Kenya rounds up zebra and wildebeest to feed hungry lions

Feb 10, 2010, 13:00 GMT

Nairobi - Kenyan rangers have begun the capture of 7,000 zebra and wildebeest to feed hungry lions, which have been attacking livestock after a drought in Amboseli National Park killed their wild prey, an official said Wednesday.

A drought last year decimated the herbivore population in Amboseli, leaving rotting corpses scattered across the plain in the shadow of Mount Kilimanjaro and forcing lions and hyenas to look elsewhere for food.

'Last year's drought was one of severest in recent history and we lost as many as 60 per cent of the herbivores in Amboseli,' Kenya Wildlife Service spokesman Paul Udoto told the German Press Agency dpa.

'The lions and hyenas lost their preferred food, which is mainly wildebeest and zebra, and of late have been raiding the local communities' compounds.'

The rounding up of animals kicked off in the private Soysambu Conservancy, close to Lake Nakuru - famous for its huge population of pink flamingos.

Udoto said that the operation would run until February 28, taking animals from four different locations and transporting them to Amboseli, hundreds of kilometres away, at an estimated cost of 103 million shillings (1.35 million dollars).

Wildlife tourism is one of Kenya's biggest earners, and Amboseli, with its views of Africa's highest mountain and huge elephant herds, is one of the most popular parks.

The Masai tribes living around Amboseli lost up to 80 per cent of their livestock in the drought, Udoto said, and can ill afford to lose any more animals to lions.

Human-animal conflict has been a major factor in the decline of lion populations in Kenya, and there have been cases where lions have been poisoned by communities keen to protect their livestock.

Kenya is next week expected to launch a strategy aimed at protecting carnivores such as lions from such conflicts.

'Lions are the most endangered: from a population of 2,000, we are losing 100 every year, so we won't have a single lion in our wild in 20 years if urgent measures are not taken,' Udoto said.