Wild dog rescued from wire snare in Kruger National Park

A female wild dog was rescued after she was found caught in a wire snare in the Kruger National Park, according to a tweet issued by SANParks on Saturday night.

The injured animal was discovered and attended to just south of the Babalala picnic site in the northern parts of Kruger between the Shingwedzi and Punda Maria rest camps.

Wire snare removed from female wild dog just south of Babalala. Fortunately the snare had not cut through the skin yet. Thank you to Karen Blackwood (Eagle Eye Safaris) for the accurate report and assistance by rangers in locating her, and of course to the vet. pic.twitter.com/BcmYghk4ae

— Kruger National Park (@SANParksKNP) January 5, 2019

Some of the thin curling wire can be seen in the image shared by Kruger’s exclusive SANParks account, and the injured animal is visibly in pain with her eyes tightly shut and mouth pulled up revealing her gritted teeth. Aside from the pain, the female appears to have come out unscathed, as it was found that the snare had not yet cut through her skin.

Kruger credits Karen Blackwood and her cohort from Eagle Eye Safaris for reporting the incident of the injured animal.

It was a team effort and the park thanked the rangers and vet for their assistance. One of the park rangers can be seen standing by the rescued wild dog, the removed wire snare in his hand.

One response to the tweet from a Johan de Villiers (@divviej) commended the efforts but lamented the fact that parks lack the resources to maintain this level of attention for more of these kinds of incidents.

‘The sad reality is that poorly-maintained park borders, patrol of [said] borders and lack of resources for our dedicated rangers adds to the increase of this type of activity. Well done to all who made this rescue a success,’ De Villiers commented.

Image: Shem Compion.

According to Siyabona Africa, African wild dogs (Lycaon pictus) are not fond of areas dominated by lions and hyenas, and are known to roam around for up to 250 square kilometres.

The wild dog population at Kruger was last estimated to be between 450 and 500 individuals, and sightings of these animals at Kruger are not as common as in other popular game reserves.

Featured image: Shem Compion

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