A method for estimating the distribution of species susceptible to foot-and-mouth disease in the Kruger National Park Region

Landscape distribution of susceptible species is needed to model the spatial spread of infectious diseases. Our objective is to develop 2 individual species animal count maps - for African buffalo and domestic cattle susceptible to foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) in the Kruger National Park Region (KNPR) of the Republic of South Africa (RSA) - using retrospective census and land use data. The KNPR includes the Kruger National Park, Limpopo and Mpumalanga provinces. We applied dasymetric mapping methods to disaggregate animal population census data to a finer resolution using ancillary data. In this study, ancillary data used to define species distributions included stocking rate or carrying capacity and land suitability parameters, A geographical information system (GIS) was used to identify suitable land and vegetation locations (x,y coordinates) for each species. Covariate-specific animal counts were modelled using a Poisson distribution. The resulting animal count data was mapped and will be used to model FMD spread within the KNPR.