New tech could aid farmers struggling with jackal predation

Black-backed jackals are increasingly proving to be a nightmare for small-scale subsistence and emerging farmers across South Africa, as these opportunistic predators wreak havoc on sheep herds, Cape {town} Etc reports.

The losses are not merely financial; they carry significant emotional and psychological burdens for those who rely on livestock for their livelihoods.

Traditional methods of managing this rising threat have failed to achieve the desired outcomes.

‘Predation by black-backed jackals is a difficult problem for farmers, with few clear solutions,’ explains Megan le Roux, a doctoral student at Stellenbosch University (SU) in the Digital Signal Processing Laboratory.

Even standard tactics such as ‘calling and shooting at night,’ which employs recorded jackal and prey distress sounds to lure the animals, have yielded disappointing results.

Compounding the issue, ecologists have raised concerns over lethal control, suggesting that it disrupts the jackals’ complex social structures and could inadvertently lead to increased predation.