Lions are disappearing rapidly across Africa, especially in West and Central Africa, where human activities like farming, hunting, and habitat loss have reduced lion populations to only a few small groups. A recent study found that lions now only occupy 1% of their historic range in West Africa, where the population has dwindled to just 400 individuals, making them the most endangered lions on Earth. Unless strong conservation efforts are taken to protect the remaining lions and their habitats, the article predicts that lion numbers across Africa could plummet by half within the next two decades.

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Africa's lions are disappearing and humans have
themselves to blame
In the race for big cat survival, Africa's lions are sadly losing
By Associated Press, adapted by Newsela staff
11.09.15
Grade Level 9 Word Count 977
LAGOS, Nigeria — Lions are vanishing in Africa, where they have long been a symbol of the continent's
wild beauty, power and freedom. The disappearance has researchers worried, including Philipp
Henschel, 40, who studies lions for a New York animal conservation group called Panthera Corporation.
The situation is particularly dire in West Africa, where Henschel tells The Associated Press that he
sought out lions for three years. He did not find a single one until a discovery in Nigeria in 2009, which
surprised him.
"Nigeria has by far the biggest human population on the continent," Henschel says. "The national parks
are fairly small compared to others in West Africa that already have lost their lions."
A mother lion and cub are pictured lounging in Kenya's Maasai Mara National Reserve in this photo supplied by the
Kenya Tourist Board. Photo: Kenya Tourist Board/MCT

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National Symbols Of Pride
West African lions are celebrated in Nigeria as a national symbol of pride. With their short manes or
none at all, they look more like Asian lions than their southern and east African cousins.
"Everyone was excited, including rangers from Nigeria's National Park Service. It was the first time they
had seen one too," Henschel says.
By 2009, there were fewer than 30 lions left in Nigeria's Kainji Lake National Park, and only about five in
the country's Yankari National Park, an incredibly low count that saddened scientists. Henschel says that
in 2006, Nigerian conservationists had found lions in six protected areas, but by 2009, lions were only
left in two areas.
Since then, Henschel has surveyed all 21 West African protected areas where lions might exist. He
found only nine lions, and in only four areas. Two of the reserves are Niokolo­Koba National Park in
Senegal, and the Pendjari and Arli National Parks, on the border between Benin and Burkina Faso.
Protecting Remaining Endangered Lions
Last year, Henschel published a report that said lions no longer exist in 99 percent of their historic, West
African range. As a result, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) added West African
lions to its Red List as critically endangered.
Henschel also said that the United States might list the West African lion as endangered under its
Endangered Species Act, a law protecting endangered wildlife and plants. The listing would prohibit
trophy imports by American hunters.
Henschel has lived nearly half his life in another West African country, Gabon, where lions had not been
seen for 20 years.
In January, a researcher was filming chimpanzees and simply by chance, filmed a lion. Ivonne Kienast of
the Max Planck Institute of Evolutionary Anthropology captured the image in Gabon's Bateke Plateau
National Park. Lions have not been sighted there since 1995, and Henschel thinks it probably strayed
across the border from Congo.
The lion appears to be 4 1/2 years old, just the right age for breeding. Researchers named him Ali, after
Gabon's President Ali Bongo, whom Henschel says loves the big cats. Panthera Corporation, the
German­based Max Planck Institute, and Gabonese wildlife officials are now searching for two female
lions to import in hopes of renewing the park's lion population.
Lion Numbers Are Alarmingly Low

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Lion populations are declining in much of Africa, especially the west and central areas of the continent.
Research shows a decrease there in nearly all lion populations since 1990, and both regions could lose
half their number of big cats within the next two decades.
Henschel contributed to that report, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The same report predicts a 37 percent chance that half the lion population of East Africa will also
disappear.
The report also noted in the south of Africa, lion populations are increasing in only four countries. The
nations are Botswana, Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe, where most lions are in fenced­in reserves.
Henschel says that until 11,000 years ago, lions roamed much of the world, and could be found in Africa,
Europe, Asia, and even North America. Today they are only in India and Africa.
Indian officials say only about 500 lions remain, all in the state of Gujarat, and the IUCN says that in all
of Africa, fewer than 20,000 lions are left in the wild.
In West Africa, Henschel's research shows only 400 lions, making them possibly the most endangered
lions on the planet.
Humans Are Mostly To Blame
There are several reasons for the decline, all caused by humans. More farmers are encroaching on
traditional lion ranges, and poachers are taking out more bush meat, such as antelope, the sole food
source for the big cat.
Global warming is also limiting grazing land, which causes conflict between nomadic herders and
farmers, and leaves even less space for lions. As a result, lions stray from protected areas and kill cattle.
Henschel says that herders will often poison a cow carcass to kill the lion that felled it.
Trophy hunting is another threat, though it is only legal in two West African countries, Burkina Faso and
Benin. The number of kills there has diminished over the last year, since the European Union banned
imports of lion trophies from both countries.
Earlier this year, a famous lion named Cecil was killed by an American trophy hunter in the southern
African country of Zimbabwe. Conservationists say he was lured out of a protected area in Zimbabwe's
Hwange National Park, wounded, tracked down and killed. People all over the world were outraged, and
the attention brought increased interest in lion conservation.
Cecil Summit
In February, Panthera and a British group called WildCRU are hosting a Cecil Summit. The gathering in

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Oxford, England plans to draw attention to the threat to lions like Cecil. Henschel hopes to use Cecil's
death to attract funding from conservation agencies and Nigerian philanthropists, to make sure lions do
not disappear in Africa.
Panthera President Luke Hunter says: "We have to confront that reality. Lions and people both evolved
in Africa and co­existed for millennia, but today, one is losing the race for survival."