Wildlife Conservation in South Africa

We are excited to share Michelle D’Alessandro’s international experience below, funded by Dr. Thomas Mack. 

Through the support of the Global Engagement Program, I had the opportunity to visit South Africa and work with some of its most notable species firsthand through Live4Now- W!ld Vets. Whether it was game capture days of giraffes and antelope species, learning how to dart moving targets from a helicopter, performing a necropsy on a baboon, or volunteering with vaccination clinics for dogs in rural villages, I was able to hone some of my clinical skills and develop various new ones on some very incredible species. I learned about South Africa’s wildlife medicine and conservation strategies through lectures and tours, including BioBanks, efforts to interrupt the exotic animal trade, and anti-poaching efforts. Two lectures specifically stuck out to me when working to understand the One Health battle the South African government faces. The first was learning how the rural communities around large game reserves lose their valuable livestock to leopards that escape the fenced-in reserves at night to hunt an easy target: Cattle. Come sunrise, the leopard is long gone, and the vultures are caught feasting on the carcass. Very readily and understandably, the villagers who did not receive formal education on food chains assumed the vultures were the culprits and began mass poisonings for revenge. Additionally, poachers learned that vultures give away their location, and they, too, began poisoning vultures to decrease the risk of being caught. Vultures are being targeted and killed in masses, with each poisoning incident affecting anywhere from 50 to 500 birds at a time. These intentional attacks have led to a detrimental decline in their population, placing many on the Endangered Species List. Losing scavengers on the food chain significantly increases the risk of disease, as the bacteria on rotting carcasses can affect the soil and water for local communities, especially those that rely on a sound system. Government veterinarians are working to educate students, creating rehabilitation centers, and game reserves have developed vulture restaurants where safe meat products are provided daily for vultures to feast on to counteract the loss of a species and the risk of infectious diseases. Wildlife monitors have surveillance programs for nests and place GPS monitors on individuals to track movement. The second incident that stuck out was discovering that certain game reserves, like Kruger, the country’s first game reserve, restricted access to the river for local communities and their livestock. In addition to losing a water source, the soil in these nearby communities can only sometimes support enough pasture for grazing. These challenges are in the face of the buffalo population within Kruger, which serves as a reservoir for Foot-in-Mouth Disease (FMD). So, significant effort went into educating people, implementing gated access for the locals to bring their cattle to the river to drink while supervised, and providing free vaccinations to ensure the livestock’s health and welfare. However, the local people only sometimes follow the guidelines and often leave their cattle in the game reserve unattended for days to drink and feed, increasing their exposure to FMD and leading to several breakouts that can have catastrophic results on One Health. The most important aspect of this trip was that the financial cost to attend the program went on to fund and support developed wildlife centers and contributed to their programs aimed to aid in both wildlife conservation medicine and the One Health objective. Being a part of the initiative to fight for wildlife and seeing how resilient animals can be in the face of anthropogenic disturbances has been a life-altering and inspiring experience. I am so grateful to the donors, especially Dr. Thomas Mack, for making these experiences possible for students.