Ethiopian Wolf conservation

230201405

Project grant Nr.

Target species

Ethiopian wolf

Canis simensis

Mammals, Carnivora, Canidae

IUCN conservation status:

EN (endangered)

EDGE status:

N/a

Why engage?

One of the rarest canids in the world. Highly specialized on rodent prey.

Need / goals

Addressing the threats to Ethiopian wolves and their Afroalpine habitat through awareness, habitat protection, supporting livelihoods, and science-led approaches to managing disease. The vision of EWCP (Ethiopian Wolf Conservation Programme) is to secure Ethiopian wolf populations and habitats across their present distribution, and to extend the species range.

Conservation action

Programme partner

Programme location

Dinsho park, Robe, Ethiopia

Funding

Date awarded:

$49,700 (since 2005)

27/10/06, 00:00

The species

Range

Habitat

Threats

Population trend

Conservation attention

Conservation need

A number of factors threaten the survival of this super-rare canid. High altitude Afroalpine grasslands are crucial pastureland for the local people’s livestock, and heathlands provide firewood. Increasing livestock populations may be already exerting unsustainable pressure, degrading the Afroalpine ecosystem in many places and reducing the wolves' prey (rodents). Already, 60% of former Ethiopian wolf habitat (i.e. land above the tree-line) has been converted to agriculture. Human encroachment continues due to high population growth. With the herders come domestic dogs, which are numerous in the Ethiopian mountains. They act as reservoirs for infectious diseases, notably rabies and canine distemper. Moreover, given the very small global population of Ethiopian wolves, inbreeding and hybridisation form an additional threat. A handful of hybrid wolves were recorded in the Web Valley of the Bale Mountains in the 1980-90s, the result of crosses between female wolves and male domestic dogs. Political instability and conflict due to livestock predation can lead to killings of Ethiopian wolves, especially in the northern highlands. As more roads are built and traffic increases steadily, so does the risk of wolves being killed by vehicles.

Addressing the need

The Ethiopian wolf (Canis simensis) is one of the rarest canids in the world. It lives in the Afroalpine habitat of Ethiopia's highland belt, where it specializes on endemic rodents as key prey. In the breeding season 2020-2021, the Ethiopian Wolf Conservation Program (EWCP) teams have monitored 34 Ethiopian wolf packs in 6 populations across Ethiopia, counting 182 individual wolves with high confidence. This is around half of the global population of this endangered species, a significant achievement unparalleled among any other endangered carnivore. Another 67 packs are estimated to occupy the rest of the habitat, leading to an overall estimate of 450 adult or subadult wolves across all Ethiopia in 2020-2022.

EWCP fights the threats to Ethiopian wolves and their Afroalpine habitat through awareness, habitat protection, supporting livelihoods, and science-led approaches to managing disease. Its vision is to secure Ethiopian wolf populations and habitats across their present distribution, and to extend the species range, stressing its role as a flagship for the conservation of the Afroalpine ecosystem on which present and future generations of Ethiopians also depend.

1wild supports this work with a grant for the ongoing challenge of rabies control, which benefits both the Ethiopian Wolf and the Ethiopian farmers native to this fragile ecosystem.

Conservation action specifics

1/2