Population Survey

A total of 920 elephants was encountered during the aerial survey. Taking into account the movement patterns of 42 functional satellite collars corroborated with the aircraft’s position, a total of three herds consisting of 18 individuals was determined to have been double counted. Therefore, these animals were of course only factored only once and the total is subsequently adjusted to 902 elephants. Of the 79 observations, group size (pooled to include family herds, lone individuals and bachelor herds) ranged from 1-120 individuals, with an average of 11.42 ± 20.63 SD. The number of elephants detected in 2021 was considerably higher compared to the 638 individuals surveyed in 2019 (Fig. 3). However, there were four collared individuals within the survey transect during the same period that went undetected by the observers and one collared individual that remained outside the survey area. During the March 2019 survey where the largest concentrations of elephants occurred on the extreme edges of the survey area (DC Azande and DC Gangala na Bodio), the survey conducted in May 2021, the largest concentration of elephants were observed in the open grasslands in the south and central areas of the park (Fig. 4 and supplementary material I).