THE WILD FAUNA OF THE EMPIEE 39 



NOTES ON GAME IN NOETHEEN EHODESIA. 

 By G. Grey. 



Probably Northern Ehodesia contains at the present time as 

 great a variety of game as any part of Africa of the same area. 



The varieties of antelope now existing in Ehodesian territories 

 north of the Zambesi are: Eland, roan antelope, sable antelope, 

 koodoo, Lichtenstein hartebeeste, tessebe, blue wildebeeste. 

 Penrice's waterbuck, lechwe (black and red), pookoo, situtunga, 

 reedbuck, impala, bushbuck, duiker, oribi, klipspringer, grysbuck, 

 yellow-backed duiker. Also a small antelope, somewhat similar to 

 the blue buck of Natal, which, I think, has not yet been accurately 

 identified; it is to be found, I believe, only near the Luapula Eiver 

 in North-Eastern Ehodesia. 



Other varieties of game are : Burchell's zebra, buffalo, warthog, 

 bushpig, elephant, hippopotamus, rhinoceros, lions, leopards, and 

 other carnivora. 



One small herd of giraffe was known to exist a few years ago 

 in the valley of the Loangwa, and possibly still exists, for great 

 efforts were being made to preserve the herd. 



Since the rinderpest swept through these territories in 1895, 

 I do not think that any species, except elephant, have diminished 

 to an important extent. 



Northern Ehodesia may be considered now as a district in which 

 preservation of all these species is practicable and possible by wise 

 regulations efSciently enforced. 



North-Eastern and North-Western Ehodesia are under separate 

 administrations; the game laws are different in the two territories, 

 but both have the same principle of charging a small licence to 

 permit the killing of the common varieties of game, protecting 

 the rarer kinds by a higher licence, restricting the number of ele- 

 phants killed by each licence-holder, and prohibiting the killing of 

 one or two species which are especially rare, such as giraffe. 



North-Western Ehodesia differentiates in the cost of licences 

 between residents and visitors, and removes all restrictions (except 

 as regards elephants) for game killed in tsetse-fiy areas. 



Though there is no section of Northern Ehodesia in which 

 game exists in the large quantity found in parts of British East 

 Africa or in the Pungwe Eiver flats of Portuguese East Africa, 

 yet Northern Ehodesia contains in the aggregate, scattered through 

 its whole extent, a large quantity of a remarkable variety of species, 

 and for this reason merits careful consideration as a district in 

 which those species may be preserved. 



