Introductory Chapter: Wildlife Management - Failures, Successes, and Prospects

Abstract

Wildlife is a resource of ecological, economic, and cultural importance. It forms a significant component of the natural ecosystem that maintains the ecological balance of nature through regulation of populations of different species; food chain or passage of food and energy through a series of functional groups comprising of producers, consumers, and decomposers; and natural cycles or circulation of inorganic nutrients between biotic and abiotic environment. Basically, each wildlife species functions with a specific role—predator, prey, decomposer, preserver, and in this way, ecological balance is maintained. For example, annual mass mortality of wildebeest drowning in the Mara River in the Greater Serengeti Ecosystem and of whales that sink on the ocean floor and salmon that die on river and streams when they come out to spawn have recently been identified as ecological input of high nutrients into these aquatic ecosystems from their carcasses and bones [1, 2]. This influences nutrient cycling in the aquatic ecosystem and maintains food webs.