His Life Also Matters!
When elephant population control programmes are disrupted in our national parks, it directly causes the breakdown and destruction of biodiversity that contributes to the extinction of species such as bush babies.
Habitat destruction in national parks—across all types of habitats—occurs when excessive elephant populations significantly reduce the number of top canopy trees and other vegetation.
These trees are also host to various insect species such as butterflies and moths. and also provide shade and habitat for various mammals, birds, reptiles, insects and plants.
This destruction has led elephants to either completely eradicate or severely threaten many tree species in Kruger Park, causing the loss of numerous complex and essential habitats.
For instance, since 1960, the number of top canopy trees in Kruger National Park, along with the various habitats tied to woodlands, has been significantly reduced affecting biodiversity.
*Consider these facts:
In 1944, the Kruger Park authority set up a representative top-canopy tree study in the Satara area with the objective to over time, study any changes that might be taking place in the overall and, at that time, widespread deciduous woodland habitats of the park as a whole. In 1944, it was determined that there were 13 top-canopy trees per hectare in the study area. Due to increasing elephant pressure over 50 years, however, this number of top-canopy trees per hectare in the study area, showed a steadily drop:
- 1955 – 13 top-canopy trees/ha in the study area
- 1965 – 9 top-canopy trees/ha in the study area
- 1967 – 6 top-canopy trees/ha in the study area
- 1974 – 3 top-canopy trees/ha in the study area
- 1981 – 1,5 top-canopy trees/ha in the study area
- 1994 – 0 top-canopy trees/ha in the study area
*Reference Natshoot website
