Browsing by Author "Levi, Matana"

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Design of the data-driven software application for identification, population monitoring, and risk assessment for lions in Serengeti Tanzania
(International Academy of Ecology and Environmental Sciences, 2024-09) Okey, Ambokile; Nyambo, Devotha; Kaijage, Shubi; Masenga, Emmanuel; Levi, Matana
This study presents a design of a Data-Driven software application for identification, population monitoring, and risk assessment for lions in Serengeti Tanzania. Lions’ populations have been declining due to poaching, overhunting, and other ecosystem factors resulting in unmet demands for tourism and ecological balance. Data-driven techniques can lower the negative consequences by providing mechanisms for lions’ management, risk assessment, and monitoring in selected wildlife reserves. Lion’s whisker spots, poaching rates, prey availability, human-conflict incidences, and pride size are key elements for achieving management, identification, monitoring, and risk assessment for lions. The software application design aimed at providing conceptual and logical requirements for the development of the application that will enhance lions’ monitoring and management efforts to protect their existence and contribution to the ecosystem. The study was conducted in the Serengeti ecosystem, including ecologists from the Tanzania Wildlife Research Institute Serengeti Wildlife Research Center, and information systems analysts. Through a mixed research methods approach, qualitative methods and incremental prototyping software development life cycle model were used to develop the specific requirements. Unified Modeling Language (UML) was used to model the requirements and led to the realization of design diagrams: application framework, database design, and artificial intelligence model workflows. The application should equip ecologists with tools to add and identify specific lions, monitor sightings, estimate population trends, assess risks for individual lions, and produce reports on monitoring and sightings. This design serves as a foundation for developing the data-driven software application for identification, population monitoring, and risk assessment for lions in Serengeti National Park Tanzania which will enhance monitoring and management activities of lions’ population non-invasively.
Forage selection by Masai giraffes (Giraffa camelopardalis tippelskirchi) at multiple spatial scales
(Oxford University Press, 2022-03-12) Levi, Matana; Lee, Derek; Bond, Monica
Management of rangelands requires knowledge of forage species that are preferred or avoided by wildlife and livestock. A recent expansion of woody vegetation into previously open grasslands in African savanna ecosystems negatively impacts many mammalian grazers. Nevertheless, the ecological role of bush encroacher plant species as food may present a benefit for browsing species. We quantified diet selection by Masai giraffes (Giraffa camelopardalis tippelskirchi) through foraging observations and vegetation sampling in the Tarangire Ecosystem of Tanzania, which includes large areas of a native shrub that livestock managers have classified as an encroacher species (Dichrostachys cinerea). We compared woody plant species used by giraffes for foraging with availability at two different spatial scales during the wet and dry seasons. Giraffes selected some woody plants such as Vachellia species while significantly avoiding others, both at the local and landscape scales. Giraffes preferred foraging on D. cinerea at both spatial scales and in both the wet and dry seasons. Management that has focused on benefiting grazing livestock by removal of encroaching species (e.g., D. cinerea) may have unintended consequences for wildlife, especially for browsing species like giraffes that feed extensively on the expanding bush species.
Giraffe foraging ecology in the Tarangire Manyara ecosystem, Tanzania
(NM-AIST, 2022-08) Levi, Matana
Management of rangelands requires knowledge of forage species that are preferred or avoided by wildlife and livestock. The recent and rapid transformation of habitat by humans has led to increased concerns about the proper management of rangelands. In East African savanna ecosystems, the expansion of woody vegetation into previously open grasslands has led some rangeland managers to advocate for the active removal of native bushes to maintain grazing lawns in African savanna ecosystems. However, little is known about how browsing herbivores might benefit from the ingrowth of woody vegetation. Diet selection by the Masai giraffe (Giraffa camelopardalis tippelskirchi) was quantified in the Tarangire Manyara Ecosystem of Tanzania. Instantaneous scan sampling was used to quantify foraged woody plant species and compare those data with proportions of available woody plant species at two different spatial scales during a wet and dry season and between areas of different protection statuses. Study results showed that giraffes demonstrated strong selection towards some woody plant species while avoiding others, both at the local and the landscape scale. Giraffes preferentially used more forage species in less protected areas (8 forage species) than in a fully protected area (only 1 species). At both spatial scales, giraffes significantly preferred the shrub Dichrostachys cinerea, a species that livestock managers have classified as encroacher species needing removal. This preference was visible in the wet and dry seasons. The results of this study suggest that browsing wildlife species such as giraffes may be adversely affected by the removal of D. cinerea from rangelands and that managing for grazing livestock only could negatively impact browsing wildlife on mixed-use lands.