ALERT | The Lion Rehabilitation & Release into the Wild Program: Stage Three

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ALERT Communities Trust (ACT) and Conservation Centre for Wild Africa (CCWA)

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The Lion Rehabilitation & Release into the Wild Program

Introduction Stage One Stage Two Stage Three Stage Four
Husbandry & Veterinary Lions in the Program

Stage Three

In stage three the pride in stage two will be darted and moved into a larger area with a greater variety of game species, and more importantly, competitive species such as hyena will be introduced.

The pride will live out a near-wild life in the managed eco-system. This pride will give birth to cubs that will be raised within a natural pride social system, in a near-wild environment and free of any human contact. As such they will gain the skills and have the human avoidance behaviours necessary for their successful reintroduction into the unfenced wild of stage four.

If necessary, cub production in stage three can be controlled by the use of temporary contraception implants. To maintain gene flow within our stage three release prides, pride males can be regularly replaced by unrelated males from other release areas.

Land for the first 10,000-acre stage three release area has been secured in the Dambwa Forest just outside the town of Livingstone in Zambia through a lease agreement and a Forestry Concession Agreement.

An EIA was completed and submitted to the Environmental Council of Zambia (ECZ) on 25th February 2008. ECZ made their decision to give the go ahead for the project on 30th May 2008. This is what they said:

“The ECZ has since reviewed the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) and based on the information provided by yourselves and from written and verbal statements by interested and affected parties and our site verification inspection findings, we have approved your project proposal.”

Statement by Mr C.M. Taulo, Principal Extension Officer for the Zambian Forestry Commission

The Department supports the project for the following reasons:

>    Protection of forests against destructive human activities has been a very challenging task for the Department over the years and there is no success story to tell about it;

> The Department therefore sees this project as an opportunity to enhance forest protection and recovery – especially in that it has been proposed for a site that was already set aside for total protection and rehabilitation;

>    The Department also sees, the proposed financial benefits to local communities as another opportunity to realize the objective of enhancing the forest’s contribution to people’s socio-economic welfare, one of the objectives of Joint Forestry Management Plan;

>    The Department also notes that the project would have benefits to the nation through increased earnings from enhanced tourism products.

Several other sites are under consideration as suitable stage three release areas in a number of countries.

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