SOLIO GAME RESERVE

The Central Province of Kenya is home to the privately held wildlife conservancy known as Solio Game Reserve.

The ranch is a privately owned, fenced protected area with an emphasis on rhino conservation. The oldest rhino sanctuary and a key breeding ground for black rhinos, the 17,500-acre reserve is located 22 kilometers north of Nyeri Town and is crucial to the conservation and breeding of black rhinos in Kenya. The rhino is one of the “Big-Five,” a popular tourist attraction. One of Kenya’s most prosperous private rhino breeding reserves is Solio Ranch. The buffalo, zebra, giraffe, and plains game like eland, oryx, impala, waterbuck, Thompson’s gazelle, and warthog coexist peacefully with the animals. There were 353 white rhinos and 635 black rhinos in Kenya’s various conservation areas by the end of 2009.

Conservation of Rhinos

A new management plan for the conservation of black rhinos in Kenya was approved by the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) in March 2003. The goal was to finish stocking new sanctuaries in both sectors using surplus rhinos from national parks and reserves as well as private land. According to the Kenya Wildlife Service, in order to establish and preserve a genetically viable population of East African black rhinos or subspecies in their native habitats in Kenya, a high and sustainable annual population growth rate must be maintained. Law enforcement and biological management were to receive more attention in order to achieve this. The KWS strategy’s specific objective was to raise the number of black rhinos by at least 5% annually in order to achieve a confirmed total of 500 rhinos by 2005, 650 rhinos by 2010, and 1000 rhinos by 2020.