Picture credit: Peter Ndung'u for Lewa Wildlife Conservancy
The 12 females and five males were bred in Florida and travelled from the Rare Species Conservatory Foundation (RSCF) to a sanctuary on the slopes of Mount Kenya run by the Meru Bongo and Rhino Conservation Trust.
Working with Tusk, a charity dedicated to African conservation, DHL Express provided an aircraft to transport the herd from Palm Beach International Airport in Florida to Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Kenya.
They were transported in custom-built crates alongside six tonnes of pelleted feed, three specialist animal care staff including a vet and two bongo specialists from the USA.
The bongos were released into a 20-acre sanctuary which has been set aside for their management and recovery by the Kenya Forest Service.
They will be kept in paddocks for their safety and their offspring will slowly be reintroduced into Mount Kenya’s forest ecosystem, where they have been absent for almost 40 years.
Mike Parra, CEO of DHL Express Europe, says, “The logistics of moves such as this are incredibly complex, with the welfare of the animals being everyone's top priority. A huge thank you to our partners at Tusk, the Lewa Wildlife Conservancy and everyone involved in making this important conservation mission a success.”
Mike Watson, CEO of Lewa Wildlife Conservancy, which helped coordinate the repatriation, adds, “For decades, these animals have been largely absent from the very forests where they belong, and this project will be crucial in reversing that loss. Seeing them set foot on Kenyan soil again is a powerful reminder of what can be achieved when organisations work together.”