The Centre's First Release

With the New Year, the Wildlife Centre moved into a new phase. 2008 will see many of the animals at the Centre released back into the wild. Ng'azi the water monitor lizard was the first lucky animal to benefit from our release programme and was returned to the wild on January 10th.

Ng'azi was brought to us by a Lilongwe resident who had found him in his garden. His front legs were injured; looking as if he had been beaten with a stick in an attempt to kill him. Water monitors can get quite aggressive if approached, capable of delivering a powerful whipping with their long tails, so killing them is fairly common occurrence.

Ng'azi was put into quarantine at the Wildlife Centre and each day fed a raw egg. He responded well to this nutritious diet and in under a month was strong enough to climb all around his enclosure and was regularly seen doing push-ups! If this wasn't a clear enough signal, the fact the Centre's carer's could no longer get close enough to him to feed him due to his aggressive behaviour convinced us that it was time to return him to the wild.

The 'Wilderness Zone' of Lilongwe's Nature Sanctuary icomplex has many native water monitors so it is clearly good habitat for them. The Lingandzi river runs through it and there is plentiful vegetation cover for hiding and insects and small mammals for eating. In short, a perfect place for Ng'azi.

With a small amount of ushering from Andy (the resident who found him) and Remke (a volunteer who had been caring for him) Ng'azi the water monitor scrambled into the crate we chose to move him in. He was less keen to leave it and only with plenty of tail whipping and hissing did he regain his freedom. But as soon as he was out, he vanished into the undergrowth and was gone. A job well done!