Where The Wild Roars: Nsumbu National Park’s pride returns
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
We originally published this article in the third edition of ThisWildEarth. Click here to read more of our publications.
Set on Zambia’s northern tip, along the southern shores of Africa’s longest freshwater lake, Nsumbu National Park is as wild as it gets. Sarah Kingdom explores this remote, seldom visited landscape to see the recent changes.
In numbers
Over 30%: The percentage of land set aside for protection in Zambia.
200: The number of buffalo reintroduced in 2021.
2024: Year lions finally returned to the landscape.
3: The number of lions introduced back into the park.
We were flying low over northern Zambia with the land shifting beneath us; vast, green, and strangely quiet. Below, Lake Tanganyika spread like glass, broken only by the occasional ripple of wind and rain. Our pilot circled slowly before lining up with the strip, one of the remotest bush airstrips I’ve ever landed on. A troop of baboons scattered at the plane’s approach.
For nearly a decade, lions had vanished from this landscape, victims of heavy poaching, political instability across the nearby Congo border, and snaring, which devastated not just predators, but antelopes, elephants, even leopards and rhinos. With top predators gone, the ecosystem began to lose its natural balance.
Zambia is one of Africa’s conservation heavyweights, with over 30% of its land set aside for protected areas. But protecting this much land is costly. That’s why, in 2017, the Zambian government partnered with the Frankfurt Zoological Society to establish the Nsumbu Tanganyika Conservation Programme (NTCP), a long-term effort to restore and protect Nsumbu National Park.
The turnaround began with boots on the ground. Thousands of snares were removed, and poaching came under control. Slowly, the wildlife returned. Elephants now move through the park in small but growing herds. Bushpigs, warthogs, and kudu are seen again. In 2021, conservationists went a step further, bringing in 200 buffalo and nearly 50 zebras to supplement prey populations and prepare the park for something bigger: the return of lions.
Bringing apex predators back into a landscape takes years of planning, relationship-building, and ecological readiness. By September 2024, Nsumbu was ready.
The operation was coordinated between Zambia’s Department of National Parks and Wildlife, the NTCP, the Zambian Carnivore Programme (ZCP), and funding support from the Lion Recovery Fund. First, a partial fence was installed along part of the park’s boundary, built not to contain lions, but to prevent future conflict with neighbouring communities. Then came the lions: two females and one male from North Luangwa National Park, 400km away.
The cats were sedated, fitted with GPS collars, and flown in. On arrival, they were moved into a large holding boma, critical to allow the lions to bond, adapt to the landscape, and form a cohesive social unit before their release.
I had the chance to return to Nsumbu just a few months after that historic release. Early one morning, I joined the park’s game scouts and a tracking team to find the lions. Innocent Siame, one of the scouts, stood at the back of the vehicle, holding up a VHF receiver as the tracking signal grew stronger. The closer we got, the more urgent the beeping. Finally, we spotted them, shoulders deep in a freshly killed puku, relaxed, confident, and at home. Seeing them as part of the ecosystem was a moment I won’t forget.
But the reintroduction wasn’t just for ecological impact. For the communities around the park, especially the Nsama Chiefdom, lions represent something deeper. They have long respected lions, and their clan name, Abashimba, means "the lion people." Their absence had left a cultural gap and an ecological one.
“The lions coming back brings pride,” said one local fisherman, Chanda Mwansa. “It connects us to who we are. And maybe now, more visitors will come. Maybe this will help us, too.”
He’s not wrong. Tourism in Zambia is increasingly looking toward its lesser-known corners. With lions back on the land, Nsumbu becomes more than just a remote outpost; it becomes a symbol of recovery community-based conservation, and what’s possible when governments, NGOs, and local people work together. Senior Ranger Sam Chella said it best: “This is just the beginning. Lions are key to this ecosystem. If they thrive, everything else will follow.”
Restoring a park like Nsumbu takes time. But with every roar that echoes across the lake, every spoor found on a sandy track, and every sighting logged, it's clear that this wild corner of Zambia is well on its way back.
ThisWildEarth
Comments