Assessing the effect of environmental enrichment on activity budget of felids at Uganda Wildlife Conservation Education Centre

Abstract

Environmental enrichment techniques have been developed and applied in order to improve the welfare of captive animals. Captive environments inevitably limit natural behaviour of the resident animals. Although several studies have been conducted on the effect of environmental enrichment on activity budgets of animals, there is limited information about the effect of environmental enrichment on the activity budgets of the lions and leopard at Uganda wildlife Conservation Education Centre (UWEC). This study assessed the activity budget of the lions and the leopard, and how they are influenced by auditory and olfactory enrichments. Each animal was observed for 1-hour sessions using instantaneous scan sampling. During the scan which lasted for five minutes, with 2 minutes of sampling at 5 minutes intervals, the behaviour of the focal animal was recorded every 30 seconds. A total of 12 scans was conducted during each hour of observation. Following baseline data collection, auditory (Afro music, lion roar and buffalo calf distress call) and olfactory treatments (Buffalo dung, male cologne and Zebra dung) were introduced in the felid enclosures according to a randomized schedule, with each treatment being carried out for five days followed by a 14-day post-treatment period prior to the next treatment being introduced. Post enrichment was conducted for five days where we replicated the experiment without enrichments but included all other variables. To assess activity budgets and how they are influenced by auditory and olfactory treatments, linear mixed-effects models were fitted. The results showed that a total of 27 individual behaviours was exhibited by the lions and leopard during baseline. The lions and leopard spend most of the day time exhibiting inactive behaviour. Afro music, lion roar and buffalo calf distress call significantly (p < 0.001) reduced inactive and abnormal behaviours among the lions and leopard and could thus improve their welfare if routinely utilised by UWEC management. Male cologne and Zebra dung had a significant effect (p < 0.001) on reducing inactive and abnormal behaviours among the lions and leopard. Auditory and olfactory enrichment can improve the welfare of the felids at UWEC by reducing inactive and abnormal behaviour. The management at UWEC and in other zoos are encouraged to routinely implement auditory and olfactory environmental enrichment for better welfare of felids.