Critically endangered giraffe saved from ‘disappearing’ island on makeshift raft

Conservationists have successfully managed to rescue a giraffe which had become stranded in flood waters by floating it downstream on a specially-designed raft. 

Kenya Wildlife Service and the US-based nonprofit Save Giraffes Now joined forces with the local community to carry out the remarkable rescue and now plan to save seven remaining giraffes in the same way. 

The adult female Rothschild giraffe named Asiwa was moved on Wednesday to the Ruko Community Wildlife Conservancy, a protected wildlife reserve in Kenya.

She had been living on Longicharo Island where water levels had been rising up to six inches a day due to heavy rains.

As the flooding slowly began to subsume the entire island, Asiwa had become cut off on her own and her rescuers faced a race against the clock to get her out. 

‘There is great urgency to execute this rescue,’ said David O’Connor, president of Texas-based Save Giraffes Now. ‘We couldn’t have asked for a better result, and we’re eager to move the others soon. With giraffe undergoing a silent extinction, every one we can protect matters.’

Two juvenile female giraffes, Susan and Pasaka, are scheduled to be moved later this week. The four remaining adult females, Nkarikoni, Nalangu, Awala and Nasieku, and one adult male, Lbarnnoti, will be moved early next year.

At Ruko they will be protected from predators, poachers and other threats. 

Rothschild giraffes are a dwindling subspecies of the Northern giraffe that once roamed the entire western Rift Valley in Kenya and into Uganda. Today, fewer than 3,000 are left in Africa, with only about 800 in Kenya.

The giraffe were originally reintroduced to the peninsula in 2011, in hopes that the isolated location would provide shelter from poaching and increase the population in their native Western Kenyan range.

But rising lake levels have cut the peninsula into an island, trapping the giraffe, and the local community. Local people have worked with giraffe conservation organisations to keep them alive ever since, in hopes of a rescue.

The massive animal boarded a custom-made steel barge, then was piloted approximately four miles to the 4,400-acre fenced sanctuary.

The barge, build by the Ruko community, is an engineering marvel, designed and built specifically to carry tall, heavy giraffe. The rectangular steel structure floats atop a series of empty drums, for buoyancy. Reinforced sides kept the giraffe from jumping out as the barge was gently manoeuvred by boats.

‘Each giraffe has its own personality,’ said Susan Myers, Save Giraffes Now founder and CEO. ‘Some are very timid, while others are brave and go onto the barge readily. This is a painstaking process, and the team is being very deliberate about the training.’

The rescue has even managed to help repair deep-rooted community tensions between the communities of the Baringo Lake region – the Pokot and the Ilchamus tribes.

They had been engaged in an often vicious conflict for years but were able to put their differences aside to unite and protect the giraffe.

As the lake waters rose, the giraffe were forced onto a shrinking slice of land on which to forage. Conservancy rangers have been taking supplemental food to the island for them, as well as conducting routine health checks.

The giraffe also faced challenges in breeding. Eight calves have been born, but just two have survived. The others are thought to have been lost to pythons, nutritional deficiencies and other natural causes.

In a trial run for the larger move, several other animals were recently relocated to Ruko, including two rather aggressive ostriches and a handful of impala and warthogs.