Table 1.
The last sightings of lions in the Western Maghreb: Morocco to Western Sahara, 1830s–1940s (Rif Mountains, Anti Atlas, Middle Atlas and High Atlas).
Table 2.
Lion sightings in the eastern Maghreb of Algeria and Tunisia 1830–1850 (Ksour Mountains, Saharan Atlas, Tell Atlas, Ouled-Nail, Aurès Mountains).
Table 3.
Lion sightings in the eastern Maghreb of Algeria and Tunisia, 1851–1860 (Ksour Mountains, Saharan Atlas, Tell Atlas, Ouled-Nail, Aurès Mountains).
Table 4.
Lion sightings in the eastern Maghreb of Algeria and Tunisia, 1861–1880 (Ksour Mountains, Saharan Atlas, Tell Atlas, Ouled-Nail, Aurès Mountains).
Table 5.
Lion sightings in the eastern Maghreb of Algeria and Tunisia, 1881–1900 (Ksour Mountains, Saharan Atlas, Tell Atlas, Ouled-Nail, Aurès Mountains).
Table 6.
Last lion sightings recorded in the eastern Maghreb of Algeria, 1900–1960 (Ksour Mountains, Saharan Atlas, Tell Atlas, Ouled-Nail, Aurès Mountains).
Figure 1.
Distribution of historical reports of lions in North Africa (AD 1500–1900).
Grey shading indicates Mediterranean scrubland ecosystems [8]. Earliest accounts in the western Maghreb from 16th to the 18th century are indicated as open circles [7], [19]. Documented sightings in known years from 1800 to 1900 are indicated as black circular markers in the western Maghreb (1–7 in Table 1); triangular markers indicate sightings in eastern Maghreb (22–133 in Tables 2–6). Asterisks (*) denote locations of human population centers. Dashed lines indicate national boundaries.
Figure 2.
Distribution of recent sightings of lions in North Africa (AD 1900–1960).
Grey shading indicates Mediterranean scrubland ecosystems [8]. Circular markers indicate sightings in western Maghreb (8–21 in Table 1); triangular markers indicate sightings in eastern Maghreb (134–149) from incidents described in Table 6. The dotted line indicates the air route across the Atlas Mountains (Casablanca-Agadir-Dakar) during which the last wild lion was photographed. Asterisks (*) denote locations of human population centers. Dashed lines indicate national boundaries.
Figure 3.
A lion seen in the Atlas Mountains, during a flight on the Casablanca-Dakar air route.
The photograph taken by Marcelin Flandrin in 1925 is the last visual record of a wild ‘Barbary’ lion of North Africa.
Figure 4.
Estimates of captive generations since wild collection in North Africa for current Moroccan Royal lions.
Grey boxes indicate estimated lion generations based on suggestions by: (a) Packer et al. [38], and (b) Hemmer [20]. Black boxes are the five known generations in the European studbook [13] since the 1974 survey at Temara Zoo. Generational positions for two studbook maternal lines are illustrated for a female cub (white box) born to studbook female 270, and a young male (267) born to female 230, tracing to founder females 37 and 21 respectively.