Estimating population sizes of lions Panthera leo and spotted hyaenas Crocuta crocuta in Uganda's savannah parks, using lure count methods E DWARD O KOT O MOYA ,T UTILO M UDUMBA ,S TEPHEN T. B UCKLAND ,P AUL M ULONDO and A NDREW J. P LUMPTRE

Despite .60 years of conservation in Uganda's national parks the populations of lions and spotted hyaenas in these areas have never been estimated using a census method. Estimates for some sites have been extrapolated to other protected areas and educated guesses have been made but there has been nothing more definitive. We used a lure count analysis method of call-up counts to estimate popu- lations of the lion Panthera leo and spotted hyaena Crocuta crocuta in the parks where reasonable numbers of these species exist: Queen Elizabeth Protected Area, Murchison Falls Conservation Area and Kidepo Valley National Park. We estimated a total of 408 lions and 324 hyaenas for these three conservation areas. It is unlikely that other conser- vation areas in Uganda host.10lions or .40 hyaenas. The Queen Elizabeth Protected Area had the largest populations of lions and hyaenas:140and211, respectively.It is estimated that lion numbers have declined by 30% in this protected area since the late 1990s and there are increasing concerns for the long-term viability of both species in Uganda.