Lions finding so-called lion habitat not all that habitable. A
paper out today in the journal Biodiversity and Conservation by
Nicholas School graduate Jason Riggio (now at the University of
California, Davis) and colleagues uses an extensive dataset and
high-resolution satellite imagery to demonstrate that much of
what we thought was suitable lion habitat is not. If you care
about lions, that is probably pretty depressing news, but it's
also news we can use -- to design more effective strategies to
save the world's big cats. Not your father's savannah The story
starts with African savannahs because that's where lions make
their homes. Savannahs are generally defined as tropical and
subtropical grasslands with scattered trees. They typically
experience a strong rainy season and a strong dry season and are
often transitional zones between deserts and jungle. (To learn
more about savannahs, check out this page and this multimedia
primer.) Savannahs are especially prevalent in Africa, covering
much of the non-Sa