The Nigerian Conservation Foundation and other conservationists have announced that they recently caught on camera chimpanzees in the Omo-Shasha-Oluwa forest traversing Ogun, Osun and Ondo states.

The NCF said the camera-trap photos were the first evidence of chimpanzees in South Western Nigeria for over a decade and the discovery had been greeted with a lot of enthusiasm by conservationists.

The Director-General, NCF, Mr. Adeniyi Karunwi, said that the deployment of camera traps and the positive results were signs of the foundation’s commitment to conserving the nation’s forest habitats, with particular attention on the OSO Forest.

“It has come as something of a surprise, as all previous reports indicated that the closest chimps were in a hilly area in a remote corner of the reserve far from where the camera-trap was set up. The survival of chimpanzees and other large mammals in such a threatened forest so close to Lagos, considering the level of urbanisation and deforestation, gives us hope for the initiative,” he said

The initiative was set up in response to the massive deforestation that occurred in the South West region and the threats to the remaining wildlife through habitat loss and hunting.

According to the NCF, the camera-traps were set by the OSO Forest Initiative’s field team as part of their biodiversity monitoring programme, adding that conservationists have not seen chimps in the area since the early 2000s.

 PUNCH.