April 7, 2023 • 31 mins
Amazing Wildlife is highlighting one of San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance's eight areas of conservation focus: the Savanna hub! Hosts Rick and Marco are joined by Shivani Bhalla and Toby Otieno, two members of Ewaso Lions, a Lion conservation project located in northern Kenya. Our guests explain why some male lions in Kenya do not have manes—and live alone, rather than in prides. They also discuss the challenges that lions have been facing over the years, as well as the efforts currently in place to protect this iconic species.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hi, I'm Rick Schwartz and I'm Marco went Welcome to
Amazing Wildlife, where we explore unique stories of wildlife from
around the world and uncover fascinating animal facts. This podcast
is a production of iHeartRadio and San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance,
an international nonprofit conservation organization which oversees the San Diego
Zoo and Safari Park. Last season, we highlighted a specific
(00:26):
species of wildlife. Every week we discuss interesting facts and
conservation information about the species as well. This season of
Amazing Wildlife, Marco and I are going to explore the
San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliances conservation hubs, and in this
episode we're focused on the Savannah Hub. Yeah, you know what,
maybe now's a good time to explain to everyone what
a conservation hub is. Good point, Marco, how would you
(00:50):
describe a conservation hub. It's a pretty awesome concept. I
got to say. You know, a conservation hub represents a
region of focus for San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliances conservation efforts.
So these efforts include working with other zoos, other conservation organizations.
You share knowledge with international communities and it's building collaborative
(01:10):
partnerships that have lasting impact on survival and the well
being of life on our planet. And I think it's
worth mentioning that we focus on eight different hubs that
are all over the world. For example, we have the
Southwest Hub right here in our own backyard, the Amazonia
Hub in South America, the African Forest Hub and Savannah
Hub also in Africa, the Asian Rainforest Hub, the Australian
(01:32):
Forest Hub, the Pacific Island Hub, and the one that
covers the most area, stretching across both northern and southern hemispheres,
the Ocean Hub. That's an epic one. And oh man,
I'm super pumped for this episode direct because I know
you've spent some time in Africa, right and you've even
visited with some of our conservation partners while you were there. Yeah,
(01:52):
I'm excited to Marco. And yes, I was fortunate enough
to spend some time in Kenya a few years ago,
and I'm thrilled to be able to share with everyone
what I experienced in the Savannah Hub. For example, I
had no idea before my time there that one area
of Kenya some lions do not live in a pride,
but instead live a more solitary life. So what that
means basically is, as we generally know, lions are one
(02:14):
of the few social cats. They live in a pride,
usually one big male protecting several females and the females
and raising the young. But here they live solitary lives
where they're not protected by a pride or a single
male protecting a bunch of females. Oh yeah, I know.
I mean when I first heard about this shift in
line social behavior, I thought, how awesome can nature be?
(02:35):
How it's constantly adapting and evolving and get this, male
lions in a certain region of Kenya do not have manes. Dude,
I've heard about that, but I've never really figured out
the howls and the wise of it. Honestly, I think
the lack of a mane might have been attached to
their genetics, But the solitary lifestyle that has me curious too.
(02:55):
Yeah right, but wait, you were there, so when you
saw the lions, were they in a pride? No, the
lions we did see tended to be solitary, meaning there
by themselves or sometimes two lions. And to be clear,
this is in and around the Samburu National Reserve just
over two hundred miles to the north of Nairobi. The
African Savannah is massive and this is just one region
(03:16):
within the country of Kenya. Well, I mean, gets a Sando.
Why is this happening? It sounds like the lions aren't
acting like lions we're all familiar with. I wonder like,
what has happened that has caused a change in behavior
like that. I mean, lions everywhere else, or at least
as far as I know, tend to live in pride.
So is this all connected to the main less males? Well,
(03:40):
I can tell we piqued your curiosity, Marco, and instead
of me trying to tell you what I think is correct,
I'd rather talk to someone who knows a lot more
about these lions. Oh yeah, what do you think in Atlanta? Well,
I'm thinking that someone from Kenya who is familiar with
the lions around the Samburu National Reserve, someone who saw
a need to have the local communities participate in lion conservation,
(04:03):
maybe even someone who is currently managing lion research. I
am Chevannibala, the executive director of iwasa lions. I am Tobiato,
Director of Operations and Impact Iwasallions is a lion conservation
project located in northern Kenya. We get our name from
(04:26):
this huge river called the Iwasa near A River, and
so we are protecting lions all across this amazing, beautiful
river that snakes its way throughout northern Kenya. Well, so
you're currently there out in the savannah. We're right on
top of a hill, which is why it's quite windy
right now, and right next to us is the huge
(04:49):
Iwasa near A River. It's below our hill. Can you
give our audience some perspective on what your campus like
and how far out or for lack of a better term,
in the wild you are right now. Yeah, we're very
far away from any type of city or town. The
closest town is two hours away, and our closest you know,
(05:10):
where we get supplies and everything from, it's probably we're
talking between two to four hours away. So we're in
a beautiful place up in northern Kenya. Oh yeah, I
mean we can hear the wind a little bit too. Now.
I know Rick has been to your camp before, but
can you tell me a little bit about it. We
have majority tents, i'd say all tents in camp with
(05:32):
shades covering them where we can collect rain water. And
then we have a couple of permanent structures, a kitchen,
a lower office, and then at the top of the
hill we have a big sort of mess area which
is a permanent structure and another permanent office. So yeah,
we've got a combination of permanent structures and tents and container.
(05:57):
So I'm actually living in a container, which is where
we are right now. It's a converted container home. Chavanni
and Tobia, I appreciate all you have done to make
sure we can connect with you while you're out there
in your camp doing the amazing work you do. Yeah, definitely,
thank you both so much. Now, Marco and I were
talking about some of the interesting things I observed when
(06:19):
I visited you a few years back. But before we
get into those questions, I would love for you to
share with us when and why did you start your
lion conservation work. We started a wassa lions back in
two thousand and seven when we realized that lions across
the African continent were in serious trouble. There's only about
(06:40):
twenty thousand lions left in Africa, and here in our country, Kenya,
we believe there's only about two thousand and five hundred lions.
No one had any idea what was happening with the
lion population in northern Kenya. So that's when we decided
to start a Wassa Lions to try and understand what
is happening with the lion population here and what can
(07:02):
we do to secure its future for generations to come.
Oh wow, I mean I knew the lions had challenges
in the wild, but only twenty thousand left in all
of Africa. That's heartbreaking. In your years of work there
in Kenya, have you found why their numbers are so low.
Lions are struggling from a whole number of threats. It
(07:25):
differs all across Africa up here in Northern Kenya. It's
a couple of reasons why their numbers are declining. Habitat loss.
They're just running out of space. It gets much harder
and harder for them to move from one place to
another because their habitat is shrinking. They also come into
contact with local communities a lot, especially when they're moving
(07:46):
from one place to another, and often lack of prey
they just don't have enough food available is a big
challenge for them, and they will target the community's livestock. Cows, camels, donkeys, goats,
and sheep often are much easier for lions, and when
they do kill a cow or a camel, understandably for
(08:06):
the livestock owner, whose entire life and survival depends on
his livestock, he's very angry and often lions are shot
in retaliation. So these were some of the first threats
that we were addressing when we started. It was Alliance
in two thousand and seven, and over time the threats
are changing. Now we're dealing with large scale infrastructure, development, disease,
(08:31):
climate change, So the threats just change over time, and
we're constantly adapting and being flexible trying to address these
challenges so communities can continue to coexist with lions like
they have for generations. And some of these changes are
brought about by the changes that even like this community
where you work, the way people do things are actually
(08:53):
now changing these eta. For example, before like ten twenty
years ago, there were more major roads coming in. Now
the development of like canoe infrastructure the government itself is
planning or which already started opening. There's like a new road,
a railway line is coming, a pipeline is coming, and
these are the things that are actually changing the liveload
(09:13):
of the people and actually changing the landscape of the lions.
And those are the new threats which want I've talked
about that are actually facing the loans right rally work
at the moment. Yeah, that's a lot of challenges. It
almost feels overwhelming when you see all these obstacles stacking
up one after the other after the other. It would
be really hard to know the best place to start
(09:34):
when it comes to helping out these lines. Yeah, I
know what you mean. But when I was there, I
learned a wassa lions started with the people, not the lions.
It was the local communities and specifically the warriors who
hunted lions that killed livestock that ended up being the
first piece of the puzzle. Shivani, What was the thought
process behind working with the warriors and how did that
(09:55):
even start. The whole concept of bringing warriors on board
into conservation was actually initiated by a young Samburu warrior himself.
Warriors are young men within the Samburu society who are
aged between about fifteen to thirty years old and their
role is protection. It's security it's keeping their livestock safe,
(10:17):
it's keeping their villagers safe, keeping their families safe. Yet
they'd never ever been involved in conservation or had ever
been asked to be involved. So when we saw that
lions were really being threatened by warriors were often implicated
when it came to killing of lions. Genera Leule a
young warrior back then, he was only nineteen years old.
(10:38):
He said to me, if we want to stop the
killing of lions, we've got to involve my demographic, the
young Samburu warrior generation, and so he started this program
called Warrior Watch. This was back in twenty ten and
Jenerarya started working with five warriors, and over time the
number of warriors grew and really transformed the way they
(10:59):
think about lions. Often they thought there were so many lions,
they didn't think conservation was even needed. They didn't know
so many lions were disappearing, and Generator worked with them,
trained them, and their main responsibility was really to keep
livestock safe. So they would have to track lions, know
exactly where the lions were every single day on foot,
(11:21):
and they would communicate that message to livestock owners and
say don't take your cows or camels here, because there's
lions in these bushes. Let's keep your livestock safe. And
so through keeping livestock safe, the warriors were keeping lions safe.
They also monitor the lions in vehicles, and every single
lion is named throughout this landscape, named after a personality
(11:42):
that the lion might have. The warriors named them, the
rest of our team named them, the community named them,
and every lion is individually known by the warriors and
the rest of our team, so they have ownership over
the lions and this landscape and keeping the lions safe
and keeping their livestock safe. What has made this program
really work was the fact that it was originated and
(12:04):
the idea came from a warrior himself. He's not a
warrior anymore. He keeps calling himself a massa, an elder now.
He's a junior elder now. And what's exciting is that
we have a new generation of warriors that joined us
a couple of years ago, So it's exciting to see
how we've sort of come full circle. New warriors have
taken on board the lion tracking and have come in
(12:26):
with so much energy and passion, and they're very different
to the old group of warriors that it's very exciting
to see that. Yeah, agreed, that is such a great
story in all of it just coming full circle, isn't
it though, And especially with Jenera seeing as a young
warrior that his demographic, the ones that hunted lions needed
to be engaged for this community conservation to actually work. Yeah,
(12:49):
you mentioned the warriors will track the lions and locate them,
but no longer hunt them. How do they track them
and what do they do once they find them. The
way we do this thing is knowing where their alliance
are fasting in the morning, and we use that by
using their knowledge of tracking of animals, and we also
(13:10):
use technology in this case. You go like a number
of alliance with GPS collars on them and so that
can actually also tel as we are the alliance are
and then communicating that back to the orders. And sometimes
they have to actually sit down where these particular lions
are and wait around so that if they see like
any livestock edding around that area, they can actually turn
(13:30):
them away. Hey, look there's a lion in there door
and like trouble, So actually take your livestock to a
different place, and that has been working when conflict does
take place, So if a cow or camera unfortunately is killed,
the warriors are the first responders. They're very quick at responding,
making sure that no one will go out and retaliate.
(13:51):
And it's a really hard thing to do, and Generator
is so skilled at this. I feel like he's quite
an extraordinary person to be able to calm down such
an angry person who's lost a camel or a cow.
He manages to calm them down, calm the tensions, and
convince them not to kill the lions. And he's now
training the rest of the team and the Warriors to
do just that. It's a very hard thing to do,
(14:13):
but our team is very skilled at this, just calming tensions.
This community based conservation that you have implemented with the
Warrior Watch program is truly remarkable to be a community
that once hunted the lion to now being a community
that protects them. It really is a model that other
cultures could learn from. And one of the other things
that is very interesting about this program, the Warrior Watch
(14:36):
program is the way it set up, and this is
the same to all the other programs you're on, is
that it actually relies more on the culture or the
traditions of this community. You see, for example, the water
Watch program. It was started, but already the warriors themselves
acknowledge about lions. So what we did, what the water
(14:58):
Watch program did was actually give like a different perspective
of looking at the lions. And that is the old
idea of the Oria Watch. Using the knowledge and skills
of the community, the knowledge of skills of the warriors
to actually do a different thing. Rather than going and
tracking these loons to kill them after they've killed their livestock,
(15:19):
is actually now using the same same knowledge and information
to actually attract them to protect them. This is so great.
I mean when I think a warrior, I think a
warrior protects those she or they care for, and in
this case not only cattle, but the lions as well.
And get this, Marco, I was introduced to the mama
simbas or lion mothers when I was there. As I recall,
(15:40):
the women of the tribes and surrounding communities wanted to
contribute to protecting the wildlife as well. Nice I love
the name Mama Simba. By the way, with the warriors
tracking the lions, what do the mama simbas do well,
I'd rather have Hivanni share with everyone the story of
the Mama Simba. I am sure she'll tell the story
better than I can. What do you think, Hivanni. So
Mama Simba started about three years after the Warrior program,
(16:04):
and it was started by two extraordinary women mentally in Paris,
roy again young Samburu women, and I remember they kept
coming up to our old camp at the bottom of
the hill, sitting there waiting for us all day every day, saying,
why are we not involved in conservation and why are
you only working with warriors. We can also do conservation
(16:24):
just like the warriors do. And they really persevered and
they kept coming until it got to a stage where
we said, right, let's you know, start your program, start
the program that you want to see, and we'll support you.
And that was really the beginning of Mama Simba. And
the Samburu women believe that why life belonged to them anyway. Culturally,
(16:47):
they have a huge belief that while life belonged to them,
but it was taken away from them. They all escaped
and it wasn't theirs anymore, and so they believed that
drew Mama Simba, while life have now come back to
them and they have a huge role to play in that.
And it's quite exciting because we've just launched a new
vision of Mama Simba because the program had been running
(17:09):
for about nine years and as I said, things have
changed so much in this landscape. So now their roles
are they're doing so much. They're out doing drought management,
They're digging water holes for wildlife. They are doing a
lot of lion habitat recovery work, so they're clearing invasive species.
They're trying to plant trees in certain areas to see
(17:33):
if we can regenerate some areas that have been lost previously.
They're planting grass. They're doing lots of cultural and coexistence
meetings with youth and women. They're supporting our Kurras Pride program,
our Lion Kids camp programs. The women are unstoppable right
They're out every single day and they're so excited and
(17:53):
passionate about what they do. And there's really no end
to what Mama Simba can do. It's really really exciting.
I absolutely love it. I can almost feel the excitement
and the energy of the Mamma Simba all the way
over here in San Diego. It really is a great
example of how much we can all do for wildlife,
and not only the grown ups of the world on
(18:14):
that at especially the kids listening today. Just follow your
heart in your passion and you can make a difference.
It really is inspiring and it gives me hope for
the future of conservation. Community conservation like this that really
looks at the whole picture of the ecosystem and the
people is so very important and I'm sure the lions
and the other wildlife will benefit from this, which actually
(18:37):
brings me back to why we started this conversation. Oh yeah,
we had some questions about the super interesting adaptations than
the Ewasa lions in your area. That's right, And to
start off with, I think it's fair to say lions
are well known for being one of the only social
cat species that we know of, living in family groups
called prides. But from what you have observed, the lions
(18:58):
in your area tend I prefer the solitary or living
by themselves lifestyle. Is that correct? And if so, why
do you think that is so? Titchare this imaginary rely
on in this landscape or in this neighborhood where there
are lots of livestock there are lots of people and
you share some of the resources, whether it's a food
(19:20):
in terms of where you stay and where you go
and drink water in such case, and you know, if
you're happen to bump into the livestock, or if you're
happen yours all on bump into your livestock and probably
kill them, that's going to be a problem to you.
So the lantin some urule, over time of our children
learned that and for them to survive and for them
(19:41):
knowing that what they end up doing and they know
this is to their own advantage, they've come to learn
that going out in big groups or in large numbers
is actually not going to help them, and so they
have become solitary. Most of them. They only go out
like in small groups to actually avoid bumping into more
(20:02):
of the livestock. Or when they're like solitary just a
few of them, it's easier for them to hide away
from the livestock and the people. So the Lant example,
because of there's lots of livestock, there's lots of people
within like the same landscape, I've actually adapted land to
be more solitary rather than like in groups. And also
(20:22):
the other reason why we think so is the lancier
mostly their main food are the waters and the war
talks are like these small compared to maybe like a
bigger antelope, for example, a zebra, And because there's lots
of the smaller food, they tend to be like in
(20:43):
small groups, so that at least when they get one
water go to two of them, that's enough to satisfy them,
as opposed to there's ten of you and you're all
going to scramble for like this small piece of food.
And so those are like some of the reasons why
you think lanting some who are mostly solitary compared to
other areas of Kenya, for example, I mean, I love
(21:03):
how you mentioned the Mara. It's because lions there are
so fat and so spoiled because there's so much food
for them everywhere, and that's why they're in these huge
prize is enough food for all of them. They don't
face the threats and lions face here. I always say,
you bring a lion from the Mara to Samburu, it'll
really struggle. I'm not even sure it'll survive. And you
(21:25):
take a lion from Samburu to the Mara, it'll have
a feast, and it's just yeah, lions have just figured
out that to survive, it's better to be alone. And
it is interesting though in the past I would say
year a year and a half, we have seen them
come together a lot more than they used to. So
hopefully that's a sign that they are feeling safer in
some places. And just upstream from us, about twenty kilometers
(21:48):
upstream and we're you know, we're in a community area,
we're not in a protected area. There are seven lions,
and it's quite interesting to see how these seven lions
are pretty much sticking together. So we are seeing a
few changes over the last year and a half and
I think it comes down to just feeling a little
bit more safer. So yeah, for us, the solitary nature
is all about survival. It's just better to be alone
(22:11):
to survive. That's really fascinating and it makes me want
to ask so many more questions about these lines overall
strategies of survival, like when do they hunt, how did
they event territory? So many questions. I know, right, I
feel like we could really go down a long path
of questions here, like, you know, does being solitary mean
(22:33):
they live more like the leopard does. Or how are
their hunting techniques different from lions that live in large prides. Oh,
that's true. And also I'm really curious about how they
raise their cubs. Oh yeah, that's a good one too.
I feel like the protection of the pride is important
to the success of rearing the cubs. Like grown up
with my da as my cousins and might ibilite that
having multiple family members that can keep an eye on them.
(22:56):
Do you see that it's more challenging for a mother
with cubs when there is not a pride to support them.
We have some amazing females here. They have learned to
bring up their cubs by themselves. They hunt for their
cubs alone, they raise their cubs alone. And most of
these lions in community areas, they actually don't leave their
cubs hidden alone for very long because in other areas
(23:18):
you'll see, you know, other females will take care of
cubs while one goes off hunting. You don't really see that. Here.
You'll see everyone go off hunting together. And we've seen
something quite unusual. Many years ago. We saw a very
well known lion as who used to live near a camp.
She taught her cubs how to hunt at a very
very young age, and they were killing small dick dick
antelopes and they were only three months old. So you know,
(23:41):
a dik dick isn't that much smaller than a three
month or lion. So our females are extraordinary. How they
have just figured out that this is the best way
to raise your cubs. Do it alone, stick with them more,
teach them how to hunt at a younger age. So yeah,
very unusual behavior and not what you sort of see
(24:02):
on the media and documentaries and all. You just don't
tend to see this at all. You see big prides
of happy lions and lots of lazy mails sleeping around.
We don't have lazy mails here. Our males. If they
slept all day, they would starve. They have to be
out hunting, so we don't have sleeping mails. And I
remember people, you shall always say to us, oh, but
(24:25):
you're protecting lions. That must be so boring. There must
be a sleep all day. Our lions are hunting at
one o'clock in the afternoon, two o'clock in the afternoon,
because it's all about survival. If you don't hunt. You're
going to starve. It doesn't matter what time of day
it is, it doesn't matter how hot it is. Go
out and hunt, otherwise you won't make it. So, yeah,
(24:45):
we don't tend to see lots of fat, happy, sleeping lions. Here.
We see active, sleek, strong, surviving lions. I like to
call our lions the real lions. Oh, I'm really glad
he mentioned the male suit because Rick had mentioned that
the male lines there don't have means. It's true. I
(25:06):
remember seeing them when I was there, and they either
lack a mane altogether or had a sort of short
scruff of a mane, like a juvenile male, but they'd
be adults. Can you tell us more about this and
why they don't have means? I remember when we first started,
a very long time ago, this is probably twenty years
ago or something, when I was driving around and I
came across this young male lion and it was almost
(25:29):
like someone had shaved him because he had no hair
at all. I mean, from far, you'd think it was
a female. That he had this giant head, and he
was so unusual. And I kept saying, it's gonna grow,
It's gonna grow. It's gonna grow, and it never did.
He was a very interesting looking male called Supercon. And
then after that we had a few others. Garrett was
(25:50):
probably one of our most famous, who had at least
a little bit more sort of mane or hair here
below his face, not so much at the top. And
then interesting when we had lions come from other places,
like they moved from like Hip here to Samburus, they
moved from the south to the north, we started seeing
a few males with actually big NaNs, and immediately we knew,
(26:12):
this male is not from here, and this male is
definitely not born here. And some of them would lose
some of their maine, so they had big means when
they arrived, but then over time it reduced. So it
has been quite interesting to see sort of the mixture
of males we've had here, from totally mameless to a
few scraggly looking guys, to some big main lions that
(26:33):
eventually became a little thinner, and over time it's just
been very different. So, yeah, Toby can maybe say why
we think this is so unusual. It's been proved elsewhere.
I think in Savo that main is actually a problem
when you try to add through like very thick bushes,
but ours we think we haven't tested this or we
(26:56):
haven't confirmed this, but we think that because of temperature,
it's very hot, so they can attempt to lose it
because imagine you walking like in the mill caught scotching
sun really like afrobe life. Yeah, so basically that's not
going to be like fun. So we think that our alliance,
because of the champers, as soon as they come here,
(27:17):
it's best for them to keep it short so that
at least like cool off or something like that. Man,
that is so interesting. I had no idea, but now
that he explained it to me, it really does make
sense as to why male lines there wouldn't have manes,
or perhaps just don't need them. I completely agree Marco,
and I think it also plays into not having a
(27:38):
pride to protect from other males. Because they tend to
be solitary, they probably have fewer fights, so the big
maine isn't needed to protect their neck when fighting. Yeah,
that's a good point. I mean, it seems the environment
where these lines live has really shaped their behavior and
the lack of main Well, I know we could probably
talk to Shivanni and Toby for hours, but I want
to be respectful everyone's time. Ah, do we have to
(28:01):
wrap it up already? Yes, we do, But before we go,
I would love to ask Savannah and Toby why do
you both do what you do? Why is the work
of a wastle lions so important? Maybe the short terms
is for the love of the lions and for the
love of the wildlife here and for our country. Lions
are symbol They're on our coat of arms, and I
(28:23):
think as Kenyons, we feel it's our duty and that's
our responsibility to protect what's ours and that definitely drives us.
What we do is so important for our country, for Kenyons,
for our economy, and for the culture of not just
the Samburu but all pastoralists who coexist with lions. So
(28:46):
that's why what we do is so important. And that's
really it, isn't it. Wildlife conservation affects all of us.
It improves the life of the wildlife, the ecosystems, and
of course the lives of human beings as well. So true,
so true, And I want to take a moment to
thank Shavanni and Toby yet again for taking the time
to work with us all the way from Kenya, with
(29:08):
the time differences and the connecting to us with everything
from their Owassa Lion camp. It is really appreciated and
I wanted to add something that Toby had mentioned when
we were talking beforehand. He mentioned how important community led
conservation is. That if conservation is going to be successful,
you must involve the community. You have got to include
the people who are actually living with the wildlife in
(29:29):
the best possible way, because otherwise, if you don't, your
conservation efforts are going to be missing an important component
and probably will not be as successful as it could
be really cool to show you how tied together people
and wildlife really are. Such wise words. Anywasa Lions is
such a great example of how all that can work together,
from sharing data with them to listening to the community members.
(29:51):
Really the goal is to have a world where all
life can thrive. For me, my big takeaway is the adaptability,
the vibrance of mother nature. It's always trying to reshape
and self depending on its environment. I know I couldn't
agree more, and I think learning more about the Prideless
Lion and the Maileless Mail proves that we still have
(30:12):
a lot to learn about wildlife in different regions. We
might know so much about a particular species in a
certain area, but as we've learned here, lions living in
a different environment, still in Africa, still in Kenya, but
they have found a different way to survive. Definitely. Well,
shall we wrap us up, Marco? All right, man, let's
do it. Thanks for listening. Everybody sets a pleasure. I
know I learned a few things today myself, and I
(30:33):
hope every listener did too. Be sure to subscribe and
tune into our next episode, in which we learn how
something as small as a mouse can make or break
an entire ecosystem. I'm Marco Went and I'm Rick Schwartz.
Thanks for listening. For more information about the San Diego
Zoo and San Diego Zoo Safari Park, go to SVZWA
(30:57):
dot org. Amazing Wildlife is a production of iHeartRadio. Our
supervising producer is Nikkia Swinton and our sound designer and
editor is Sierra Spreen. For more shows from iHeartRadio, check
out the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen
to your favorite shows.
Hi, I'm Rick Schwartz and I'm Marco went Welcome to
Amazing Wildlife, where we explore unique stories of wildlife from
around the world and uncover fascinating animal facts. This podcast
is a production of iHeartRadio and San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance,
an international nonprofit conservation organization which oversees the San Diego
Zoo and Safari Park. Last season, we highlighted a specific
(00:26):
species of wildlife. Every week we discuss interesting facts and
conservation information about the species as well. This season of
Amazing Wildlife, Marco and I are going to explore the
San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliances conservation hubs, and in this
episode we're focused on the Savannah Hub. Yeah, you know what,
maybe now's a good time to explain to everyone what
a conservation hub is. Good point, Marco, how would you
(00:50):
describe a conservation hub. It's a pretty awesome concept. I
got to say. You know, a conservation hub represents a
region of focus for San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliances conservation efforts.
So these efforts include working with other zoos, other conservation organizations.
You share knowledge with international communities and it's building collaborative
(01:10):
partnerships that have lasting impact on survival and the well
being of life on our planet. And I think it's
worth mentioning that we focus on eight different hubs that
are all over the world. For example, we have the
Southwest Hub right here in our own backyard, the Amazonia
Hub in South America, the African Forest Hub and Savannah
Hub also in Africa, the Asian Rainforest Hub, the Australian
(01:32):
Forest Hub, the Pacific Island Hub, and the one that
covers the most area, stretching across both northern and southern hemispheres,
the Ocean Hub. That's an epic one. And oh man,
I'm super pumped for this episode direct because I know
you've spent some time in Africa, right and you've even
visited with some of our conservation partners while you were there. Yeah,
(01:52):
I'm excited to Marco. And yes, I was fortunate enough
to spend some time in Kenya a few years ago,
and I'm thrilled to be able to share with everyone
what I experienced in the Savannah Hub. For example, I
had no idea before my time there that one area
of Kenya some lions do not live in a pride,
but instead live a more solitary life. So what that
means basically is, as we generally know, lions are one
(02:14):
of the few social cats. They live in a pride,
usually one big male protecting several females and the females
and raising the young. But here they live solitary lives
where they're not protected by a pride or a single
male protecting a bunch of females. Oh yeah, I know.
I mean when I first heard about this shift in
line social behavior, I thought, how awesome can nature be?
(02:35):
How it's constantly adapting and evolving and get this, male
lions in a certain region of Kenya do not have manes. Dude,
I've heard about that, but I've never really figured out
the howls and the wise of it. Honestly, I think
the lack of a mane might have been attached to
their genetics, But the solitary lifestyle that has me curious too.
(02:55):
Yeah right, but wait, you were there, so when you
saw the lions, were they in a pride? No, the
lions we did see tended to be solitary, meaning there
by themselves or sometimes two lions. And to be clear,
this is in and around the Samburu National Reserve just
over two hundred miles to the north of Nairobi. The
African Savannah is massive and this is just one region
(03:16):
within the country of Kenya. Well, I mean, gets a Sando.
Why is this happening? It sounds like the lions aren't
acting like lions we're all familiar with. I wonder like,
what has happened that has caused a change in behavior
like that. I mean, lions everywhere else, or at least
as far as I know, tend to live in pride.
So is this all connected to the main less males? Well,
(03:40):
I can tell we piqued your curiosity, Marco, and instead
of me trying to tell you what I think is correct,
I'd rather talk to someone who knows a lot more
about these lions. Oh yeah, what do you think in Atlanta? Well,
I'm thinking that someone from Kenya who is familiar with
the lions around the Samburu National Reserve, someone who saw
a need to have the local communities participate in lion conservation,
(04:03):
maybe even someone who is currently managing lion research. I
am Chevannibala, the executive director of iwasa lions. I am Tobiato,
Director of Operations and Impact Iwasallions is a lion conservation
project located in northern Kenya. We get our name from
(04:26):
this huge river called the Iwasa near A River, and
so we are protecting lions all across this amazing, beautiful
river that snakes its way throughout northern Kenya. Well, so
you're currently there out in the savannah. We're right on
top of a hill, which is why it's quite windy
right now, and right next to us is the huge
(04:49):
Iwasa near A River. It's below our hill. Can you
give our audience some perspective on what your campus like
and how far out or for lack of a better term,
in the wild you are right now. Yeah, we're very
far away from any type of city or town. The
closest town is two hours away, and our closest you know,
(05:10):
where we get supplies and everything from, it's probably we're
talking between two to four hours away. So we're in
a beautiful place up in northern Kenya. Oh yeah, I
mean we can hear the wind a little bit too. Now.
I know Rick has been to your camp before, but
can you tell me a little bit about it. We
have majority tents, i'd say all tents in camp with
(05:32):
shades covering them where we can collect rain water. And
then we have a couple of permanent structures, a kitchen,
a lower office, and then at the top of the
hill we have a big sort of mess area which
is a permanent structure and another permanent office. So yeah,
we've got a combination of permanent structures and tents and container.
(05:57):
So I'm actually living in a container, which is where
we are right now. It's a converted container home. Chavanni
and Tobia, I appreciate all you have done to make
sure we can connect with you while you're out there
in your camp doing the amazing work you do. Yeah, definitely,
thank you both so much. Now, Marco and I were
talking about some of the interesting things I observed when
(06:19):
I visited you a few years back. But before we
get into those questions, I would love for you to
share with us when and why did you start your
lion conservation work. We started a wassa lions back in
two thousand and seven when we realized that lions across
the African continent were in serious trouble. There's only about
(06:40):
twenty thousand lions left in Africa, and here in our country, Kenya,
we believe there's only about two thousand and five hundred lions.
No one had any idea what was happening with the
lion population in northern Kenya. So that's when we decided
to start a Wassa Lions to try and understand what
is happening with the lion population here and what can
(07:02):
we do to secure its future for generations to come.
Oh wow, I mean I knew the lions had challenges
in the wild, but only twenty thousand left in all
of Africa. That's heartbreaking. In your years of work there
in Kenya, have you found why their numbers are so low.
Lions are struggling from a whole number of threats. It
(07:25):
differs all across Africa up here in Northern Kenya. It's
a couple of reasons why their numbers are declining. Habitat loss.
They're just running out of space. It gets much harder
and harder for them to move from one place to
another because their habitat is shrinking. They also come into
contact with local communities a lot, especially when they're moving
(07:46):
from one place to another, and often lack of prey
they just don't have enough food available is a big
challenge for them, and they will target the community's livestock. Cows, camels, donkeys, goats,
and sheep often are much easier for lions, and when
they do kill a cow or a camel, understandably for
(08:06):
the livestock owner, whose entire life and survival depends on
his livestock, he's very angry and often lions are shot
in retaliation. So these were some of the first threats
that we were addressing when we started. It was Alliance
in two thousand and seven, and over time the threats
are changing. Now we're dealing with large scale infrastructure, development, disease,
(08:31):
climate change, So the threats just change over time, and
we're constantly adapting and being flexible trying to address these
challenges so communities can continue to coexist with lions like
they have for generations. And some of these changes are
brought about by the changes that even like this community
where you work, the way people do things are actually
(08:53):
now changing these eta. For example, before like ten twenty
years ago, there were more major roads coming in. Now
the development of like canoe infrastructure the government itself is
planning or which already started opening. There's like a new road,
a railway line is coming, a pipeline is coming, and
these are the things that are actually changing the liveload
(09:13):
of the people and actually changing the landscape of the lions.
And those are the new threats which want I've talked
about that are actually facing the loans right rally work
at the moment. Yeah, that's a lot of challenges. It
almost feels overwhelming when you see all these obstacles stacking
up one after the other after the other. It would
be really hard to know the best place to start
(09:34):
when it comes to helping out these lines. Yeah, I
know what you mean. But when I was there, I
learned a wassa lions started with the people, not the lions.
It was the local communities and specifically the warriors who
hunted lions that killed livestock that ended up being the
first piece of the puzzle. Shivani, What was the thought
process behind working with the warriors and how did that
(09:55):
even start. The whole concept of bringing warriors on board
into conservation was actually initiated by a young Samburu warrior himself.
Warriors are young men within the Samburu society who are
aged between about fifteen to thirty years old and their
role is protection. It's security it's keeping their livestock safe,
(10:17):
it's keeping their villagers safe, keeping their families safe. Yet
they'd never ever been involved in conservation or had ever
been asked to be involved. So when we saw that
lions were really being threatened by warriors were often implicated
when it came to killing of lions. Genera Leule a
young warrior back then, he was only nineteen years old.
(10:38):
He said to me, if we want to stop the
killing of lions, we've got to involve my demographic, the
young Samburu warrior generation, and so he started this program
called Warrior Watch. This was back in twenty ten and
Jenerarya started working with five warriors, and over time the
number of warriors grew and really transformed the way they
(10:59):
think about lions. Often they thought there were so many lions,
they didn't think conservation was even needed. They didn't know
so many lions were disappearing, and Generator worked with them,
trained them, and their main responsibility was really to keep
livestock safe. So they would have to track lions, know
exactly where the lions were every single day on foot,
(11:21):
and they would communicate that message to livestock owners and
say don't take your cows or camels here, because there's
lions in these bushes. Let's keep your livestock safe. And
so through keeping livestock safe, the warriors were keeping lions safe.
They also monitor the lions in vehicles, and every single
lion is named throughout this landscape, named after a personality
(11:42):
that the lion might have. The warriors named them, the
rest of our team named them, the community named them,
and every lion is individually known by the warriors and
the rest of our team, so they have ownership over
the lions and this landscape and keeping the lions safe
and keeping their livestock safe. What has made this program
really work was the fact that it was originated and
(12:04):
the idea came from a warrior himself. He's not a
warrior anymore. He keeps calling himself a massa, an elder now.
He's a junior elder now. And what's exciting is that
we have a new generation of warriors that joined us
a couple of years ago, So it's exciting to see
how we've sort of come full circle. New warriors have
taken on board the lion tracking and have come in
(12:26):
with so much energy and passion, and they're very different
to the old group of warriors that it's very exciting
to see that. Yeah, agreed, that is such a great
story in all of it just coming full circle, isn't
it though, And especially with Jenera seeing as a young
warrior that his demographic, the ones that hunted lions needed
to be engaged for this community conservation to actually work. Yeah,
(12:49):
you mentioned the warriors will track the lions and locate them,
but no longer hunt them. How do they track them
and what do they do once they find them. The
way we do this thing is knowing where their alliance
are fasting in the morning, and we use that by
using their knowledge of tracking of animals, and we also
(13:10):
use technology in this case. You go like a number
of alliance with GPS collars on them and so that
can actually also tel as we are the alliance are
and then communicating that back to the orders. And sometimes
they have to actually sit down where these particular lions
are and wait around so that if they see like
any livestock edding around that area, they can actually turn
(13:30):
them away. Hey, look there's a lion in there door
and like trouble, So actually take your livestock to a
different place, and that has been working when conflict does
take place, So if a cow or camera unfortunately is killed,
the warriors are the first responders. They're very quick at responding,
making sure that no one will go out and retaliate.
(13:51):
And it's a really hard thing to do, and Generator
is so skilled at this. I feel like he's quite
an extraordinary person to be able to calm down such
an angry person who's lost a camel or a cow.
He manages to calm them down, calm the tensions, and
convince them not to kill the lions. And he's now
training the rest of the team and the Warriors to
do just that. It's a very hard thing to do,
(14:13):
but our team is very skilled at this, just calming tensions.
This community based conservation that you have implemented with the
Warrior Watch program is truly remarkable to be a community
that once hunted the lion to now being a community
that protects them. It really is a model that other
cultures could learn from. And one of the other things
that is very interesting about this program, the Warrior Watch
(14:36):
program is the way it set up, and this is
the same to all the other programs you're on, is
that it actually relies more on the culture or the
traditions of this community. You see, for example, the water
Watch program. It was started, but already the warriors themselves
acknowledge about lions. So what we did, what the water
(14:58):
Watch program did was actually give like a different perspective
of looking at the lions. And that is the old
idea of the Oria Watch. Using the knowledge and skills
of the community, the knowledge of skills of the warriors
to actually do a different thing. Rather than going and
tracking these loons to kill them after they've killed their livestock,
(15:19):
is actually now using the same same knowledge and information
to actually attract them to protect them. This is so great.
I mean when I think a warrior, I think a
warrior protects those she or they care for, and in
this case not only cattle, but the lions as well.
And get this, Marco, I was introduced to the mama
simbas or lion mothers when I was there. As I recall,
(15:40):
the women of the tribes and surrounding communities wanted to
contribute to protecting the wildlife as well. Nice I love
the name Mama Simba. By the way, with the warriors
tracking the lions, what do the mama simbas do well,
I'd rather have Hivanni share with everyone the story of
the Mama Simba. I am sure she'll tell the story
better than I can. What do you think, Hivanni. So
Mama Simba started about three years after the Warrior program,
(16:04):
and it was started by two extraordinary women mentally in Paris,
roy again young Samburu women, and I remember they kept
coming up to our old camp at the bottom of
the hill, sitting there waiting for us all day every day, saying,
why are we not involved in conservation and why are
you only working with warriors. We can also do conservation
(16:24):
just like the warriors do. And they really persevered and
they kept coming until it got to a stage where
we said, right, let's you know, start your program, start
the program that you want to see, and we'll support you.
And that was really the beginning of Mama Simba. And
the Samburu women believe that why life belonged to them anyway. Culturally,
(16:47):
they have a huge belief that while life belonged to them,
but it was taken away from them. They all escaped
and it wasn't theirs anymore, and so they believed that
drew Mama Simba, while life have now come back to
them and they have a huge role to play in that.
And it's quite exciting because we've just launched a new
vision of Mama Simba because the program had been running
(17:09):
for about nine years and as I said, things have
changed so much in this landscape. So now their roles
are they're doing so much. They're out doing drought management,
They're digging water holes for wildlife. They are doing a
lot of lion habitat recovery work, so they're clearing invasive species.
They're trying to plant trees in certain areas to see
(17:33):
if we can regenerate some areas that have been lost previously.
They're planting grass. They're doing lots of cultural and coexistence
meetings with youth and women. They're supporting our Kurras Pride program,
our Lion Kids camp programs. The women are unstoppable right
They're out every single day and they're so excited and
(17:53):
passionate about what they do. And there's really no end
to what Mama Simba can do. It's really really exciting.
I absolutely love it. I can almost feel the excitement
and the energy of the Mamma Simba all the way
over here in San Diego. It really is a great
example of how much we can all do for wildlife,
and not only the grown ups of the world on
(18:14):
that at especially the kids listening today. Just follow your
heart in your passion and you can make a difference.
It really is inspiring and it gives me hope for
the future of conservation. Community conservation like this that really
looks at the whole picture of the ecosystem and the
people is so very important and I'm sure the lions
and the other wildlife will benefit from this, which actually
(18:37):
brings me back to why we started this conversation. Oh yeah,
we had some questions about the super interesting adaptations than
the Ewasa lions in your area. That's right, And to
start off with, I think it's fair to say lions
are well known for being one of the only social
cat species that we know of, living in family groups
called prides. But from what you have observed, the lions
(18:58):
in your area tend I prefer the solitary or living
by themselves lifestyle. Is that correct? And if so, why
do you think that is so? Titchare this imaginary rely
on in this landscape or in this neighborhood where there
are lots of livestock there are lots of people and
you share some of the resources, whether it's a food
(19:20):
in terms of where you stay and where you go
and drink water in such case, and you know, if
you're happen to bump into the livestock, or if you're
happen yours all on bump into your livestock and probably
kill them, that's going to be a problem to you.
So the lantin some urule, over time of our children
learned that and for them to survive and for them
(19:41):
knowing that what they end up doing and they know
this is to their own advantage, they've come to learn
that going out in big groups or in large numbers
is actually not going to help them, and so they
have become solitary. Most of them. They only go out
like in small groups to actually avoid bumping into more
(20:02):
of the livestock. Or when they're like solitary just a
few of them, it's easier for them to hide away
from the livestock and the people. So the Lant example,
because of there's lots of livestock, there's lots of people
within like the same landscape, I've actually adapted land to
be more solitary rather than like in groups. And also
(20:22):
the other reason why we think so is the lancier
mostly their main food are the waters and the war
talks are like these small compared to maybe like a
bigger antelope, for example, a zebra, And because there's lots
of the smaller food, they tend to be like in
(20:43):
small groups, so that at least when they get one
water go to two of them, that's enough to satisfy them,
as opposed to there's ten of you and you're all
going to scramble for like this small piece of food.
And so those are like some of the reasons why
you think lanting some who are mostly solitary compared to
other areas of Kenya, for example, I mean, I love
(21:03):
how you mentioned the Mara. It's because lions there are
so fat and so spoiled because there's so much food
for them everywhere, and that's why they're in these huge
prize is enough food for all of them. They don't
face the threats and lions face here. I always say,
you bring a lion from the Mara to Samburu, it'll
really struggle. I'm not even sure it'll survive. And you
(21:25):
take a lion from Samburu to the Mara, it'll have
a feast, and it's just yeah, lions have just figured
out that to survive, it's better to be alone. And
it is interesting though in the past I would say
year a year and a half, we have seen them
come together a lot more than they used to. So
hopefully that's a sign that they are feeling safer in
some places. And just upstream from us, about twenty kilometers
(21:48):
upstream and we're you know, we're in a community area,
we're not in a protected area. There are seven lions,
and it's quite interesting to see how these seven lions
are pretty much sticking together. So we are seeing a
few changes over the last year and a half and
I think it comes down to just feeling a little
bit more safer. So yeah, for us, the solitary nature
is all about survival. It's just better to be alone
(22:11):
to survive. That's really fascinating and it makes me want
to ask so many more questions about these lines overall
strategies of survival, like when do they hunt, how did
they event territory? So many questions. I know, right, I
feel like we could really go down a long path
of questions here, like, you know, does being solitary mean
(22:33):
they live more like the leopard does. Or how are
their hunting techniques different from lions that live in large prides. Oh,
that's true. And also I'm really curious about how they
raise their cubs. Oh yeah, that's a good one too.
I feel like the protection of the pride is important
to the success of rearing the cubs. Like grown up
with my da as my cousins and might ibilite that
having multiple family members that can keep an eye on them.
(22:56):
Do you see that it's more challenging for a mother
with cubs when there is not a pride to support them.
We have some amazing females here. They have learned to
bring up their cubs by themselves. They hunt for their
cubs alone, they raise their cubs alone. And most of
these lions in community areas, they actually don't leave their
cubs hidden alone for very long because in other areas
(23:18):
you'll see, you know, other females will take care of
cubs while one goes off hunting. You don't really see that. Here.
You'll see everyone go off hunting together. And we've seen
something quite unusual. Many years ago. We saw a very
well known lion as who used to live near a camp.
She taught her cubs how to hunt at a very
very young age, and they were killing small dick dick
antelopes and they were only three months old. So you know,
(23:41):
a dik dick isn't that much smaller than a three
month or lion. So our females are extraordinary. How they
have just figured out that this is the best way
to raise your cubs. Do it alone, stick with them more,
teach them how to hunt at a younger age. So yeah,
very unusual behavior and not what you sort of see
(24:02):
on the media and documentaries and all. You just don't
tend to see this at all. You see big prides
of happy lions and lots of lazy mails sleeping around.
We don't have lazy mails here. Our males. If they
slept all day, they would starve. They have to be
out hunting, so we don't have sleeping mails. And I
remember people, you shall always say to us, oh, but
(24:25):
you're protecting lions. That must be so boring. There must
be a sleep all day. Our lions are hunting at
one o'clock in the afternoon, two o'clock in the afternoon,
because it's all about survival. If you don't hunt. You're
going to starve. It doesn't matter what time of day
it is, it doesn't matter how hot it is. Go
out and hunt, otherwise you won't make it. So, yeah,
(24:45):
we don't tend to see lots of fat, happy, sleeping lions. Here.
We see active, sleek, strong, surviving lions. I like to
call our lions the real lions. Oh, I'm really glad
he mentioned the male suit because Rick had mentioned that
the male lines there don't have means. It's true. I
(25:06):
remember seeing them when I was there, and they either
lack a mane altogether or had a sort of short
scruff of a mane, like a juvenile male, but they'd
be adults. Can you tell us more about this and
why they don't have means? I remember when we first started,
a very long time ago, this is probably twenty years
ago or something, when I was driving around and I
came across this young male lion and it was almost
(25:29):
like someone had shaved him because he had no hair
at all. I mean, from far, you'd think it was
a female. That he had this giant head, and he
was so unusual. And I kept saying, it's gonna grow,
It's gonna grow. It's gonna grow, and it never did.
He was a very interesting looking male called Supercon. And
then after that we had a few others. Garrett was
(25:50):
probably one of our most famous, who had at least
a little bit more sort of mane or hair here
below his face, not so much at the top. And
then interesting when we had lions come from other places,
like they moved from like Hip here to Samburus, they
moved from the south to the north, we started seeing
a few males with actually big NaNs, and immediately we knew,
(26:12):
this male is not from here, and this male is
definitely not born here. And some of them would lose
some of their maine, so they had big means when
they arrived, but then over time it reduced. So it
has been quite interesting to see sort of the mixture
of males we've had here, from totally mameless to a
few scraggly looking guys, to some big main lions that
(26:33):
eventually became a little thinner, and over time it's just
been very different. So, yeah, Toby can maybe say why
we think this is so unusual. It's been proved elsewhere.
I think in Savo that main is actually a problem
when you try to add through like very thick bushes,
but ours we think we haven't tested this or we
(26:56):
haven't confirmed this, but we think that because of temperature,
it's very hot, so they can attempt to lose it
because imagine you walking like in the mill caught scotching
sun really like afrobe life. Yeah, so basically that's not
going to be like fun. So we think that our alliance,
because of the champers, as soon as they come here,
(27:17):
it's best for them to keep it short so that
at least like cool off or something like that. Man,
that is so interesting. I had no idea, but now
that he explained it to me, it really does make
sense as to why male lines there wouldn't have manes,
or perhaps just don't need them. I completely agree Marco,
and I think it also plays into not having a
(27:38):
pride to protect from other males. Because they tend to
be solitary, they probably have fewer fights, so the big
maine isn't needed to protect their neck when fighting. Yeah,
that's a good point. I mean, it seems the environment
where these lines live has really shaped their behavior and
the lack of main Well, I know we could probably
talk to Shivanni and Toby for hours, but I want
to be respectful everyone's time. Ah, do we have to
(28:01):
wrap it up already? Yes, we do, But before we go,
I would love to ask Savannah and Toby why do
you both do what you do? Why is the work
of a wastle lions so important? Maybe the short terms
is for the love of the lions and for the
love of the wildlife here and for our country. Lions
are symbol They're on our coat of arms, and I
(28:23):
think as Kenyons, we feel it's our duty and that's
our responsibility to protect what's ours and that definitely drives us.
What we do is so important for our country, for Kenyons,
for our economy, and for the culture of not just
the Samburu but all pastoralists who coexist with lions. So
(28:46):
that's why what we do is so important. And that's
really it, isn't it. Wildlife conservation affects all of us.
It improves the life of the wildlife, the ecosystems, and
of course the lives of human beings as well. So true,
so true, And I want to take a moment to
thank Shavanni and Toby yet again for taking the time
to work with us all the way from Kenya, with
(29:08):
the time differences and the connecting to us with everything
from their Owassa Lion camp. It is really appreciated and
I wanted to add something that Toby had mentioned when
we were talking beforehand. He mentioned how important community led
conservation is. That if conservation is going to be successful,
you must involve the community. You have got to include
the people who are actually living with the wildlife in
(29:29):
the best possible way, because otherwise, if you don't, your
conservation efforts are going to be missing an important component
and probably will not be as successful as it could
be really cool to show you how tied together people
and wildlife really are. Such wise words. Anywasa Lions is
such a great example of how all that can work together,
from sharing data with them to listening to the community members.
(29:51):
Really the goal is to have a world where all
life can thrive. For me, my big takeaway is the adaptability,
the vibrance of mother nature. It's always trying to reshape
and self depending on its environment. I know I couldn't
agree more, and I think learning more about the Prideless
Lion and the Maileless Mail proves that we still have
(30:12):
a lot to learn about wildlife in different regions. We
might know so much about a particular species in a
certain area, but as we've learned here, lions living in
a different environment, still in Africa, still in Kenya, but
they have found a different way to survive. Definitely. Well,
shall we wrap us up, Marco? All right, man, let's
do it. Thanks for listening. Everybody sets a pleasure. I
know I learned a few things today myself, and I
(30:33):
hope every listener did too. Be sure to subscribe and
tune into our next episode, in which we learn how
something as small as a mouse can make or break
an entire ecosystem. I'm Marco Went and I'm Rick Schwartz.
Thanks for listening. For more information about the San Diego
Zoo and San Diego Zoo Safari Park, go to SVZWA
(30:57):
dot org. Amazing Wildlife is a production of iHeartRadio. Our
supervising producer is Nikkia Swinton and our sound designer and
editor is Sierra Spreen. For more shows from iHeartRadio, check
out the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen
to your favorite shows.
Hosts And Creators
Rick Schwartz
Marco Wendt
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