Peter Apps, BioBoundary Project, Botswana Predator Conservation, Wild Entrust All over the world, the survival and recovery of predator populations are threatened by lethal control in response to predator attacks on livestock and people. Paradoxically, when successful conservation increases predator numbers, this Human-Wildlife Conflict intensifies. Nepal faces just such a challenge; her tiger population has more than tripled since 2010, and as their numbers increased, more of the striped...

African wild dog overmarking a synthetic (lab produced artificial) scent mark precisely as if it were a natural scent mark. The Importance of Scent Communication in African Wild Dogs A few months ago, Botswana Predator Conservation’s BioBoundary project achieved a significant milestone. For the first time, we captured evidence that African wild dogs respond behaviorally to single lab-produced components of their territorial scent mark signals. They react in the same way they do to natural...

Our BioBoundary experiments at livestock enclosures have previously shown that BioBoundary deterrents, based on predators’ chemical signals, protect livestock by keeping predators away. But nearly all predator attacks happen when animals are out grazing, and using BioBoundary chemical signals at overnight kraals does not protect these free-ranging livestock. Adapting our BioBoundary deterrents to protect livestock while they are grazing has the potential to revolutionize how all sectors of...