Dr. Craig Packer is an ecologist. His research interests include ecology of infectious diseases, ecosystem processes in African Savannahs, and conservation strategies for mitigating problem-animal conflicts. Packer is currently the director of the Lion Research Center and co-founder of Savannahs Forever Tanzania. Packer is a professor at the University of Minnesota’s department of Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior. In 1990 Packer received a J.S. Guggenheim Fellowship, became a Distinguished McKnight University Professor in 1997, and in 2003 Packer was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Packer is the author of Into Africa, which won the 1995 John Burroughs medal, and more than 100 scientific articles. Packer is known most for his studies on lions in different areas of Africa.

Life

Craig Packer was born in Fort Worth Texas in 1950. Packer graduated from Stanford University with a degree in Human Biology in 1972. Packer completed his Doctorate of Philosophy at the University of Sussex in 1977. Packer currently lives in Minneapolis MN and teaches introductory to biology to non-majors at the University of Minnesota.

Baboons

While studying at Stanford, Packer was sent to Tanzania to study baboons at the Gombe Stream Research Center with Jane Goodall. During this study, Packer was one of the first ecologists to study complex hypotheses about the adaptive significance of behavior in his studies of coalition formation in baboons and the reasons why male baboons dispersed from their troop of birth to new troops. Packer attended the University of Sussex to complete his baboon research.

Serengeti Lion Project

In 1978 Packer began the Serengeti Lion Project to study various historical questions about lions. One of his biggest contributions to the Serengeti Lion Project was the discovery that successive outbreaks of canine distemper virus had different impacts depending on the rainfall patterns from the previous year. Packer studied how severe droughts led to co-infections of canine distemper virus by a tick-borne parasite, babesia. The co-infection mixed with high levels of babesia showed to be far more fatal than the distemper virus itself.
Packer also studied the effects of a full moon and its correlation to the number of lion attacks. Along with his colleagues, they discovered that the risks of man-eating attacks are highest during the first week after the full moon, which may help explain why there are so many myths about the full moon. They also discovered that people in southern Tanzania are most at risk from man-eating lions in areas where they have to sleep in their fields to protect their crops from nocturnal crop-pests such as bush pigs. The lions stumble upon a novel prey species when they follow the pigs into people's fields.

Works

Packer, C. 1994. Into Africa. University of Chicago Press.

Craft, ME., Vols, E., Packer, C., Meyers, LA. 2011. Disease transmission in territorial populations: the small-world network of Serengeti Lions. Journal of the Royal Society Interface 8(59) 776-786.

Packer, C., Swanson, A., Ikanda D., Kushnir, H. 2011. Fear of Darkness, the Full Moon and the Nocturnal Ecology of African Lions. PLoS ONE 6(7): e22285.

Packer, C. A Bit of Texas in Florida. 2010. Science 24, 329(5999) 1606-1607.

Packer, C., Kosmala, M., Cooley, H.S., Brink, H., Pintea, L., Garshelis, D., Purchase, G.,

Strauss, M., Swanson, A., Balme, G., Hunter, L., & K. Nowell. 2009. Sport hunting, predator control and conservation of large carnivores. PLoS ONE 4(6): e5941.

Mosser, A. & C. Packer. 2009. Group territoriality and the benefits of sociality in the African lion, Panthera leo. Animal Behaviour.

Welburn, S., K. Picozzi, P. Coleman & C. Packer. 2008. Patterns in age-seroprevalence consistent with acquired immunity against Trypanosoma brucei in Serengeti lions. PLoS-Neglected Tropical Diseases 2(12): e347.

Munson, L., K.A. Terio, R. Kock, T. Mlengeya, M.E. Roelke, E. Dubovi, B. Summers, A.R.E. Sinclair & C. Packer. 2008. Climate extremes and co-infections determine mortality during epidemics in African lions. PLoS-One 3, e2545.

Ikanda, D. & C. Packer. 2008. Ritual vs. retaliatory killing of African lions in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, Tanzania. Endangered Species Research 6, 67-74.

Fryxell, J., A. Mosser, A.R.E. Sinclair & C. Packer. 2007. Group formation stabilizes predator-prey dynamics. Nature 449, 1041-1044.

Citations

Packer, C. (2010) A Bit of Texas in Florida Science 24, 329(5999) 1606-1607.Retrieved on October 15from the Science Magazine website: http://www.sciencemag.org/content/329/5999/1606.summary

Public Broadcasting Service. (2011) Nature: Elsa’s Legacy, the Born Free Story. Retrieved October 15, 2011 from the PBS website: http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/episodes/elsas-legacy-the-born-free-story/interview-lion-expert-craig-packer/6143/

University of Minnesota. (2011) College of Biologigical Sciences: Faculty and Staff. Retrieved on October 15, 2011 from the University of Minnesota website: http://www.cbs.umn.edu/eeb/contacts/craig-packer