Specialist Nairobi team will help tackle wildlife crime

INTERPOL has announced the formation of specialist team to be based in Nairobi, Kenya, which will tackle criminals such as ivory poachers and rhino horn smugglers.

The team in Nairobi – who will be an extension of the Environmental Crime Unit based in Lyon, France – will collaborate with national law enforcement agencies to increase information exchange and assist with national and regional investigations with a specific focus on wildlife crime.

With the goal of stemming the illegal trade of ivory and rhino horn, the team will work with countries and partner organisations to combat elephant and rhino poaching as part of INTERPOL’s Project Wisdom.

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A place of hope amid the elephant poaching crisis

(CBS News) NAIROBI, Kenya -- There is an elephant poaching crisis in Africa: 25,000 are killed a year.
There is, however, one place of hope near Nairobi.

The orphaned elephants there are getting a second chance at life thanks to their "foster mother," Dame Daphne Sheldrick.

"We try to replicate what that baby elephant would have had in the wild, the most important being a family," Sheldrick said.

Sheldrick has lived among elephants for nearly 60 years and started the orphanage in the 1970s when poaching elephants for their tusks became an international crisis.

Over the years, she's discovered elephants share many traits with humans: A long life span, mourning of their dead, and strong family bonds. That's led to new techniques for raising elephants in captivity.

"So we have a team of keepers that represent the elephant family that they've lost. And here in the nursery, the keepers and the attendants are with the little orphans 24 hours a day, because a baby elephant in a natural situation would never ever be left on its own and all the family care for that baby," Sheldrick said.


Read on: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18563_162-57561441/a-place-of-hope-amid-the-elephant-poaching-crisis/

Six lions killed after they strayed from Nairobi National park

Second incident in 2 months

June 2012. Six lions have been speared to death by residents of a Nairobi suburb after the wandered out of the Nairobi National Park and hilled four goats. This follows an incident in May when a lioness was killed and 5 other lions were removed from a Nairobi suburb.

The retaliatory killing of two adult lionesses, two sub adults and two cubs on the outskirts of Nairobi occurred after the carnivores had invaded a boma and killed four goats. Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) rangers responded to a community report on the lions which had strayed from Nairobi National Park and spent the night attempting to deal with the problem.

KWS dispatched rangers and a veterinary capture team to search for the lions. Unfortunately, whilst they were searching for the lions, the animals were killed by a mob.

Nairobi National Park is seasonal park and during rainy seasons, the resident herbivores often stray out of the park and lions often follow them. While outside the park, the lions occasionally kill livestock from community bomas.

Working to reduce human/wildlife conflict
However, KWS works with community human wildlife conflict resolution committees and elders in ensuring that people and their property are protected from destruction by wildlife in the same way that wildlife is protected.

The killing is a big loss to the economy given that lions enjoy an iconic status as a big draw for tourists who visit Kenya.

100 lions killed every year
Kenya has been losing 100 lions a year for the past seven years, leaving the country with just 2000 of its famous big cats. Conservationists have blamed habitat destruction, disease and conflict with humans for the lion population decline.

KWS would like to strongly discourage the public any killing of lions and other wildlife as this is criminal. Instead, communities should alert KWS officers nearest to them about any problem animals. Besides KWS offices spread across the country, the public can report to 24-hour hotlines 0728331981, 0736506052 and 0770296352.

http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/nairobi-lions-killed.html#cr

Sniffer dogs catch ivory smugglers in Nairobi

Success for the latest tool against wildlife trafficking

December 2010. Two suspects were arrested at Nairobi Airport with 101 ivory chopsticks weighing 900 gramme. The illegal cargo, found amongst 10 boxes on the way to Milan, was detected by Kenya Wildlife Service Canine Unit sniffer dogs based at the airport. The cargo had been disguised as handicraft and other ornaments.

The two arrested arrested are both Kenyan nationals. To combat illegal trafficking in wildlife trophies at Nairobi Airport, The Kenya Wildlife Service has deployed sniffer dogs at the airport on a full-time basis.

http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/ivory-dogs010.html

Bizarre hairy fly is rediscovered

Scientists have rediscovered a bizarre insect in Kenya, collecting the first Terrible Hairy Fly specimen since 1948.


Since then, at least half a dozen expeditions have visited its only known habitat - a rock cleft in an area east of Nairobi - in search of the fly.

Two insect specialists recently spotted the 1cm-long insect, known as Mormotomyia hirsuta, living on the 20m-high rock.

They point out that it looks more like a spider with hairy legs.

The fly was found by Dr Robert Copeland and Dr Ashley Kirk-Spriggs during an expedition led by the International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology (ICIPE).

"The rediscovery of the species, which has been collected on only two occasions before, in 1933 and 1948, has caused excitement in insect museums world-wide," the team members said in a statement.

The insect - found in only one location in Kenya - is covered in yellow hairs


Unable to fly and partial to breeding in bat faeces, the fly is thought to live only in the dank, bat-filled cleft of the isolated rock in Kenya's Ukazi Hills.

It also has non-functional wings that resemble miniature belt-straps, and tiny eyes.

Dr Copeland of the Nairobi-based ICIPE said the fly's physical appearance had left scientists bamboozled about where exactly it belonged in the entire order of Diptera, or "true flies".

"We have collected fresh specimens for molecular analysis to see where exactly the Terrible Hairy Fly fits into the evolutionary process," Robert Copeland told Reuters news agency.

"The fly has no obvious adaptations for clinging onto other animals for transfer from one place to another. With its long legs, it could perhaps wrap itself around a bat and get a ride... but it's never been found elsewhere."

But he added: "Since Mormotomyia cannot fly, there is a strong possibility that it is really restricted to this tiny habitat."