Consequences of a pastoralist incursion on large mammal space use in Loisaba Conservancy-northern Kenya

"Pastoralists and large mammals regularly compete over access to grazing lands. This has been true historically and is particularly relevant in the present day. In the 21st century, competition between livestock and wildlife has increased in frequency given that grazing lands are rapidly dwindling (due to habitat fragmentation and human range expansion) and drying up (via the processes of desertification fueled by climate change). These dynamics are particularly apparent in East Africa and perhaps most obvious in northern Kenya. In February of 2017, a point source pastoralist incursion occurred in Laikipia County, Kenya. An estimated 40,000 livestock grazed onto Loisaba Conservancy by armed pastoralists. The livestock resided on the 226km2 conservancy land for four months before departing to the north. Using a broad scale camera trapping system (53 sites distributed across the conservancy), I compared patterns in site visitation rates for large mammalian herbivores that rely on grazing, browsing, and mixed feeding life histories directly before, during, and after this livestock incursion. The camera traps were active for 379 camera-trap weeks and 2,653 camera-trap nights. I recorded a total of 2,200 site visits of large mammalian herbivores. I fit spatially-explicit Bayesian site visitation models to these data to evaluate the effects of the pastoralist incursion on space use of seven large herbivore species. I found stark contrasts in patterns of site visitation rates for all large herbivores across the three time periods. My results indicate that the incursion considerably changed space use of large herbivores and altered their association with a variety of landscape features, including human settlements and water access points. Competition between pastoralists and wildlife is predicted to intensify in the future, emphasizing the importance of assessing the consequences of these interactions. I discuss the implications of this competition for wildlife conservation, pastoralist livelihoods, and the role of grazing lands in modulating interactions of pastoralist livestock and large mammals."--Page ii.