KENYA
WILDLIFE SERVICE
www.kws.org
While
attending an Envirovet summer institute program I had the pleasure
of meeting Dr. Elizabeth Wambwa, a veterinarian with the Kenya Wildlife
Service (KWS). We became tent mates while touring Kenya and shared
some memorable times. I stayed on to observe a giraffe translocation
she was working on in Nakuru. It was amazing to watch the process
of identifying the correct giraffe, darting from a Landrover, securing
a hood and ropes to guide it to a trailer for transport to a holding
boma, release, and eventual loading into a truck for relocation.
The capture team made it look simple. The sight of giraffes fording
a stream in the back of a stake bed truck will forever be etched
in my mind.
Proper
equipment is key to minimizing injury and stress. Seeing the need
for KWS to acquire an appropriate trailer for this purpose, the
“Embery Institute” appropriated funds for the construction
of a giraffe field transport trailer. The Kenya Wildlife Service
Veterinary Unit is based at the organization’s headquarters
in Nairobi. The unit comprises the country’s most competent
wildlife veterinarians, technicians, and animal capture staff. They
can be mobilized quickly and work efficiently when funds, equipment
and drugs are available. ‘They attend to wildlife cases in
all parts of Kenya, involving a wide variety of species.
The
goal of the veterinary unit is to offer wildlife veterinary service
nationally to ensure stable/growing healthy populations of wildlife
within Kenya, assist in preventing habitat destruction by wildlife,
and reduce human-wildlife conflict. They also prevent extinction
of rare species by establishing viable breeding groups. Translocations
of wildlife are incorporating into park management when necessary
to set up endangered species breeding groups when decline threatens
their existence; when it is necessary to move animals out of areas
where they are causing deterioration of the ecosystem and/or overstocking
has been confirmed to be a problem; and for introduction of wildlife
species into national parks and reserves, ranches and conservation
areas.
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