A framework for ecologically and socially informed risk reduction before and after outbreaks of wildlife-borne zoonoses.

Despite increasing emphasis being placed on the inclusion of upstream ecological and social perspectives for zoonotic disease control, few guidelines exist for practitioners and decision makers to work with communities in identifying suitable, locally relevant interventions and integrating these into public health action plans. With an interdisciplinary group of Kenyan stakeholders, we designed and tested a comprehensive framework for the co-design, evaluation, and prioritisation of beneficiary-oriented, ecologically and socially informed interventions for preventing and controlling outbreaks of wildlife-borne zoonoses. Our approach used four globally important wildlife-borne pathogens-Rift Valley fever virus, Congo-Crimean haemorrhagic fever virus, and the causative agents of anthrax and rabies-enabling stakeholders to develop a shared understanding of complex transmission pathways, identify a broad array of measures targeting ecological, biological, and social processes governing outbreaks of these pathogens, and explore trade-offs for specific interventions.

The Bacterial and pathogenic landscape of African buffalo (Syncerus caffer) whole blood and serum from Kenya.

Background: African buffalo (Syncerus caffer) is a significant reservoir host for many zoonotic and parasitic infections in Africa. These include a range of viruses and pathogenic bacteria, such as tick-borne rickettsial organisms. Despite the considerations of mammalian blood as a sterile environment, blood microbiome sequencing could become crucial for agnostic biosurveillance.

Heads up-Four Giraffa species have distinct cranial morphology.

Giraffe (Giraffa spp.) are among the most unique extant mammals in terms of anatomy, phylogeny, and ecology. However, aspects of their evolution, ontogeny, and taxonomy are unresolved, retaining lingering questions that are pivotal for their conservation.

Climate change perceptions and adaptation by Sebei pastoralists in Mount Elgon, Uganda: a qualitative survey.

Background: Pastoralists' sedentarisation and agriculturalisation might increase their vulnerability to climate change impacts, but few studies have investigated if this is the case in mountain areas. In Uganda, little is known about how Sebei pastoralists have perceived and adapted to such changes. This study sought to establish perspectives of Sebei pastoralists on climate change in terms of its occurrence and impacts as well as access to livelihood assets and or opportunities to withstand such challenges.

Household satisfaction with health services and response strategies to malaria in mountain communities of Uganda.

Background: Measuring satisfaction with health service delivery in fragile communities provides an opportunity to improve the resilience of health systems to threats including climate change. Additionally, understanding factors associated with the choice of response strategies to certain public health threats provides an opportunity to design context-specific interventions.

Methods: We used polytomous latent class analyses to group participants' responses and an additive Bayesian modelling network to explore satisfaction with health service delivery as well as factors associated with response strategies of households to malaria.

A spatially explicit assessment of factors shaping attitudes toward African elephant conservation.

Conservation plans that explicitly account for the social landscape where people and wildlife co-occur can yield more effective and equitable conservation practices and outcomes. Yet, social data remain underutilized, often because social data are treated as aspatial or are analyzed with approaches that do not quantify uncertainty or address bias in self-reported data. We conducted a survey (questionnaires) of 177 households in a multiuse landscape in the Kenya-Tanzania borderlands.

Trypanosomiasis in Introduced Southern White Rhinoceros (Ceratotherium simum simum) Gifts to Ex Situ Habitat in Aitong, Kenya.

During the opening of diplomatic relations in the 1990s, South Africa gifted 20 southern white rhinoceros (Ceratotherium simum simum) to Kenya. The species is not indigenous to Kenya, and management of the introduction was not clearly addressed in the legislation. Responsibility was left to the private sector and local authorities.

Socioeconomic benefits associated with bats.

Background: While bats are tremendously important to global ecosystems, they have been and continue to be threatened by loss of habitat, food, or roosts, pollution, bat diseases, hunting and killing. Some bat species have also been implicated in the transmission of infectious disease agents to humans. While One Health efforts have been ramped up recently to educate and protect human and bat health, such initiatives have been limited by lack of adequate data on the pathways to ensure their support.

Epidemiology and ecology of the sylvatic cycle of African Swine Fever Virus in Kenya.

African Swine Fever (ASF) is caused by a DNA virus (AFSV) maintained and transmitted by the Argasid ticks. The re-emergence of the disease in Africa coupled with its rapid spread globally is a threat to the pig industry, food security and livelihoods. The ecology and epidemiology of the ASFV sylvatic cycle, especially in the face of changing land use and land cover, further compounds the menace and impacts of this disease in Kenya.

Crop use structures resource selection strategies for African elephants in a human-dominated landscape.

To conserve wide-ranging species in degraded landscapes, it is essential to understand how the behavior of animals changes in relation to the degree and composition of modification. Evidence suggests that large inter-individual variation exists in the propensity for use of degraded areas and may be driven by both behavioral and landscape factors. The use of cultivated lands by wildlife is of particular interest, given the importance of reducing human-wildlife conflicts and understanding how such areas can function as biodiversity buffers.

Fungal endophytes from saline-adapted shrubs induce salinity stress tolerance in tomato seedlings.

To meet the food and feed demands of the growing population, global food production needs to double by 2050. Climate change-induced challenges to food crops, especially soil salinization, remain a major threat to food production. We hypothesize that endophytic fungi isolated from salt-adapted host plants can confer salinity stress tolerance to salt-sensitive crops.

Social-ecological predictors of spotted hyena navigation through a shared landscape.

Human-wildlife interactions are increasing in severity due to climate change and proliferating urbanization. Regions where human infrastructure and activity are rapidly densifying or newly appearing constitute novel environments in which wildlife must learn to coexist with people, thereby serving as ideal case studies with which to infer future human-wildlife interactions in shared landscapes. As a widely reviled and behaviorally plastic apex predator, the spotted hyena () is a model species for understanding how large carnivores navigate these human-caused 'landscapes of fear' in a changing world.

Genetic diversity of lion populations in Kenya: Evaluating past management practices and recommendations for future conservation actions.

The decline of lions () in Kenya has raised conservation concerns about their overall population health and long-term survival. This study aimed to assess the genetic structure, differentiation and diversity of lion populations in the country, while considering the influence of past management practices. Using a lion-specific Single Nucleotide Polymorphism (SNP) panel, we genotyped 171 individuals from 12 populations representative of areas with permanent lion presence.

Giraffe lineages are shaped by major ancient admixture events.

Strong genetic structure has prompted discussion regarding giraffe taxonomy, including a suggestion to split the giraffe into four species: Northern (Giraffa c. camelopardalis), Reticulated (G. c.

Putative bloodmeal sources in Glossina austeni tsetse fly of Arabuko Sokoke National Reserve in Kenya.

Tsetse flies, the sole biological vectors of trypanosomiasis, are predominantly controlled using visual traps and targets baited with attractant lures. Formulation of the lures is informed by compositions of odors from vertebrate hosts preferred by specific tsetse species. However, there are no effective lures for Glossina austeni, a major vector of trypanosomiasis along eastern-coastal region of Africa.

Effect of ecological and anthropogenic factors on grouping patterns in African lions across Kenya.

Social carnivores frequently live in fission-fusion societies, where individuals that share a common territory or home range may be found alone, in subgroups, or altogether. Absolute group size and subgroup size is expected to vary according to resource distribution, but for species that are susceptible to anthropogenic pressures, other factors may be important drivers. African lions () are the only truly social felid and lion prides are characterized by fission-fusion dynamics with social groups frequently splitting and reforming, and subgroup membership can change continuously and frequently.

Land use drives differential resource selection by African elephants in the Greater Mara Ecosystem, Kenya.

Understanding drivers of space use by African elephants is critical to their conservation and management, particularly given their large home-ranges, extensive resource requirements, ecological role as ecosystem engineers, involvement in human-elephant conflict and as a target species for ivory poaching. In this study we investigated resource selection by elephants inhabiting the Greater Mara Ecosystem in Southwestern Kenya in relation to three distinct but spatially contiguous management zones: (i) the government protected Maasai Mara National Reserve (ii) community-owned wildlife conservancies, and (iii) elephant range outside any formal wildlife protected area. We combined GPS tracking data from 49 elephants with spatial covariate information to compare elephant selection across these management zones using a hierarchical Bayesian framework, providing insight regarding how human activities structure elephant spatial behavior.

Cooperative breeding alters physiological and behavioral responses to habitat fragmentation.

Animals respond to habitat alteration with changes in their behavior and physiology. These changes determine individual performance and thus precede changes in population size. They are therefore hypothesized to provide important insights into how animals cope with environmental change.

Mapping brucellosis risk in Kenya and its implications for control strategies in sub-Saharan Africa.

In Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), effective brucellosis control is limited, in part, by the lack of long-term commitments by governments to control the disease and the absence of reliable national human and livestock population-based data to inform policies. Therefore, we conducted a study to establish the national prevalence and develop a risk map for Brucella spp. in cattle to contribute to plans to eliminate the disease in Kenya by the year 2040.

Novel strains of Culex flavivirus and Hubei chryso-like virus 1 from the Anopheles mosquito in western Kenya.

Surveillance of mosquito vectors is critical for early detection, prevention and control of vector borne diseases. In this study we used advanced molecular tools, such as DNA barcoding in combination with novel sequencing technologies to discover new and already known viruses in genetically identified mosquito species. Mosquitoes were captured using BG sentinel traps in Western Kenya during May and July 2019, and homogenized individually before pooled into groups of ten mosquitoes.

A worldwide perspective on large carnivore attacks on humans.

Large carnivores have long fascinated human societies and have profound influences on ecosystems. However, their conservation represents one of the greatest challenges of our time, particularly where attacks on humans occur. Where human recreational and/or livelihood activities overlap with large carnivore ranges, conflicts can become particularly serious.

Bloodmeal host identities among sympatric and tsetse flies in Shimba Hills National Reserve, Kwale, Kenya.

Odor from preferred/non-preferred tsetse fly vertebrate hosts have been exploited in R&D of attractants/repellents of the fly for human and livestock protection. Odors from vertebrate hosts of and tsetse flies can facilitate formulation of novel attractants effective against or improvement of existing attractant blends for We compared vertebrate blood meal sources of both fly species at Shimba Hills National Reserve, Kenya, to establish putative preferred host of either species, hence potential source of or specific odors. We trapped sympatric adult flies in 2021 and 2022 using NGU traps/sticky panels baited with POCA, collected their blood meals and characterize the meals using HRM vertebrate 16S rRNA- PCR (for host identification), and compared host profiles using GLM and Fisher's exact tests.

Application of decision tools to ethical analysis in biodiversity conservation.

Achieving ethically responsible decisions is crucial for the success of biodiversity conservation projects. We adapted the ethical matrix, decision tree, and Bateson's cube to assist in the ethical analysis of complex conservation scenarios by structuring these tools so that they can implement the different value dimensions (environmental, social, and animal welfare) involved in conservation ethics. We then applied them to a case study relative to the decision-making process regarding whether or not to continue collecting biomaterial on the oldest of the two remaining northern white rhinoceroses (Ceratotherium simum cottoni), a functionally extinct subspecies of the white rhinoceros.

Evaluating expert-based habitat suitability information of terrestrial mammals with GPS-tracking data.

Aim: Macroecological studies that require habitat suitability data for many species often derive this information from expert opinion. However, expert-based information is inherently subjective and thus prone to errors. The increasing availability of GPS tracking data offers opportunities to evaluate and supplement expert-based information with detailed empirical evidence.