Sango Conservancy Culls Hundreds of Elephants to Protect Habitat

As of November 2025, Sango conservancy in southeast Zimbabwe is in the midst of a controversial mass cull of its elephant population. The private conservancy, which is home to over 950 elephants, plans to slaughter 600 of them by the end of 2026 - nearly two-thirds of its resident herd.

The decision to undertake this large-scale cull comes as the conservancy struggles to manage the devastating impact of the growing elephant population on the land. Thousands of trees and much of the forest have been destroyed by the ever-hungry elephants, leaving large swaths of the conservancy resembling a desert. Nearly 80% of the grass has disappeared, and a third of the native mopane trees are now dead or stunted.

The conservancy's experts warn that the elephants are "eating themselves out of house and home" and that their numbers have become unsustainable for the land to support. With each adult elephant requiring almost a square mile of bush to thrive, the 950 elephants at Sango are far more than the conservancy can accommodate without severe environmental degradation.

To address this crisis, the conservancy has embarked on a systematic cull, using a "boma" method to herd elephants into an enclosure and then shoot them. The meat from the culled animals is then distributed to local communities facing food shortages, providing much-needed protein and nutrition. While a grim task, the conservancy sees it as a necessary step to save the habitat and protect the other wildlife that call Sango home.