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Endangered and vulnerable mammals at risk of becoming roadkill

31 March 2025 | Story Andre Damons | Photo Andre Damons

Prof Aliza le Roux, Assistant Dean of the Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences and Professor in the Department of Zoology and Entomology, at the Southern African Mountain Conference (SAMC2025).

Animals in mountainous areas around the world, in particular endangered, vulnerable, and near threatened mammals, are at risk of becoming roadkill as road networks expand further into these previously inaccessible terrains.

These mammals, which fall into the category of conservation risk according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) definitions, include African wild dogs (endangered), lions and leopards (both vulnerable), elephants (endangered), and honey badgers (NT – near threatened). Among the road-killed birds found in these areas are the hooded vulture (critically endangered) and the endangered steppe eagle.

This is according to Prof Aliza le Roux, Assistant Dean of the Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences and Professor in the Department of Zoology and Entomology, who presented research during a session at the Southern African Mountain Conference (SAMC2025). Prof Le Roux, a behavioural ecologist studying how animals respond to risks and opportunities in the environment, did an oral presentation titled Patterns of wildlife-vehicle collision in montane environments during a session on Mountain biodiversity: animals.

The conference, under the patronage of UNESCO and organised by the University of the Free State (UFS) Afromontane Research Unit (ARU) – in partnership with the African Mountain Research Foundation (AMRF) and the Global Mountain Safeguard Research Programme (GLOMOS) – brought together researchers, policy makers, and practitioners from across Southern Africa and beyond. It delved into critical issues around mountain ecosystems, communities, governance, and transboundary cooperation.

For the research, Prof Le Roux, Dr Katlego Mashiane, Lecturer in the UFS Department of Geography, and Dr Clara Grilo from the BIOPOLIS project in Portugal, looked for published data/papers from 1971 to 2024, finding that most of the published literature on roadkill in Africa came from the 21st Century.

Heightens risks to wildlife

According to her, they found that amphibians were killed at the highest rate in the mountainous regions, while mammals were killed most frequently in the low-lying regions. Mammalian species classified as near threatened or more vulnerable to extinction on the IUCN Red List were most frequently found in the high-elevation mountains (7,7% of species killed in these areas), but also in low-lying areas (3,8% of mammalian roadkill). About 3% of the birds killed at moderate elevations were also of conservation concern.

“Increased vehicular traffic and better-paved roads in montane environments heighten the risks to wildlife inhabiting these regions, including the potential for more wildlife-vehicle collisions, leading to higher mortality rates. In terms of sheer numbers, many more small species (less than 1 kg in adult weight) are killed than larger species. This is probably because we either don’t see them or don’t care if we hit them. But we do care if our cars collide with something large like an eland – it does damage to us as well as them.”

“Unpredictable weather patterns and sudden topographical changes all contribute to these roads potentially being more hazardous for both drivers and any surrounding wildlife: the ruggedness of these terrains and tortuosity of roads can make it harder for drivers and wild animals to detect one another on mountain roads, increasing the likelihood of collisions,” writes Prof Le Roux and her colleagues.

The researchers estimated the roadkill rates for each observed species and then analysed the correlation with topographic aspects of the study sites. They used the 90m digital elevation model downloaded from the geospatial cloud-computing platform Google Earth Engine and classified ‘high’ elevation mountains as regions lying above 2 000 metres above sea level (masl), ‘moderate’ elevation mountains as lying between 1 500 and 2 000 masl, and ‘low’ regions as areas below 1 500 masl.

Limited data

Prof Le Roux and Dr Mashiane also extracted slope and the topographic ruggedness index. Roadkill rates were estimated for 15 different amphibian species, 98 reptilian, 261 avian, and 273 mammalian species, comprising 5 549 individual road kills.

“These findings indicate that roads in mountainous African regions pose a high risk to our indigenous wildlife. The accidents in mountainous areas are something to be aware of, as we are moving further into mountains where there is often vulnerable and unique biodiversity. When we do kill vertebrates through a collision, it is often a species that we would not find in low-lying areas.”

Unfortunately, Prof Le Roux says, they cannot say what the continental patterns are because so little data is available about biodiversity and roadkill patterns in the central and western parts of the continent. The data they found came from only 10 countries, and almost none of the studies took the form of systematic, longitudinal monitoring. The data sets were all ‘snapshots’ of roadkill in specific areas.

News Archive

Student leaders 2012/13 announced

2012-08-30

Ready for the task - Sabelo Khumalo, SRC President of the Qwaqwa Campus and William Clayton, SRC President of the Bloemfontein Campus.
Photo: Johan Roux
31 August 2012

The 2012/13 elections for the Student Representative Councils (SRC) of the University of the Free State were completed successfully and show meaningful support for the changes in student governance adopted by students across campuses over the past two years.

The SRC elections at the Qwaqwa Campus were completed on 23 August 2012, while the elections at our Bloemfontein Campus took place on 27 and 28 August 2012.

The SRC Elections at our Bloemfontein Campus showed a voter turnout of 4516 votes (30.8%), with the elections at the Qwaqwa Campuses showing 1753 votes (46%) – both campuses reached the required quorums and the IEA (Bloemfontein Campus) and IEC (Qwaqwa Campus) declared the elections free and fair and announced the results as a true reflection of the will of the student bodies at the campuses.

The full SRC at Bloemfontein Campus now consists of 62% black and 38% white, and 53% female and 47% male members.

In the Qwaqwa elections, SADESMO achieved 46, 38% of the vote, with SASCO, PASMA and NASMO each achieving 30,23% and 8,39% and 14,26%, respectively.

The successful elections at Bloemfontein Campus show that the detailed transformation of student governance introduced by students at the Campus in 2010 and adopted by the university in 2011, succeeded in mobilizing greater participation of students in governance and representation. These changes in the main included a shift to independent candidacy for elective portfolios (12 seats) and organizational candidacy in nine sub-councils that holds ex officio seats on the SRC. Changes also included the establishment of student representative seats in faculty governance and management forums and the adoption of a reviewed Central SRC Constitution. Ex officio seats hold full and equal constitutional authority in the SRC.

Students at Qwaqwa Campus introduced additional portfolios to its SRC, including ex-officio seats for academic affairs, arts and culture, commuter students, Rag Community Service, religious affairs, residences and sports.

A joint sitting of the Campus SRCs will establish the Central SRC 2012/13 on 9 September 2012.

As a further opportunity for participation in and the development of student governance and representation, the current Central SRC herewith also announces its recent adoption of a student governance advisory programme, namely the UFS Student Elders Council (SEC).

The SEC is established as a combined programme between the Central SRC and the Dean of Student Affairs and will consist of selected senior student leaders from all campuses who completed their terms of office, apply and are appointed to the Elders Council by the Central SRC.

The Council will serve as an advisory structure to the Central SRC and other student structures in support of the continuous development of student governance and representation of the student body at the university.

The SEC will advise the Central SRC to be constituted following the constitution of the respective Campus SRCs.

The SRC members at the Bloemfontein Campus are:

President: Mr William Clayton

Vice-President: Mr Bonolo Thebe

Secretary: Ms Karis-Robin Topkin

Treasurer: Mr Pieter Coetzee

Arts & Culture: Ms Chanmari Erasmus

Accessibility & Student Support: Ms Gene McCaskill

First-generation Students: Ms Tanya Calitz

Legal and Constitutional Affairs: Ms Nokuthula Sithole

Media, Marketing & Liaison: Ms Neo Chere

Sport: Mr Tshepo Moloi

Student Development & Environmental Affairs: Ms Thabisile Mgadi

Transformation: Ms Koketso Mofokeng

Dialogue & Ex officio: Associations Council: Mr Anesu Ruswa

Academic Affairs & Ex officio: Academic Affairs Council: Ms Nombuso Ndlovu

Residence Affairs & Ex officio: Residences Council: Mr Johann Steyn

City Residence Affairs & Ex officio: Commuter Council: Mr Michael van Niekerk

Postgraduate Affairs & Ex officio: Postgraduate Council: Mr Fadeyi Akinsuyi

International Affairs & Ex officio: International Council: Ms Tumelo Moreri

Student Media Affairs & Ex officio: Media Council: Mr Jamal-Dean Grootboom

RAG Community Service & Ex officio: RAG Fundraising Council: Mr Jaco Faul

RAG Community Service & Ex officio: RAG Community Service Council: Ms Keneue Mahloana

The SRC members at the Qwaqwa Campus are:

President General: Mr S Khumalo

Deputy President: Mr P T Lenka

Secretary General: Mr D Khethang

Treasurer General: Mr S I Sithole

Media & Publicity: Mr S N Ntombela

Politics & Transformation: Tbc

Student Development & Evironmental Affairs: Tbc Academic Affairs: Mr T Molawude

Arts & Cultural Affairs: Mr T Nkohli

Off-Campus Students: Mr B Mtshali

RAG, Community Service & Dialogue: Ms S F Mlotya

Religious Affairs: Ms D C Khau

Residence & Catering Affairs: Ms Z Mzolo

Sports Council: Mr S Mngomezulu

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