Distribution

Formerly most of Africa, except for the lowland tropical forest belt and the central Sahara, the African populations are now scattered in reserves and national parks. Lion populations are becoming increasingly fragmented and isolated from each other. This is particularly serious in west Africa where this cat and many other species are largely restricted to conservation areas. In South Africa, Zimbabwe, Namibia and increasingly in Botswana, lion populations are also mainly confined to national parks and game reserves. Eastern Africa still has fairly substantial lion numbers outside formal conservation areas but even here they are being squeezed out of areas where they are coming into conflict with people and livestock. Lion populations of varying levels of viability are known to occur in 70 African conservation areas. Lions are believed to be extinct, or nearly so, in 10 sub-Saharan countries. Although no accurate estimates are available, it is estimated that the present number of lions in the wild is fewer than 50 000 and falling. In the 1950s there were probably as many as 400 000 lions on the continent, but by the mid-1970s the total had probably been more than halved. Namibia now has no more than 600, with wanderers outside conservation areas soon to be eradicated by farmers. In Zimbabwe there are over 1 000 lions, most of which in national parks and safari blocks. With the current instability in Zimbabwe, poaching has increased, and inevitably this will decrease the lion local populations too. In South Africa viable lion populations are restricted to the Kruger (+ 2 000) and Kalahari Gemsbok national parks (+ 150). The lion also extended through the Middle East to Arabia, Persia and India. Lions once also occurred throughout North America and at least into the northern areas of South America. They reached their peak distribution about 10,000 years ago, but then their range started to shrink rapidly. In the western hemisphere the arrival of advanced hunter-gatherers near the end of the Pleistocene era probably resulted in competition for prey species. The lion's decline in Europe is believed to have coincided with the development of dense and extensive forests. It managed to hold its own in south-eastern Europe until about 2000 years ago, when the last lions were killed in the Balkan peninsula. Populations in the Middle East were probably close to extinction at the time of the Crusades. No more than 300 lions now survive in the wild outside Africa, all in the Gir Forest in India, in circumstances that are to a large extent artificial.