Snapshot Serengeti Talk

Impala with collar? Scientists, ideas?

  • davidbygott by davidbygott moderator

    Very odd. The animal is an ungulate for sure, looks like Impala but in poor condition. The 'collar' on neck is definitely man-made with stitching. But I know of no Impala collaring project. Scientists, any ideas about this one?

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  • gardenmaeve by gardenmaeve

    I have read of pet impalas. So sorry to see this.

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  • Jinx by Jinx

    I was hoping you would comment on this David. It did seem very odd, especially because this animal is very thin.

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  • tillydad by tillydad moderator

    Have never seen a collared impala, and this one looks awful.

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  • davidbygott by davidbygott moderator

    A web search revealed this paper: E.K.Mtui 2014, "Road Constraints on Impala Behaviour" ( http://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:733683/FULLTEXT01.pdf ). In June 2013 the author fitted 4 female impalas with satellite GPS collars to assess how roads influenced their movement patterns. All the impalas' ranges lay within the SSS study area, in central Serengeti NP.

    So, this must be one of her study animals. This photo was taken in Oct 2013 so maybe the study was still in progress, though Mtui doesn't mention removing the collars as far as I can see.

    Collars were provided by Africa Wildlife Tracking ( http://www.awt.co.za/ ) and their website shows photos of very similar collars to this one.

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  • tillydad by tillydad moderator in response to davidbygott's comment.

    Thanks David, that at least explains the collar . It is to be hoped that it did not adversely affect this particular impala, though looking at the emaciation it makes me wonder . It would be interesting to see whether it lasted for the length of the trial .

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  • DZM by DZM admin

    Kind of cool, two separate science projects colliding, if this is indeed a Mtui impala!

    I would hope that Mtui and the collar manufacturers would know how to collar an impala without adversely affecting it... the emaciation might be completely coincidental. I would assume that it does happen, collars or no?

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  • tillydad by tillydad moderator

    Emaciation does, of course, occur naturally but I have not yet seen one on here that is this bad. Coincidence ? I have doubts .

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  • Jinx by Jinx

    Mystery solved. That paper says the impalas' health was checked before collaring (blood drawn, etc), so this condition had to have occurred between June 2013 and October 2013. I'm not an expert but that sounds like a rapid decline. Are collars normally removed after studies are done?

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