A pack of African wild dogs has completed a record-breaking journey of 2,485 miles (4,000 km) in Zambia.
Scientists say this is the longest distance ever traveled by any African terrestrial mammal in search of a mate.
This also indicates that despite increasing human pressure, wildlife can travel vast distances.
These three dogs, who are brothers, traveled through winding roads and busy urban areas in Zambia.
Not only this, these dogs were also avoiding many obstacles including major cities.
However, many other wild dogs tracked with the help of GPS collars in this study died after getting trapped in illegal traps. This also reveals the dangers they face.
Only 6,000 dogs left
Three sisters involved in the same study had almost completed a similar record journey, but when one of them got trapped in a net, they stopped moving forward.
African wild dogs are among the rarest hunter-gatherers in Africa. According to estimates, now only about 6,000 of them are left in the forests.
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These wild dogs live in social groups and hunt together. They are known to roam widely in search of new areas and other groups and breeding opportunities. Many times they travel hundreds of kilometers.
These dogs cannot reproduce in the same herd in which they are born. So they either wait and eventually become successors to their herd or go out in search of mates at two or three years of age.
In a span of eight months, the brothers covered a distance of about 260 miles in a straight line, but in total they covered about 10 times that distance, crossing rough terrain.
This type of travel is known as dispersal, i.e. traveling in one direction in search of a mate. This is a different behavior from migration, during migration animals move back and forth with the seasons in search of food or shelter and then return to their places.
The wildebeest migration has been recognized as Africa's longest migration. According to the United Nations Convention on Migratory Species, wildebeest move more than 400 miles between Tanzania and Kenya depending on the season in search of pasture and water.
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long distance moving animals
Globally, caribou travel the longest of any animal. It travels 839 miles in a round trip. Gray wolves have been recorded traveling more than 4,350 miles in a year.
In this case, perhaps more important than the distance was the route the wild dogs took through Zambia.
They kept roaming in areas where there was a huge population of wildlife. They also passed through areas filled with man-made obstacles, including the capital Lusaka and several highly developed heavy industrial areas.
The study suggests that wild dog populations in eastern and southern Africa may be more closely related than conservationists previously thought.
Scott Creel, the lead author of this research paper and Professor of Montana State University, who has been studying African wild dogs since 1991, says that if viewed with caution, this study provides hope.
"It is reasonable to assume that in eastern and southern Africa, except in fenced areas, every major wild dog population is potentially interconnected," he said.
But underlining the dangers of poaching, he said in the context of conservation, "We can say that the glass is both half empty and half full."
Although all three male wild dogs completed the long journey successfully, two of the three female dogs died.
The researchers noticed a pattern during the study. The surviving members of the herd were returning to the same place again and again. This often happens when a partner dies.
This research, published in the journal 'Ecology', emphasizes the need to create natural pathways outside protected areas. Such pathways connect wildlife areas separated by roads, towns and farms.
Bruce Ellender, co-author of this research and Kafue Conservation Director of the environmental organization 'The Nature Conservancy', said that to save species like wild dogs and elephants, such areas will have to be created which are interconnected.
"We cannot treat these protected areas as isolated islands and expect them to continue working in the long run. We have to think more broadly than this," he said.
We used AI to translate this article, which was originally written in English. A BBC journalist checked this translation before publication. Learn more about how we're using AI.
