Largest migration of land mammals arrives in South Sudan with millions of antelopes

Badingilo and Boma National Parks. A herd of antelope roams the vast grasslands of South Sudan in what is, according to conservation scientists, the largest migration of land mammals in the world.

The first exhaustive aerial study of that country’s wildlife, published last Tuesday, detected some 6 million specimens.

The analysis, which was carried out in 2023 for two weeks in two national parks and nearby areas, was based on aerial observations, almost 60 thousand photos and the monitoring of more than a hundred collared specimens in about 120 thousand square kilometers. .

The estimate by the non-profit organization African Parks, which is responsible for the study, along with the government of South Sudan, far exceeds the arrival of other large migratory herds, such as the 1.36 million wildebeest that were estimated last year in the Serengeti, located between Tanzania and Kenya.

But they warned that the animals face the growing threat of commercial poaching in a nation rife with guns and weak law enforcement.

Saving the planet’s last great wildlife migration is incredibly importantsaid Mike Fay, a conservation scientist who led the analysis. There is much evidence that the world’s ecosystems are collapsing, the world’s resources are being severely degraded and that is causing gigantic disruption to the planet..

South Sudan is still suffering the ravages of five years of fighting that broke out in 2013 and left almost 400,000 dead. The elections scheduled for last year were postponed to next December, but there are few preparations in order to hold them. Violence continues in some areas, and some 2 million people remain displaced, while 9 million (75 percent of the population) depend on humanitarian aid, according to the United Nations.

Antelope migration is already being promoted as a source of national pride in a country trying to overcome its conflict-ridden past. Billboards advertising the arrival of these animals have recently been installed in the capital, Juba, and the government hopes that they will one day become a magnet for tourists.

South Sudan has six national parks and a dozen game reserves covering more than 13 percent of its territory. The migration extends from the east of the Nile, in the Badingilo and Boma parks, to neighboring Ethiopia. It includes four main antelope: the white-eared conch – of which there are about 5 million – the tiang, the Mongalla gazelle and the bohor antelope.