Sunday 10 February 2013

African elephants prefer Serengeti National Park


By Michelle Warwicker, BBC Nature

Wild African elephants prefer to live in safer, protected areas and become stressed when they leave them.

Scientists have found African elephants living outside Serengeti National Park are more stressed than those within the protected area.

More elephants also choose to live inside the park, suggesting they "know" which areas are safer to live in, and actively avoid humans.

Details are published in the African Journal of Ecology.

Serengeti National Park helps protect animals from threats such as illegal hunting and habitat disturbance.

With no fences around protected areas in the Serengeti, animals and people may come and go, and elephants can enter into areas where they are at greater risk.

The study aimed to determine African elephants' (Loxodonta africana) welfare inside Serengeti National Park and in the partially-protected adjoining areas of Grumeti Game Reserve and Ikoma Open Area, where human disturbance is greater.


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