15 Giraffes Relocated to Lake Mburo National Park

15 Giraffes have been removed from Murchison Falls National Park to Lake Mburo National Park situated in Kiruhura District. Uganda Wildlife Authority executive director Andrew Seguya flagged off the transnight journey on Tuesday. Eight giraffes, including two bulls and six females, were the first batch to be transported. They arrived at their destination on Wednesday morning. The major objective for translocation of the Giraffes is to boost tourism in Lake Mburo National Park.

The initiative is also aimed at reducing the number of Giraffes in Murchison Falls National Park to different places where they can feed and breed freely. Murchison falls National park has 900 giraffes. Andrew Seguya said that the Introducing the giraffes in Lake Mburo will help diversify wildlife and consequently, attract tourists and Lake Mburo is expected to receive more tourists in the near feature. Lake Mburo National Park has been without giraffe species since it was gazette since they became extinct about 50 years ago.

According to Jossy Muhangi, the Uganda Wildlife Authority public relations manager, said that ecological studies had been conducted before the relocation exercise to ensure the safety of the animals. He noted that Lake Mburo is well endowed with shrubs and Acacia trees which are food for the giraffes.

Being the smallest National Park in Uganda, Lake Mburo has been known for hosting zebras and the introduction of Giraffes is a big deal for promoting tourism in Lake Mburo. Lake Mburo National Park is located conveniently close to the highway that connects Kampala to the parks of western Uganda. It is a home to 350 bird species as well as zebra, impala, eland, buffalo, oribi, Defassa waterbuck, leopard, hippo, hyena, topi and reedbuck. Though this park is less known for wildlife safaris, it is one of the ecoparks where one can enjoy a weekend escape while in Uganda.

13 Lakes are found in the park and among them include Lake Mburo which forms part of a 50km-long wetland system linked by a swamp. Five of these lakes lie within the park’s borders. Once covered by open savanna, Lake Mburo National Park now contains much woodland as there are no elephants to tame the vegetation. In the western part of the park, the savanna is interspersed with rocky ridges and forested gorges while patches of papyrus swamp and narrow bands of lush riparian woodland line many lakes.