30/07/10, 05:55:48 EDT

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Arrival of two white rhinos from Disney Animal Kingdom, FloridaArrival of two white rhinos from Disney Animal Kingdom, Florida

eTN

On Wednesday 23 August at 8.40 PM, a male and a female Southern White rhino were brought in by a MartinAir MD-11 at Entebbe International Airport.

The two rhinos, named Hasani and Nande, were donated by Disney Animal Kingdom in Florida to the Government of Uganda. Disney also took care of the transport of the animals: by road to Miami on Monday, to be flown to Amsterdam where they landed on Tuesday morning, and on Wednesday to Entebbe. They were offloaded from the plane and loaded onto two lowbed trucks from Civicon. The animals were accompanied by a team of three staff members of Disney Animal Kingdom (Joe Christman, Michele Miller and Sam Berner) and a videographer (Doug Brown) and awaited by a delegation from Rhino Fund Uganda (Yvonne Verkaik - executive director, Bruce Hathorn - member of the Rhino Fund board, and Dr. Joachim Idibu - veterinarian) and two veterinarians from the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industries and Fisheries (Dr. Oree) and Uganda WIldlife Authority (Dr. Atimnedi). The convoy left Entebbe Airport at 1 AM for the last stretch to Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary, where we arrived at 6 AM. The first rhino to be offloaded into the bomas was Hasani, the 5 year old male, weighing over 1500 kgs. Around 1 AM his companion Nande, a 7 year old female, weighing over 1700 kgs, was left into the boma as well. Both rhinos will spend their quarantine period in the bomas at Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary. They are adapting well to their new environment and are eating and drinking. In a few months they will be released from their bomas and they can explore the 7,000 ha of the sanctuary and meet their four friends that were brought to Ziwa in July 2005. Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary currently has 6 southern white rhinos. The intention is to bring the founder population to 15-20 animals by importing more southern whites, and to bring in black rhinos of the Eastern Black subspecies next year. In total 50 rhinos can live at the sanctuary. Once this number is reached, small groups of rhinos can be brought to protected areas in their original habitat, like Murchison Falls, Ajai and Kidepo, to allow room for continued breeding at Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary. Background: The last rhino was seen in Uganda in 1983. In 1997, Rhino Fund Uganda was established with as its single goal to bring back the rhino to Uganda. The project came into full swing in 2001, when two rhinos were brought to the Uganda Wildlife Education Center in Entebbe. Directly after that, money was raised and land was selected for the establishment of a breeding sanctuary. Ziwa Ranchers, a cattle business in Nakasongola and Masindi districts, offered the free use of the land where Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary has now been set up. A team of 40 rangers (trained by Uganda Wildlife Authority) and askaris protect the area and the rhinos. The sanctuary is open for visitors every day and rhinos can be tracked together with ranger-guides. Rates are $20 or $10 for East African residents or Ushs 5,000/= for Ugandan citizen

 Printable Version  | published Aug 28, 2006