Reintroductions, Introductions, and the Importance of Post-Release
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Opinion release of red colobus into Masingini and Kichwele Reintroductions, introductions, and the would, if historical information is accurate, therefore importance of post-release monitoring: constitute reintroduction attempts. lessons from Zanzibar The use of the term translocation is less clear. The Between 1991 and 1996 Struhsaker & Siex (1998) made IUCN Guidelines aim to distinguish this from reintro- a valiant and worthwhile series of surveys to assess the ductions and introductions by requiring that the release outcome of earlier attempts to establish viable popu- be at a site containing conspecifics. Translocation, how- lations of the Zanzibar red colobus monkey Procolobos ever, is used in a wider sense in wildlife management to kirkii, one of Africa's most endangered primates. Between refer generally to any transportation of animals from one 1977 and 1981 red colobus were released at three sites in site to another, most often a wild-to-wild movement. Zanzibar, two of which, Masingini and Kichwele, were Translocation perhaps becomes clearer when it is used believed to have probably held red colobus before the with regard to movement at the level of the individual 1800s, whereas red colobus never naturally occurred at (Stanley Price, 1989), whereby wild-caught animals are the third site, on the island of Pemba (Struhsaker & Siex, removed for release into the wild at another site. In this 1998). The results of the surveys indicated that one of way it is possible to translocate animals as part of a these releases was successful, with red colobus still population reintroduction programme. A number of red present and apparently breeding only at Masingini. colobus monkeys could be described as having been In reading this paper I was struck by how it high- translocated to Masingini and Kichwele in order to lighted the importance of the three 'P's of wildlife reintroduce populations of red colobus at these sites. restoration projects: Preparation, Post-release moni- The term introduction is not defined by Struhsaker & toring and Publication. The paper also revealed a need Siex (1998), but may be inferred to mean the release of for improved standardization of terminology. animals into habitat outside their historical range. This The expansion of the use of reintroductions as a means accords well with the IUCN definition of 'conservation/ to restore threatened species, and the growing need to benign introduction: an attempt to establish a species, for ensure that any such projects have the greatest possible the purpose of conservation, outside its recorded distri- chance of success, prompted the IUCN/SSC's Re- bution but within an appropriate habitat and eco- introduction Specialist Group to produce a series of geographical area' (IUCN, 1998). The release of red guidelines for reintroductions (IUCN, 1998). These colobus on to Pemba was correctly described as an guidelines set out the stages and requirements for any introduction. serious reintroduction attempt. The guidelines also Perhaps as a result of the definitions they have chosen, define a number of terms in order to standardize their Struhsaker & Siex go on to refer to translocation and usage and avoid confusion in the published literature. introduction as 'two of the last and relatively desperate Struhsaker & Siex (1998) considered the release of red options: surpassed only by reintroduction ...' (1998: 278). colobus into their former range to constitute a transloca- If anything, the introduction of animals into areas outside tion, that is 'the capture of free-ranging wild animals in their normal range may be considered most desperate, their native habitat and their release into natural or implying as it does that there is no remaining area left near-natural habitat within their geographical range', within the species's historic range. However, it is mis- distinguishing this from a reintroduction, that is 'the leading to consider these actions as desperate, because transfer of captive animals (usually captive-bred) into the desperation may lead to hastily contrived and ultimately wild' (Struhsaker & Siex, 1998: 278). These definitions are ineffective programmes. As the process for management at odds with the ones used in the IUCN Guidelines, and restoration of rare or threatened species becomes where a translocation is 'a deliberate and mediated more firmly grounded in good science and rigorous movement of wild individuals to an existing population protocols, we should rather consider reintroduction, of conspecifics', and a reintroduction is 'an attempt to translocation, introduction and other deliberate releases establish a species in an area which was once part its of wildlife as another set of available tools in our historical range, but from which it has been extirpated expanding conservation kit-bag. or become extinct (IUCN, 1998). A final point, and one which is well made in the The principal difference with the IUCN definition of Struhsaker and Siex paper, concerns the difficulty in reintroduction is that the animal to be released can come learning anything useful from release projects that are from any source, the key point being their release into poorly planned, have little or no follow-up monitoring, habitat in which the species is no longer found. The and which have not been clearly documented, either as 1999 FFI, Oryx, 33(2), 89-97 Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. IP address: 170.106.202.226, on 25 Sep 2021 at 17:49:41, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1365-3008.1999.00551.x 90 Opinion publications or internal reports. It is difficult to conclude have been made with good intent. It is only in retro- anything about the apparent failures of the releases at spect that it is possible to review the shortcomings of Kichwele and Pemba, because these took place at least classic colonial wildlife legislation, which relies on cen- 12 years before the surveys, involved the release of tralized state control to achieve its ends. Where unmarked animals and were poorly documented, par- Spinage is critical of the 'socialist-inspired motives' of ticularly in the case of Pemba where no written record the radicals, nothing could be more socialist-Marxist of the release was available. Although much attention than the monolithic bureaucratic system he espouses has been focused on the pre-release and release phases as the desirable approach (Martin, 1996). Whatever the of reintroductions, this probably reflects the difficulty motivation, the de facto situation is as Child (1995) and expense of putting adequate post-release moni- stated it: colonial legislation has had the effect of alien- toring programmes in place. But it is the post- ating wildlife from local peoples, has failed to reverse release monitoring of the survival, dispersal and species' population declines because of its unenforce- behaviour of released individuals that will provide the ability, and has failed to provide any incentives for information that is essential for assessment of success conservation. or failure. If a release fails to establish a population it Spinage uses a somewhat circular argument when is just as important to know why animals have died, he states that the fact that African game laws remained migrated or failed to breed. As Struhsaker and Siex unaltered in many African countries after indepen- can well attest, it is virtually impossible to answer dence is indicative of the fact that 'suitable, acceptable these questions more than a decade after the fact. alternatives' cannot be found. A much simpler ex- planation is to be found in the inertia of state bureaucra- Philip /. Seddon cies and their mindless preservation of systems that National Wildlife Research Centre empower them. It is generally in those countries where National Commission for Wildlife Conservation no attempts have been made to alter colonial law that and Development the greatest wildlife declines have occurred. PO Box 1086 Taif, Saudi Arabia E-mail: [email protected] Spinage is mischievous in giving the impression that the radicals are advocating the total abrogation of game laws. The statement in his abstract that the 'ab- References rogation of such laws will not lead to a lessening of IUCN (1998) Guidelines for Reintroductions. IUCN/SSC the increasing destruction of African wildlife' is per- Reintroduction Specialist Group. IUCN, Gland, haps the window into the thought processes that moti- Switzerland and Cambridge, UK. vate the entire paper. There is a fatalistic assumption Stanley Price, M.R. (1989) Animal Reintroductions: The Arabian that everywhere wildlife is decreasing—which is not Oryx in Oman. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. true. And given this assumption, there follows the Struhsaker, T.T. & Siex, K.S. (1998) Translocation and introduction of the Zanzibar red colobus monkey: success rather negative approach that even if the law is failing and failure with an endangered island endemic. Oryx, 32, it is better than no law. He does not consider that 277-284. there may be an alternative suite of enabling laws that provide the economic and proprietorial incentives for landholders to retain and manage wildlife on their land. Landholders in this situation require the full The rule of law and African game, and social backup of the law as much as the State does because change and conservation misrepresentation— they too will have to deal with illegal hunting of a reply to Spinage wildlife. However, if they are able to offset the over- I write to comment on two papers by Clive Spinage head costs of protection against the returns from (1996, 1998). Spinage's thesis in the first paper is wildlife, this may lead to viable land-use systems. straightforward—'game' laws were established with Spinage is wrong when he assumes that the radicals good intent, they are necessary, and those who advo- are arguing for a return to traditional African custom- cate dispensing with them are irresponsible.