ONYANGO, Peter Hongo is a Senior GIS Officer at the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) in Nairobi, Kenya. He deals with data mobilization and organization to enhance wildlife conservation and wildlife policy development. Prior to joining KWS, Peter worked as a Consultant at UNDP – Somalia in the SWB Department. He was involved in data quality assurance by accurate geospatial data input and processing. Peter has also worked as a GIS Assistant for Regional NGO called African Conservation Centre (ACC) in Nairobi. At KWS and ACC, Peter has been involved in community resources data collection using space technology, data analysis and quality thematic mapping. He holds an MSc degree in GIS from University of Nairobi, degree of Bachelor of Technology in Geoinformatics from the Technical University of Kenya (TUK) and a Diploma in Cartography from former Kenya Polytechnic, now TUK. He has also attended training in Wildlife Management Planning for Biodiversity by GIS and Remote Sensing in Japan; and training in Discovery, Exploration and Exploitation of Free Data and Tools for supporting the Mitigation of and the Adaptation of Agriculture and Forestry to Climate Change in Belgium. Peter is a member of Institution of Surveyors of Kenya, Geospatial Chapter. He is also a Global Biodiversity Information Fund (GBIF) mentor in data Mobilization and Organization.
Project Summary
MAPPING THE FLOODING OF LAKE NAKURU NATIONAL PARK AND ITS EFFECTS ON RESIDENT WILDLIFE
Lake Nakuru National Park (LNNP) covers an area of 188 km2 and is fully enclosed with a comprehensive perimeter fence. The park is a home to 56 different species of mammals, 550 plant species, and 450 species of terrestrial birds as well as flamingos and other water birds. The park is flooded and the lake coverage increased from initial 31 km2 in 2009 to 54 km2 in 2018. This impacted negatively on the available space for wildlife. The park infrastructure including some park roads, main gate and the park headquarters were submerged in the floods. This would require a substantial amount of financial resources for rehabilitation. The floods reduced water salinity and this disturbed the water pH balance that helped growth of blue-green algae which formed the bulk of the flamingos’ food. This made flamingos to migrate from Lake Nakuru to other places. Flamingos made the largest attractant to tourists in LNNP and their absence led to decline in tourist numbers impacting negatively to the national economy. The study provided data and information such as the current flood zones, change in land cover including acreages, flooded wildlife habitats, the infrastructure submerged in water, and the affected wildlife species and their new residents. These data and information could be used to mitigate future climate variability impacts on wildlife. The tools, equipment and data used included a computer, a laptop a Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS), satellite images, topographical sheets, wildlife census blocks and wildlife statistical datasets.
The overall objective of this research project was to investigate the effects of flooding to wildlife and their habitats in Lake Nakuru National Park. GIS softwares such as ArcGIS 10.6, QGIS, and excel were used to carry out data analysis and development of thematic maps. The Exploratory Spatial Data Analysis (ESDA) that involved the use of a number of techniques to describe and visualize spatial distribution, discover patterns of spatial association, and also to identify hotspots were used. Some of the results included wildlife distribution maps before and after the floods, land cover change maps and wildlife displaced habitats among others. Key words: Lake Nakuru National Park • Flooding effects to resident wildlife • wildlife displace habitats • Land cover change • Choropleth mapping technique
Research Supervisors
Prof. Galcano Canny Mulaku
