Participants

Alex Macharia – Ag team leader Henry Lekochere John Mungai Julius Mutamu Gerald Maghanga 4 KWS rangers

Area Covered

The month’s operations were carried out at the Maktau, Murka and Kishushe areas, as well as at the Lumo Community Sactuary and at Saltlick.

TOTAL SNARES COLLECTED 34

Findings

The field operations stared on a high note on the 7th of November. Lumo and Maktau were the fist places that we visited due to the fact that we had been given information that bush meat was being traded at the market place. For a period of two weeks we laid early morning ambushes along know poacher tracks in the Lumo community wildlife sanctuary. Our ambushes were successful and we were able to arrest two poachers

who were booked at Taveta police station on OB23/09/11/05. Upon interrogation we found out that the poachers were from the Maktau area. They directed us to their area of operation where we were able to lift 34 big snares.

The following week the team moved the de-snaring operations to the cut line at the mining post. We found three guys mining illegally and were able to arrest one who was booked at the Taveta police station.

Unfortunately the other two managed to escape. On the 15th the team was patrolling the Kishushe areas. While there we received a message about a baby elephant that for over three days had been spotted following a herd of cattle. The baby was first sighted in the Chala area. The exercise of finding the elephant calf and capturing it took two days. The first day was spent looking for the calf with no results. On the second day with help from the community members we managed to find and safely rescue the calf which was later air lifted to the Nairobi Nursery.

The levels of snaring seem to be very low this month, which was expected, due to it being the rainy season. This however does not mean that snaring is not taking place. Due to the heavy rains operations were difficult especially in the Kishushe areas where vegetation is very thick.

Report by Alex Macharia