Rains breathe life to Rift lakes

• Water levels at six bodies that were drying up improve as rivers flow again

All the six lakes in the Rift Valley are slowly recovering following the ongoing rains.

Water levels at lakes Turkana, Baringo, Bogoria, Nakuru, Elementaita and Naivasha have improved in the last few days.

During the dry spell, lakes Nakuru and Elementaita, which host hundreds of thousands of flamingos, almost dried up while water at Bogoria, Baringo and Naivasha had greatly declined.

The population of flamingos at Lake Nakuru had reduced from 1.5 million mid this year to 500,000 during the November census.

Hundreds of pelicans which inhabit the mouth of River Njoro at the Lake Nakuru National Park had all migrated to other marine resources.

It was a similar story at Lake Elementaita with only a small population of flamingos remaining at the mouth of River Kariandusi.

A research scientist, Dr Bernard Kuloba said that the three rivers draining into Lake Nakuru, namely Makalia, Nderit and Njoro were flowing.

Slowly recovering

“The lake is slowly recovering since the onset of the current rains and we are hoping that the flamingos and pelicans which had relocated to other sources would return,” he said.

However, Dr Kuloba noted that the water flowing into the lake was carrying loads of silt due to environmental degradation in the catchment area.

“The forests and other plantations that used to sieve the storm water before it goes into the river and finally the lake have been destroyed causing massive erosion and consequent siltation,” he said.

Asked whether the Kenya Wildlife Service would de-silt the lake to save it from extinction, Dr Kuloba said such a move would destabilise the marine ecosystem by destroying small micro-organisms and tampering with soil alkaline levels.

He observed that such an operation would disturb millions of birds which inhabit the lake.

Catchment area

“We have to secure the catchment area first before de-silting the lake or else we will be working in vain since erosion would continue without a proper vegetation cover,” said Dr Kuloba.

The rains are also a great relief to thousands of farmers who had planted quick maturing crops last November in anticipation of the El nino rains.

The farmers had started losing hope following the continued drought with some planning to sue the government and the meteorological department.

A farmer, Mr Jacob Gitonga, was optimistic that his maize crop would mature if the rains continued for a little bit longer.