Panic at the disco: solar-powered strobe light barriers reduce field incursion by African elephants Loxodonta africana in Chobe District, Botswana TEMP E S. F. ADAMS ,I SAIAH MWEZI and NEI L R. JORDAN


Abstract Managing interactions between humans and wild elephants is a complex problem that is increasing as a result of agricultural and urban expansion into and alongside pro- tected areas. Mitigating negative interactions requires the development of new tools to reduce competition and pro- mote coexistence. Many studies have tested various mitiga- tion techniques across elephant ranges in Africa and Asia, with varying levels of success. Recently, strobe lights have been suggested as a potential mitigation strategy in deterring African lionsPanthera leo fromkraals or bomas, but this tech- nique has to date not been tested to reduce negative human– elephant interactions. Over a 2-year period (November 2016– June 2018),we tested the effectiveness of solar-powered strobe light barriers in deterring African elephants Loxodonta afri- cana, in collaboration with 18 farmers in a community ad- jacent to the Chobe Forest Reserve and Chobe National Park in northern Botswana. Although elephants were more like- ly to pass by fields with solar-powered strobe light barriers (which was probably a result of selection bias as we focused on fields that had previously been damaged by elephants), theywere less likely to enter these treatment fields than con- trol fields without such barriers. Our findings demonstrate the efficacy of light barriers to reduce negative human– elephant interactions in rural communities.


Keywords African elephant, Botswana, conservation, human– elephant conflict, human–wildlife interactions, Loxodonta afri- cana, mitigation, solar-powered strobe light barrier


Plotnik, 2018). Consequently, there is a growing need to de- velop, test and implement effective mitigation methods that reduce such interactions (Karidozo&Osborn, 2015;Mumby &Plotnik, 2018; Shaffer et al., 2019). Management of negative human–wildlife interactions requires a holistic approach that considers social and cultural aspects, combined with political support, to implement meaningful and successful mitigation (Demotts & Hoon, 2012;Hoare, 2015;Adams et al., 2017b). Although the drivers of these so-called human–wildlife con- flicts are complex, and include social, historical and economic factors, there is a dearth of technical solutions to these prob- lems (Webber et al., 2007; Mackenzie & Ahabyona, 2012; Kansky & Knight, 2014; Shaffer et al., 2019). Many wildlife species come into conflict with humans, in


Introduction H


uman population increase and rapid urbanization are resulting in increased negative interactions between


people and elephants across their range (Osborn & Parker, 2003; Kansky & Knight, 2014; Ngama et al., 2016;Mumby &


TEMPE S. F. ADAMS* (Corresponding author, orcid.org/0000-0001-9824-8028)


and ISAIAH MWEZI Elephants Without Borders, PO Box 682, Kasane, Botswana E-mail tempe@unsw.edu.au


NEIL R. JORDAN*( orcid.org/0000-0002-0712-8301) Taronga Institute for Science and Learning, Taronga Conservation Society Australia, Dubbo, Australia


*Also at: Centre of Ecosystem Science, School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of New SouthWales, Sydney, Australia


Received 17 April 2019. Revision requested 23 September 2019. Accepted 25 September 2019. First published online 3 July 2020.


a wide variety of situations (Balmford et al., 2001;Crespin & Simonetti, 2019). One of the most iconic species involved in negative interactions with humans is the African elephant Loxodonta africana, which is forced into closer contact with people as more of the species’ historical range is trans- formed to accommodate a rapidly expanding human popula- tion (Hoare, 2015). As a result human–elephant interactions, including human–elephant conflicts, which are broadly de- fined as any interaction which ‘results in negative effects on human, social, economic, or cultural life, on elephant conser- vation, or on the environment’ (Parker et al., 2007,p. 11), are increasingly common. The best approach to reduce such in- teractions is to prevent them, for example through careful land-use allocation that does not encourage crop production adjacent to wildlife areas. However, inmost of the elephant’s range the opportunity for land-use planning that takes into account the needs of wildlife has been missed and most land has already been allocated and developed (Gunaryadi et al., 2017). It is thus necessary to implement effective miti- gation methods to manage human–elephant interactions. Competition for resources can have a complex and long-


term impact on the livelihoods of communities who live amongst elephants (Mayberry et al., 2017). Incidents are often most common where elephants occur in large num- bers and where protected areas abut agricultural fields (Mackenzie & Ahabyona, 2012; Hoare, 2015; Shaffer et al., 2019). Negative interactions can result in biodiversity loss, damage to property, social costs (including loss of income), and loss of human and elephant lives (Parker et al., 2007; Mackenzie & Ahabyona, 2012; Hoare, 2015). There is thus a need across the elephant’s range for effective and low- cost methods for keeping elephants out of fields, especially


This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Oryx, 2021, 55(5), 739–746 © The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Fauna & Flora International doi:10.1017/S0030605319001182


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