Pachyderms and Parks: Ecological Politics and East Africa’s National Parks

Schauer, Jeff

doi:10.1007/978-3-030-02883-1_6

Jeff Schauer⁴

Part of the book series: African Histories and Modernities ((AHAM))

285 Accesses

Abstract

This chapter takes up the contested role of ecological sciences and study units during the long process of decolonization in East Africa. Comparing the Nuffield Unit of Tropical Animal Ecology (Uganda), the Tsavo Project (Kenya), and the Serengeti Research Institute (SRI) (Tanzania), it demonstrates how international scientists’ efforts to draw generalizable conclusions from their study of national parks, and to introduce what they regarded as apolitical scientific rigor to park management, collided with international public opinion, older forms of administration, and the priorities of new governments. Ecological units and their science were sites for the contestation of power and influence, but also varied in their relation to administrators and national governments, particularly as they grappled with the problems of managing herbivore populations in national parks.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution

Subscribe and save

Springer+ Basic

$34.99 /Month

Get 10 units per month
Download Article/Chapter or eBook
1 Unit = 1 Article or 1 Chapter
Cancel anytime

Buy Now

Chapter: USD 29.95; Price excludes VAT (USA)

eBook: USD 79.99; Price excludes VAT (USA)

Hardcover Book: USD 99.99; Price excludes VAT (USA)

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

1.
C. R. Field, “Queen Elizabeth National Park Research and Management,” February 13, 1967, NUTAE C/iii, NUTAE—University Library (Cambridge).
2.
Glen Martin, Game Changer: Animal Rights and the Fate of Africa’s Wildlife (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2012).
3.
An important work on scientific field stations is Raf De Bont, Stations in the Field: A History of Place-Based Animal Research, 1870–1930 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2014).
4.
Jane Carruthers, National Park Science, 30.
5.
Frederic Clements, Research Methods in Ecology (New York: Arno Press, 1977 (1905)), 1. On holism and empire, see Peder Anker. Imperial Ecology: Environmental Order in the British Empire, 1895–1945 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2001).
6.
Clements, Research Methods, 6, 17.
7.
Donald Worster. The Wealth of Nature: Environmental History and the Ecological Imagination (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), 158–160; Jane Carruthers, National Park Science, 74.
8.
Jordan Fisher Smith, Engineering Eden: The True Story of a Violent Death, a Trial, and the Fight over Controlling Nature (New York: Crown, 2016).
9.
Salt, Memo on the programme of the NUTAE, November 6, 1961, NUTAE/B/iii NUTAE—University Library (Cambridge).
10.
Pantin, memo on NUTAE, December 4, 1961, NUTAE B/iii NUTAE—University Library (Cambridge).
11.
Notes of a discussion of the NUTAE committee, February 25, 1961, NUTAE C/iii, NUTAE—University Library (Cambridge).
12.
C. R. Field and R. M. Laws, “The Distribution of the Larger Herbivores in the Queen Elizabeth National Park, Uganda,” Journal of Applied Ecology, 7 (August 1979): 273–294.
13.
A. J. Haddow, note on Salt’s memo, March 26, 1962, NUTAE H, NUTAE—University Library (Cambridge).
14.
Irven O. Buss, Elephant Life: Fifteen Years of High Population Density (Ames: Iowa State University Press, 1999).
15.
C. R. Field, “A Study of the Feeding Habits of the Hippopotamus (Hippopotamus amphibius Linn.) in the Queen Elizabeth National Park, Uganda, With Some Management Implications,” Zoologica Africana 5, 1 (1970): 71–86.
16.
“Notes from the Parks: a fine spectacle of wildlife,” Uganda Argus, March 27, 1958; “The Uganda Tourist Supplement, 1958,” Uganda Argus, July 26, 1958.
17.
Rennie Bere. A Cuckoo’s Parting Cry: Life and Work in Uganda, 1930–1960 (Cheltenham: Cedar Publishing Ltd, 1990), 230–31.
18.
Uganda Game Department Annual Report 1934 (Government Printer, 1935); Bere, Story of Uganda National Parks, RCMS 170: 9/3, RCMS Library—University Library (Cambridge).
19.
IUCN, Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources in Modern African States (Morges: IUCN, 1963), 99.
20.
Bere, Story of Uganda National Parks, RCMS 170: 9/3, RCMS Library—University Library (Cambridge).
21.
Aldo Leopold, Game Management (New York: Scribner’s, 1933); A. Starker Leopold, F. F. Darling, Wildlife in Alaska: an Ecological Reconnaissance (Ronald Press Company, 1953).
22.
Bere, Story of Uganda National Parks, RCMS 170: 9/3, RCMS Library—University Library (Cambridge).
23.
Bere, Story of Uganda National Parks, RCMS 170: 9/3, 9/4, RCMS Library—University Library (Cambridge).
24.
Troisième Conférence Internationale, 83.
25.
Bere, Story of Uganda National Parks, RCMS 170: 6/2, RCMS Library—University Library (Cambridge); Mary Jobe Akely, Congo Eden (London: Victor Gollancz Ltd, 1951), 163–4.
26.
See, for example, Field and Laws, Distribution of the Larger Herbivores.
27.
Memo from Government of Uganda to Henry Hopkinson, September 7, 1953, NA CO822/315.
28.
Akely, Congo Eden, 163–4.
29.
Keith Caldwell, “Report on a Faunal Survey in Eastern Africa,” August 14, 1947, KNA KW1/84.
30.
Bere, Story of Uganda National Parks, RCMS 170: 6/9, RCMS Library—University Library (Cambridge).
31.
Troisième Conférence Internationale, 8–9, 140, 150.
32.
“Scientists Studying Mweya Erosion,” Uganda Argus, October 5, 1957.
33.
“World Advice Sought on Game Parks Dilemma,” Uganda Argus, November 30, 1957.
34.
“Hippos to be moved from erosion areas,” Uganda Argus, May 17, 1957; Bere, Story of Uganda National Parks, RCMS 170: 9/3, RCMS Library—University Library (Cambridge).
35.
“Control of park hippos by shooting,” Uganda Argus, July 9, 1958.
36.
Bere, Story of Uganda National Parks, RCMS 170: 9/5–9/8, RCMS Library—University Library (Cambridge).
37.
Field, “Study of the Feeding Habits,” 71–86. 1970.
38.
“Control of Park Hippos by Shooting,” Uganda Argus, July 9, 1958.
39.
Field, “A Study of the Feeding Habits,” 83.
40.
Eltringham worked for the Wildfowl Trust in Britain, and as Director of Zoology at King’s College, London. Under his watch, NUTAE became the Uganda Institute of Ecology. “Technical Assistance to the Ugandan Institute of Ecology, 4th European Development Fund of EEC,” August 1986, UWA Library.
41.
Buss, Elephant Life, x.
42.
Katete to Laws, December 9, 1964, Laws to Katete, December 12, 1964, NUTAE/Q/I, NUTAE—University Library (Cambridge).
43.
Laws, Initial Programme of Research, May 1961, NUTAE/B/iii; Delany to Pantin, February 5, 1966, NUTAE/O, NUTAE—University Library (Cambridge).
44.
Minutes of an emergency meeting of the EAWLS Council, November 6, 1964, KNA KW5/1.
45.
Delany to Pantin, February 15, 1966, NUTAE/O, NUTAE—University Library (Cambridge).
46.
“Summary of present position,” May 1966, NUTAE/A/I, NUTAE—University Library (Cambridge).
47.
Laws to Pantin, April 28, 1965, NUTAE/Q/I, NUTAE—University Library (Cambridge).
48.
Material from this section originally appeared as Jeff Schauer, “The Elephant Problem: Science, Bureaucracy, and Kenya’s National Parks, 1955 to 1975,” African Studies Review, 58, 1 (April 2015), 177–198, and is reproduced here with permission from African Studies Review.
49.
Ricketts to all permanent secretaries, 1962, KNA KW1/15.
50.
This design resembled South Africa’s. Carruthers, National Park Science, 93.
51.
Chief Game Warden to Temple-Boreham, October 10, 1966, KNA KW1/15.
52.
A. P. Achieng to Chief Game Warden, March 10, 1966, KNA KW1/15.
53.
Eleventh Service Conference of Kenya National Parks, May 5–6, 1964, Proceedings of the second National Parks Service Conference, April 14–15, 1955, KNA KW6/54; Minutes of East African Natural History Society meeting, April 20, 1954, KNA KW5/46; Cowie, Fly Vulture.
54.
Cowie and Caldwell, Memo, April 14, 1953, KNA KW8/7.
55.
Daphne Sheldrick, The Tsavo Story (London: Collins and Harvill Press, 1973), 15, 19–20.
56.
Royal National Parks Executive Committee meeting, August 8, 1955, KNA KW1/80; Tsavo National Park East, Report, April 1 to June 30, 1952, KNA KW23/31.
57.
Dennis Holman, Massacre of the Elephants (New York: Hold, Rinehart & Winston, 1967), 9, 29.
58.
First Annual Report, Kenya Wild Life Society (1956), 17.
59.
Permanent Secretary to Treasury, July 25, 1958, KNA KW1/36; Monthly Report to Ministry of Forests, January 26, 1958, KNA KW1/38.
60.
Ian Parker, “The anti-poaching campaign” in eds. Ian Parker and Stan Bleazard, An Impossible Dream: Some of Kenya’s Last Colonial Wardens Recall the Game Department in the British Empire’s Closing Years (Moray: Librario Publishing Ltd, 2001): 101, 112. Holman (1967): 214.
61.
I. S. C. Parker, “The Ivory Trade, Vol. 3,” 1979, Appendix 6, 1, Ian Parker Collection Relating to East African Wildlife Conservation, Special and Area Studies Collections, George A. Smathers Libraries, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida.
62.
Game Warden to Permanent Secretary, September 30, 1959, KNA KW1/36.
63.
Game Department Annual Report, 1960. Colony and Protectorate of Kenya (Nairobi: Government Printer, 1961).
64.
Dennis Holman, The Elephant People (John Murray, 1967), 31.
65.
Game Department Annual Report, 1960. Colony and Protectorate of Kenya (Nairobi: Government Printer, 1961).
66.
I. S. C. Parker, Letter of May 28, 1960, KNA KW17/3.
67.
Sheldrick, Tsavo Story, 91–2.
68.
Martin Anderson, Galana, 26.
69.
Anderson, Galana.
70.
Glover to Olindo, January 16, 1972, KNA KW24/32.
71.
Minutes of emergency EAWLS Council meeting, November 6, 1964, KNA KW5/1.
72.
Tsavo Royal National Park, meeting minutes, December 19, 1962, KNA KW10/1.
73.
Letter, Cowie to Worthington, December 6, 1962, KNA KW10/1.
74.
C. L. Boyle (Fauna Preservation Society) to Cowie, October 9, 1962, KNA KW10/1.
75.
Collected in Overseas Press Comment, 1962–1963, KNA KW20/11.
76.
“Tsavo Elephants,” East African Standard, September 23, 1965, KNA KW20/9.
77.
Anthony Lavers, “Fate of the Elephants,” East African Standard, October 1, 1965, KNA KW20/9.
78.
Sheldrick, Tsavo Story, 150. As late as 1964, Sheldrick advocated the use of helicopters to kill as many as 5000 elephants in Tsavo. Minutes of Subcommittee of Trustees appointed to consider the Elephant Problem, November 6, 1964, KNA KW10/2.
79.
Worster, Wealth of Nature, 158–160.
80.
National parks Advisory Committee Meeting on Elephant Problem in Tsavo, June 13, 1963, KNA KW6/61.
81.
Minutes of an EAWLS council emergency meeting, November 6, 1964, KNA KW5/1.
82.
Vollmar and McGregor, Ark Under Way 89.
83.
First report to the Ford Foundation on grant for ecological research on Tsavo elephants, October 1965 to January 1967, KNA KW10/3.
84.
Stan Bleazard, “Call me Al” in Parker and Bleazard, Impossible Dream, 291–2.
85.
Memo from AWLF President to AWLF Trustees, 1963, Russell E. Train Papers, Folder 5, Library of Congress.
86.
Noel Simon, “New Directions in the 1950s” in Parker and Bleazard, Impossible Dream, 89–90.
87.
“Notes on the Second Elephant Committee Meeting,” March 28, 1966, KNA KW6/71.
88.
Western, Dust of Kilimanjaro, 117–120.
89.
D. R. M. Stewart to I. S. C. Parker, March 16, 1966, KNA KW10/3; Sheldrick, Tsavo Story, 125.
90.
Sheldrick, Tsavo Story, 187–8.
91.
“The Great Elephant Hunt,” Time, November 4, 1966, in KNA KW20/13.
92.
“Ian Parker video commentaries: four conservation narratives,” Ian Parker Collection Relating to East African Wildlife Conservation, Special and Area Studies Collections, George A. Smathers Libraries, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida.
93.
Overseas Press Comment, 1966, KNA KW20/13.
94.
First report to the Ford Foundation on the grant for ecological research on Tsavo elephants, October 1965 to January 1967, KNA KW10/3.
95.
First report to the Ford Foundation on the grant for ecological research on Tsavo elephants, October 1965 to January 1967, KNA KW10/3.
96.
Olindo to Laws, July 14, 1967, KNA KW10/3.
97.
Laws to Achieng, July 18, 1967, KNA KW10/3.
98.
Laws to Olindo, October 27, 1967, KNA KW10/3.
99.
Achieng to Chief Game Warden, March 31, 1966, KNA KW1/15.
100.
Mutinda to Chief Game Warden, June 11, 1966, KNA KW1/15.
101.
J. Barrah to G. S. K. Boit, October 12, 1964, KNA KW1/15; Olindo to Laws, December 4, 1967, KNA KW10/3.
102.
Laws, “The Tsavo Research Project—Current Problems and Future Needs,” 1967, KNA KW10/3.
103.
Olindo’s comments on Laws’ paper, 1967–1968, KNA KW24/35.
104.
Olindo to Laws, April 13, 1968, KNA KW6/72.
105.
“Scientist Again Warns on Tsavo Elephants,” Sunday Nation, October 27, 1968. “The Last of the Elephants in Our Lifetime,” Daily Nation, November 3, 1968.
106.
“Parks Director Incredulous at Laws’ Letter,” Sunday Nation, November 17, 1968.
107.
Derek Taylor, “An answer which appeared in the Times of Zambia on Feb. 7 1969,” KNA KW24/31.
108.
Leuthold to Africana, April 26, 1972, KNA KW24/33.
109.
Daphne Sheldrick, Love, Life, and Elephants: An African Love Story (New York: Picador, 2012), 168.
110.
“Wildlife Resources and Economic Development by S K Eltringham,” reviewed by Ian Parker. The Quarterly Review of Biology, 60, 3 (Sept 1985): 399–400.
111.
P. E. Glover to Elspeth Huxley, December 11, 1968, KNA KW10/3.
112.
Pitman to Chief Secretary, January 19, 1929, NA CO536/155/3; Glover to Huxley, December 11, 1968, KNA KW10/3.
113.
Glover to Huxley, December 11, 1968, KNA KW10/3.
114.
Somerville, Ivory; Martin, Game Changer.
115.
Hayes, Last Place on Earth, 241–2.
116.
Hayes, Last Place on Earth, 242.
117.
Sheldrick, Tsavo Story, 224, 284.
118.
Howard McCurdy, AWLF, “Administering Kenya’s National Parks,” 1975, KNA KW21/7.
119.
Tsavo Research Coordinating Committee Working Paper on Plans for Future Research at the Tsavo Research Project, 1974, KNA KW24/34.
120.
See South Wales Argus, Yorkshire Evening Post, Herald Express, Worcester Evening News, Oldham Chronicle, Telegraph and Argus, Daily Telegraph, Cape Times, etc., Overseas Press Comment, 1966, KNA KW20/13.
121.
Nikko Tinbergen, “Ecological Research in the Serengeti.” Unpublished report, 1965, SRI, F.67, Weston Library—U Oxford.
122.
Memo on the Serengeti Research Institute, January 13, 1965, J. S. Owen (Director), SRI, F.67, Weston Library—U Oxford.
123.
Shetler, Imagining Serengeti; Hughes, Moving the Maasai; Benjamin Gardner, Selling the Serengeti: the Cultural Politics of Safari Tourism (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2016).
124.
“SRI progress report January to March 1970,” 1970, SRI. F.71, Weston Library—U Oxford.
125.
Memo on the Serengeti Research Institute, January 13, 1965, J. S. Owen (Director). “Future programme of Wildlife and Ecological Research,” SRI, F.67, Weston Library—U Oxford.
126.
“SRI progress report, April to June 1969,” 1969, SRI, F.70, Weston Library—U Oxford.
127.
Memo on the Serengeti Research Institute, January 13, 1965, J. S. Owen (Director), SRI, F.67, Weston Library—U Oxford.
128.
Serengeti research project, introductory remarks by Dr. Niko Tinbergen at a meeting in Seronera on January 4, 1965, held to discuss the future of the project, SRI, F.67, Weston Library—U Oxford.
129.
SRI director’s report to Scientific council, July 1966 to December 1966, SRI, F.73, Weston Library—U Oxford.
130.
“SRI, director’s report, December 1, 1967 to December 1, 1968,” SRI, F.73, Weston Library—U Oxford.
131.
“Proceedings of meetings of the Serengeti Research Society,” December 12–13, 1965, SRI F.46, Weston Library—U Oxford.
132.
Memo on the Serengeti Research Institute, January 13, 1965, J. S. Owen (Director), SRI, F.67, Weston Library—U Oxford.
133.
“SRI quarterly report, January to March 1967,” SRI, F.67, Weston Library—U Oxford.
134.
Memo on the Serengeti Research Institute, January 13, 1965, J. S. Owen (Director), SRI, F.67, Weston Library—U Oxford.
135.
For example, “SRI progress report January to March 1970,” SRI, F.71, Weston Library—U Oxford.
136.
SRI director’s report to the ford foundation. Undated, 1969, SRI, F.74, Weston Library—U Oxford.
137.
Statement by the Board of Trustees of the Tanzania National Parks regarding the policy they intend to pursue with regard to research in the Serengeti National Park, 1964, SRI, F.64, Weston Library—U Oxford.
138.
Proceedings of meeting of the Serengeti research society, December 12–13, 1965, SRI, F.46, Weston Library—U Oxford.
139.
Nikko Tinbergen, “Ecological Research in the Serengeti,” Unpublished report, 1965, SRI, F.67, Weston Library—U Oxford.
140.
Quarterly Reports, SRI, Weston Library—U Oxford.
141.
Hugh Lamprey, “Serengeti Research Institute Quarterly Report, July-September 1966” (1966).
142.
“SRI quarterly report, January to March 1967,” SRI, F.67, Weston Library—U Oxford.
143.
“SRI quarterly report, April to June 1967,” SRI, F.67, Weston Library—U Oxford.
144.
“SRI quarterly report, July to September 1967,” SRI, F.67, Weston Library—U Oxford.
145.
“SRI director’s report to scientific council, July 1966 to December 1966,” SRI F.73, Weston Library—U Oxford.
146.
Minutes of the third meeting of the Serengeti Research Institute, November 22, 1966, SRI F.47, Weston Library—U Oxford.
147.
Minutes of the Fourth Meeting of the Serengeti Research Institute, February 27, 1967, SRI F.48, Weston Library—U Oxford.
148.
“The Elephant Problem in the Serengeti,” Oryx, 9, 6 (December 1968), 404; “SRI progress report, April to June 1971,” SRI, F.71, Weston Library—U Oxford.
149.
“SRI progress report, April to June 1971,” SRI, F.71, Weston Library—U Oxford.
150.
Hayes, Last Place on Earth, 85, 90, 249.
151.
Hayes, Last Place on Earth, 249.
152.
Tinbergen to “Mr Robin” of Ford Foundation in Nairobi, February 5, 1969, SRI, F.66, Weston Library—U Oxford.
153.
Tinbergen to “Mr Robin” of Ford Foundation in Nairobi, February 5, 1969, SRI, F.66, Weston Library—U Oxford.
154.
“SRI progress report, July to September 1968,” SRI, F.69, Weston Library—U Oxford.
155.
Minutes of meeting of the Scientific Council of SRI, January 6–7, 1971, SRI F.49, Weston Library—U Oxford.
156.
Tinbergen to “Mr Robin” of Ford Foundation in Nairobi, February 5, 1969, SRI, F.66, Weston Library—U Oxford.
157.
First meeting of the Serengeti Research Institute. July 13, 1966, SRI, F.47, Weston Library—U Oxford.
158.
Brian Jackman, “Foreword,” in Brian Jackman, ed. Myles Turner: My Serengeti Years. The memoirs of an African Game Warden (London: Elm Tree Books, 1987), xv.
159.
To the members of the “Africa committee,” Undated, SRI, F.64, Weston Library—U Oxford.
160.
Minutes of SRI Scientific Council,” December 20–21, 1967, SRI, F.48, Weston Library—U Oxford.
161.
Minutes of meeting of the SRI Scientific Council, January 6–7, 1971, SRI, F.49, Weston Library—U Oxford.
162.
Letter, Tinbergen to O. Starnes (Director of the East Africa Common Services Organization), October 2, 1967, SRI F.56, Weston Library—U Oxford.
163.
O. Starnes (Director of the East Africa Common Services Organization) to Lamprey, September 26, 1967, SRI, F.56, Weston Library—U Oxford.
164.
Lamprey to Tinbergen, October 13, 1967, SRI, F.56; Tinbergen to Lamprey, September 28, 1967, SRI F.56, Weston Library—U Oxford.
165.
Garland’s apt term for such scientists, in Garland, “The Elephant in the Room,” 58.
166.
Research Applications, 1966–1970, KNA KW24/25.
167.
F. Fraser Darling, Wild Life in an African Territory: a Study made for the game and Tsetse Control Department of Northern Rhodesia (London: Oxford University Press, 1960), 107.
168.
Carruthers identifies a shift in South Africa around 1960 in National Park Science, xi.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

University of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV, USA
Jeff Schauer

Authors

Jeff Schauer
View author publications
You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Schauer, J. (2019). Pachyderms and Parks: Ecological Politics and East Africa’s National Parks. In: Wildlife between Empire and Nation in Twentieth-Century Africa. African Histories and Modernities. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-02883-1_6

Download citation

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-02883-1_6
Published: 05 December 2018
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-02882-4
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-02883-1
eBook Packages: HistoryHistory (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics