Towards sustainable game bird management by rural communities in Laikipia, KenyaTitus Adhola1, Dr. Nicholas Georgiadis2 & Dr. Penn Llyod3

1. National Museums of Kenya, 2. Mpala Research Center, 3. University of Cape Town

Rationale

This project was prompted by recognition of four deficiencies:

1. Considerable but unrealised potential exists for rural communities in semi-arid areas to derive economic benefit from sport hunting of game birds.

2. To manage game birds sustainably, knowledge of their local ecology and population dynamics is required. 3. Game bird management capacity and experience is lacking in Kenya. 4. Vulturine guineafowl population biology has never been studied in the wild.

Approach

The following methods are being used:

1. Distance Sampling was to estimate guineafowl densities. Both guineafowl species are being censused within strata on 4 properties in Laikipia: Mpala, Ol Jogi-Pyramid, Elkarama and Ol Pejeta.

2. MODIS NDVI is used as a surrogate for rainfall in assessing the association between Guineafowl abundance and rainfall.

3. Satellite imagery and NDVI will be used to ‘predict’ distribution of guineafowls after a sustained period of distribution data collection.

Preliminary Results

1. Surveys done so far indicate helmeted guineafowl are more widespread than vulturine guineafowl in Laikipia (Fig. 2), with highest densities at Elkarama and lowest at Mpala (Fig. 3).

2. Vulturine Guineafowls have so far been recorded only at Mpala and Oljogi, but the densities do not differ between the two properties (Fig. 2).

3. Mean and variance of NDVI values successffully discriminate all but one sighting location of the two species (Fig. 4).

Property

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VulturineHelmeted

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Fig. 3. Densities of guineafowl species on different properties

Future

1. Further sampling will include drier areas to the northeast (Samburu Reserve);2. We will add remote sensing imagery to increase the number of variables used in discriminating habitat preferences between the two species;3. Addition of breeding success data may highlight different responses by the two species to rainfall;4. Experience gained in censusing game birds will be applied in game bird management on community land.

Fig 1. Vulturine (left) and Helmeted Guineafowl (right) co-occur in parts of Laikipia District, and not in others. What factors control their distribution and abundance?

Sponsors: The Research Programme for Sustainable Use of Dryland Biodiversity (RPSUD), Nancy and Lambeth Townsend, and the National

Museums of Kenya. James Osundwa provided GIS assistance.

Objectives

Focusing on two closely related game bird species Helmeted Guineafowl Numida meleagris and Vulturine Guineafowl Acryllium vulturinum ( Fig. 1) which coexist in the Laikipia region of central Kenya, objectives were to:

1. Compare the densities, population dynamics, habitat associations, and breeding seasonality of the two species, along a rainfall gradient.

2. Develop and implement methods for monitoring their populations that are suitable for management purposes.3. Assess the potential for game bird management on some of the group ranches in the region.

Fig. 4. Discriminant analysis based on means and standard deviations of Modis NDVI values at each sighting location correctly classified all sightings of helmeted guineafowl (filled circles) and all sighting of vulturine guineafowl (open circles) but one (arrowed). This suggests the quantity and variance of rainfall influences guineafowl species’ distribution.

Mpala A

Mpala BMpala C

Ol Jogi

Elkarama

Ol Pejeta

Laikipia

Kenya

Fig. 2, left: Locations where helmeted and vulturine guineafowl have been sighted on the focal properties in Laikipia.

Right: mean NDVI map of the same area, showing the rainfall gradient from south-west to north-east.