'Lions’ presence in human-dominated areas is neither new nor surprising

Asiatic lions (Panthera leo persica) now occur in the wild only as a small population (about 250 animals) within a single reserve, the Gir forest in Gujarat state in western India. Persistent attacks by lions on humans hinder support among local peoples for lion conservation. We analyzed 193 attacks by lions on humans and conducted interviews with 73 villagers to identify the spatial, temporal, and social factors associated with lion-human conflict in the region. An average of 14.8 attacks by lions and 2.2 lion-caused deaths occurred annually between 1978 and 1991, and most attacks (82%) occurred on private lands outside the forest reserve. A drought in 1987-1988 precipitated an increase in rates of conflicts (from 7.3 to 40.0 attacks/year) and in the proportion of attacks that occurred outside the reserve (from 75% to 87%). The spatial pattern of lion attacks could not be distinguished from random before the drought, whereas attacks were clustered after the drought in village subdistricts with a higher ratio of revenue land to forest edge and those closer to sites where lions where lions were formerly baited for tourist shows. Subadult lions were involved in conflicts in disproportion to their relative abundance. A majority of villagers interviewed expressed hostile attitudes toward lions owing to the threat of personal injury and economic hardship (mainly livestock damage) posed by lions. The escalation in lion-human conflict following the drought probably resulted from a combination of increased aggressiveness in lions and a tendency for villagers to bring their surviving livestock into their dwellings. Dissatisfaction with the government's compensation system for lion-depredated livestock was reported widely. The current strategy for coping with problem lions--that is, returning them to areas in the Gir forest already saturated with lions--is inadequate, as indicated by the sharp increase in lion-human conflict since 1988. Prohibiting lion baiting for tourist shows, consolidation of reserve boundaries, and implementation of a more equitable and simpler system for compensating villagers for livestock destroyed by lions could provide short-term alleviation of lion-human conflict in the region.