Participants:

David Njoroge – team leader Michael M. Mwangi – assistant team leader Samuel Adero - tracker Peter Wambua – tracker John Malonza - tracker Ikuthu Mwoni - cook 2 KWS Rangers – Wyclife Ngumba and Zachary Ngumi

Area of operation:

The areas patrolled this month included the Ngutuni sanctuary, Ndii general area, Irima station, Mbulia ranch, and the Kasigau and Rukinga ranch ambushes.

216 SNARES RECOVERED

FINDINGS.

The month’s operations started with us carrying out our patrols in Ndii and the Irima station both of which are poaching hotspots that usually yield a high number of snares. The stretch along Irima station yielded 49 snares most of which targeted large game as the area is frequented by buffaloes, elephants and large antelopes.

Our patrols in Ndii are carried out in the early hours of the morning as we combine the patrols with ambushes in the hope of arresting the poachers who operate in the area. We came across an elephant whose right leg was caught in a snare. The elephant seemed to be in pain as it had struggled throughout the night to free itself. We called the vet unit to come and assist us in rescuing the elephant, who was still struggling to get free of the snare. 10 minutes before the vet arrived the elephant managed to break the snare from where it was attached to the tree and ran off into the thickets in search of its herd. Working together with the vet unit we tried to locate it. Unfortunately it had headed into the hills and we had no way of reaching it. We later returned to the Ndii area and collected 29 snares made of cable wire.

At Rukinga ranch we combined our de-snaring patrols with night ambushes. With information given to us by the chairman in charge of the ranches we were able to invade a poacher’s hideout, but unfortunately the poachers had already left. We were able to track them but were not able to arrest them as all they possessed was a small smelly piece of meat which could have been either game meat or domestic meat. The areas around Rukinga and Kasigau showed signs that poaching using the lamping method is still regularly taking place. The lamping method uses Torches to blind the animal so that the poachers can get close enough to kill it. We talked to the local chief and village elders who assured us that they would identify any poachers in their villages and allow us to invade their houses if the poachers were able to evade arrest during our ambushes. We hope that with their cooperation we will be able to arrest more poachers in the following months. A total of 216 snares were lifted by the team this month.

KONE AND NDIENDASA WIND PUMP The de-snaring team took time during the month’s operations to repair the wind pumps at Kone and Ndiendasa. The team was accompanied by the Kijito crew who went to work on the Kone community pump, which is about 200km from Voi. Upon removing the 200ft pipes we found that the last two pipes had rusted and could not be returned to the borehole. The Kijito crew replaced this with smaller pipes as the water level was still high enough for the smaller ones to be used. Once the wind pump was repaired the people from the community flocked to the pump to collect water. We then went to fix the pump at Ndiendasa and were there until late the following day.

Report David Njoroge