Animal Spotlight: Hirola

Hirola (Beatragus Hunteri), also known as Hunter's hartebeest or Hunter's antelope, is a critically endangered antelope discovered by zoologist H.C.V Hunter in the year 1888. It is arguably the most endangered large mammal on the African continent.
Description
The hirola has tan to to rufous-tawny coats with slightly paler underparts. They have white spectacles around their eyes and inverted white chevron running between their eyes. The hirola's horns are very sharp. Male and females look similar although males are slightly larger with thicker horns and darker coats.

Habitat
The hirola's natural range is an area of no more than 1500km2 but there is also a translocated population in Tsavo East National Park. They are apparently now restricted to the south-eastern coast of Kenya, just south of the border with Somalia.

They inhabit short-grass, seasonally grid, grasslands in dry acacia bush/scrub and forest savannah mosaic habitats.

The hirola prefers areas that are used by livestock which puts them at risk from diseases like tuberculosis.

Behavior
Hirola cluster in harems, consisting of territorial male, several females and their young. Small groups of bachelor males and yearlings also occur. Hirola form larger herds ranging in size from 15 to 40 individuals to many hundreds, depending on the time of the year. Hirola are diurnal animals, most active during the morning and evening.

Hirola mate at the beginning of the long rainy season in March and April. Males compete among themselves for access to females and generally defend territories in which they maintain a harem of about 7 or 8 females.

Threats
Factors of population threats include disease, poaching, severe drought, predation, competition for food and water, and habitat loss. In the Garissa area, hirola are preyed on by lions and hunting dogs. Whereas in the Tsavo region, they are preyed on by cheetahs and lions. Other predators are hyenas and eagles. The Tsavo population additionally faces faces predation by relatively high densities of large carnivores and competition from a greater variety of other wild herbivore species than its natural range.

Sources

1. http://www.edgeofexistence.org/mammals/species_info.php?id=37
2. http://animaldiversity.org/accounts/Beatragus_hunteri/
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hirola
4. http://www.vectronic-aerospace.com/wildlife.php?p=wildlife_project_hirola&nav=projects
5. http://www.nrt-kenya.org/ishaqbini-hirola-update-august-2015/
6. http://www.iucnredlist.org/details/6234/0