Arabian oryx - Qarn Nazwa 25.10.09

[MarkS]

13 oryx just south of Qarn Nazwa, by the feeding trough this afternoon. My wife, Louise, took this with a Fuji Finepix - imagine what Mike Barth could have done!

Mark

2965

[Mike Barth]

Excellent, I have only seen these at the Sharjah Wildlife centre !

Well done

[Greg Simkins]

Good to see my oryx making a favourable impression.
cheers

[MarkS]

Good to see my oryx making a favourable impression.
cheers

Greg,

What is the status of this herd? Are they released stock or wild, but helped out by feeding/watering? This is the 2nd time I've seen them in this area.

Cheers

Mark

[Greg Simkins]

A brief history of the DDCR Oryx. In 1999 we re-introduced 70 Arabian oryx into the Al Maha Reserve (27km²) the main objective at that time was to get this endangered species breeding in the desert habitat, this was successful and in 2003 we had approximately 200 animals. At this stage the Dubai Desert Conservation Reserve (225km²) was created and incorparated a part of Quarn Nazwa and we moved some of the animals out of the original Al Maha area through both natural expansion and translocation. Our oryx herd has now grown to about 300 and we have changed are focus from breeding to the establishment of sustainable herds. However we do still provided supplementary feed, as the vegetation improves from years of overgrazing, and that is the trough you can see near Nazwa. We now have about 100 oryx that are not utilising the supplementary feed at all and that number increases in the cooler winter months.

Cheers

[MarkS]

Thanks and congratulations Greg. Glad to hear successful conservation stories like this one.

Mark