Population Status and Trend of Water Dependent Grazers (Buffalo and Waterbuck) in the Kenya-Tanzania Borderland

Even though over many years the IUCN has considered the African buffalo and waterbuck and ab-undant species in Africa with no conservation concern, the situation is rapidly changing. Using aerial counts in wet and dry season in 2010 and 2013, this study assessed the trend, population status and distribution of the African buffalo and common waterbuck in the Northern Tanzania and Southern Kenya borderland. Both species were rare in the borderland, with the Amboseli re-gion had the highest number of buffalo (241.5 ± 29.9), followed by Magadi/Namanga (58.0 ± 22.0), West Kilimanjaro (38.8 ± 34.9), and lastly Lake Natron (14.5 ± 9.0) areas. In terms of density, Am-boseli also led with 0.03 ± 0.00 (buffalo per km2), but rest had similar densities of 0.01 ± 0.00 buf-falo per km2. In terms of percent changes in buffalo, Amboseli area had a positive increase (+10.59 ± 27.71), but with a negative growth of −17.12 in the dry season. All other changes in all locations had negative (decline) buffalo numbers over time. For waterbuck numbers, Amboseli area also le