and 19 species have been detected during patrolling trips in the years 2010 and 2018, respectively (Figure 2). Mammals are considerably dominant representing 59 percent followed by birds at 27.3 percent then reptiles at 13.7 percent of the species observed.
3.2. Changes in Wildlife Diversity in JENP during 2010-2018
A total number of 100 individual animals were observed in the summer of 2010
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Figure 2. Number of species observed in JENR during patrolling trips in the summer of 2010 & 2018.
and 116 individual animals in 2018 representing three taxonomic groups (i.e. mammals, birds, and reptiles). Despite the 16 percent increase in the total number of individual animals detected during the two periods, however, species richness has declined from 22 species in 2010 to 19 species in 2018 (Figure 2). As such, three species including lion, wild dog, and crest porcupine disappeared from patrolling routes observations (see Table 2). Contrarily and despite the decline in numbers of some species, other species numbers have witnessed an increase such as lesser kudu, caracal, monitor, and lunar bird (Table 2). Overall and according to the observations during patrolling routes, the trend of wildlife abundance indicated that 50 percent of the species are increasing, 18 percent stable, and 32 percent declining (Table 3).
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Table 2. Seasonal presence and change in abundance for different wildlife species in JENP from January to June in the years 2010 and 2018.
3.3. Wildlife Threats in JENP
According to respondents’ responses in the structured questionnaire, several factors have affected and contributed to the current abundance and trend of wildlife species in Jebel-Eldair National Park (Figure 3). While there are about 40 percent of respondents stated human settlements and the formation of 18 new villages near the park is the most significant factor followed by tree logging (19 percent) and habitat deterioration (19 percent), but soil erosion and fire reported to have a minor and occasional effects (Figure 3).
4. Discussion
4.1. Drivers of Wildlife Changes in JENP during 2010-2018
The study addressed the potential of patrolling observation records in monitoring wildlife diversity in protected areas. Inferring from Table 2, there was a notable decline in species from 2010 to 2018 as about 14 percent of the species were not observed at all in the summer of 2018. Additionally, there were about five mammal species that became rare such as the jackal, spotted hyena, stripped hyena, serval, and civet in addition to the Siberian bird. Anthropogenic activities such as agricultural expansion, livestock grazing, and woodcutting have destroyed
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Table 3. Abundance trend for different wildlife species in Jebel-Eldair National Park during the period between 2010 and 2018.
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Figure 3. Respondents’ views on wildlife threats in JENP National Park.
their habitat and hence it may contribute to these noted changes. In this regard, Ali and Nimir [37] in the study in Dinder National Park have reported that many threats and anthropogenic factors have led to biodiversity decline in which the absence of a proper land use system in the vicinity of the park, increasing the displaced people, trespassing of pastoralists are characterizing the reasons. Although, these activities could have been practiced, in a sustainable and harmonized manner that leads to natural resources benefits sharing and best management practices. The essence of management activities serves to improve the status of the wildlife resources and address the needs of people who utilize this resource to the benefit of all including the management of demographics and economic conditions changes [38] . Therefore, the management of Jebel-Eldair National Park could be directed towards the enhanced balance between man and nature where humans can conserve nature and gain its services such as energy sources, creation of jobs in rural areas, sustainable use of natural resources, improving and modernizing agricultural production [39] [40] .
The Plethora of drivers depicted in Figure 3 has characterized the wildlife diversity decline and loss. The human settlements, habitat destruction by woodcutting, and farming activities in the surrounding area of Jebel-Eldair have been considered as main drivers. Generally, it could be said that higher population densities inhabit the eastern part of Jebel-Eldair have exert intensive pressure on the natural resources compared to other sides of the park. The topography of the eastern has eased the movement of people and their livestock to invade Jebel-Eldair National Park and consequently become a gate of uncontrolled exploitation of the anthropogenic activities inside Jebel-Eldair account of its natural resources leading to the complete depletion unless the best conservation and coherent management policies being applied.
4.1. Underlying Drivers of Wildlife Diversity
Moreover, the absence of local integrated natural resources management plans was found as another cause of wildlife diversity declining, because the forest authorities permit farming activities around the reserve without consultation with the wildlife administration [41] [42] [43] [44] . These activities are considered as most wildlife habitat destructive factors that reduce forest cover and hinder the migration process in and out of Jebel-Eldair nature reserve. Also, the local forest authorities are allowing tree-felling for charcoal production, because the majority of people depend on firewood as a main energy source for their cooking and lightening where the most preferred trees are Acacia Seyal, Pseudocedreal kotschyii, Combretum sp, and Anogeissus sp. This activity also leads to wildlife habitat destruction, which requires strict controlling measures for better conservation [40] [45] . The extensive cutting practice of the above-mentioned species would eventually affect their regeneration compared to the other tree species found within Jebel-Eldair Nature National Park.
Nevertheless, this study has some limitations which are related to data quality and validity of patrolling observation reports. For instance, the method assumes that animals that were not in the route during patrolling are absent and thus not available. Also, patrolling intensity, timing, and coverage are other determining factors in the observations.
5. Conclusion
The global concern about biological diversity especially in the areas that are in danger of wildlife loss such as the Savanna Mountains of Sudan has driven the initiation of this study to groom some wildlife databases through sound wildlife diversity assessment methods as well as appraising the feasibility of these methods for better and robust monitoring and conservation measures. From the adopted methods of wildlife tracking (season 2010 and season 2018) along with the expert observations, the findings have been drawn. Accordingly, a moderate to high biodiversity decline in the most important wildlife species especially lion, wild dog, and crest porcupine, and six other species were found rare such as civet, spotted hyena, striped hyena, jackal, seraval, and Siberian bird where only 18 (in 2018) out of 22 (in 2010) wildlife species that have been observed. Nevertheless, species like lesser kudu, caracal, monitor, and lunar birds have started to dominate. Many anthropogenic factors have driven wildlife diversity changes including human settlements, and agricultural and livestock grazing activities. The study recommends that there is a need for solid conservation strategies along with wildlife law enforcement by conservation authorities, raising local communities’ consciousness and development and adopting modern technologies for wildlife monitoring such as remote sensing, GIS, radio collars, camera traps, and acoustic monitoring to boost the management planning and inform decision-makers. This study presents an innovative, cost-effective method by integrating patrol records with expert interviews to track wildlife population dynamics and anthropogenic impacts in JENP. This approach facilitates strategic conservation planning and offers a model for global biodiversity monitoring, advancing conservation practices; further studies must pay attention to the limitations of the method and develop robust designs for it.
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to thank the contributions of the Wildlife Research Center and wildlife officers from the Wildlife Protection Administrative Headquarters in Khartoum. Many thanks are given to the colleagues who participated directly or indirectly in the data collection and analysis process.