Kidepo to be restocked with wildlife
Nov 25, 2003
THE Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) has dispatched a team of experts to capture wild animals in Lake Mburo National Park for restocking Kidepo National Park, top wildlife officials have said.
THE Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) has dispatched a team of experts to capture wild animals in Lake Mburo National Park for restocking Kidepo National Park, top wildlife officials have said.
Moses Mapesa, UWA’s acting executive director, said recently that the team comprises of two veterinary doctors and two wildlife ecologists.
“We have to revamp the wild animal population in Kidepo, which were affected by poaching,†he said adding that this would encourage breeding with the few remaining animals.
He said some populations species were becoming unviable because they do not have the ability to reproduce and expand the population.
Mapesa said the European Union funded the efforts to re-introduce giraffes, roan antelopes, kudus, ostriches and elands some of which will be moved from Murchsion Falls National Park.
He said the team in Lake Mburo is working round the clock with park wardens and rangers to drive the first batch of animals, 10 elands into a quarantine facility. He said the animals will stay in seclusion for a month.
Mapesa said a large enclosure (boma) has been built to the animals to examine the animals before their eventual movement to Kidepo, which he called translocation.
He said the wanton killing of wild animals caused by political instability and civil unrest in the 1970s and 1980s had depleted some wild animal species.
UWA’s spokesperson, Barbara Musoke, said the animals would be transported in crates by road and that they will release the animals from quarantine in Kidepo after three months.
Mapesa said giraffes were also translocated in the 1990s from Nakuru National Park, Kenya to Kidepo and that their population was gradually increasing.
Kidepo once had the black rhino, which was declared extinct in the 1980s after marauding poachers exterminated them for the rhino horn believed to stimulate sex.
It is said to be one of Uganda’s most spectacular parks and covers about 1400 square kms and borders Kenya and Sudan.
Moses Mapesa, UWA’s acting executive director, said recently that the team comprises of two veterinary doctors and two wildlife ecologists.
“We have to revamp the wild animal population in Kidepo, which were affected by poaching,†he said adding that this would encourage breeding with the few remaining animals.
He said some populations species were becoming unviable because they do not have the ability to reproduce and expand the population.
Mapesa said the European Union funded the efforts to re-introduce giraffes, roan antelopes, kudus, ostriches and elands some of which will be moved from Murchsion Falls National Park.
He said the team in Lake Mburo is working round the clock with park wardens and rangers to drive the first batch of animals, 10 elands into a quarantine facility. He said the animals will stay in seclusion for a month.
Mapesa said a large enclosure (boma) has been built to the animals to examine the animals before their eventual movement to Kidepo, which he called translocation.
He said the wanton killing of wild animals caused by political instability and civil unrest in the 1970s and 1980s had depleted some wild animal species.
UWA’s spokesperson, Barbara Musoke, said the animals would be transported in crates by road and that they will release the animals from quarantine in Kidepo after three months.
Mapesa said giraffes were also translocated in the 1990s from Nakuru National Park, Kenya to Kidepo and that their population was gradually increasing.
Kidepo once had the black rhino, which was declared extinct in the 1980s after marauding poachers exterminated them for the rhino horn believed to stimulate sex.
It is said to be one of Uganda’s most spectacular parks and covers about 1400 square kms and borders Kenya and Sudan.