By Otto Bakano (AFP)

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NAROK, Kenya — Kenyan rangers on Thursday began relocating 50 rampaging elephants to the renowned Maasai Mara game reserve to stem rising human deaths and property destruction in outlying villages.

The first four of the elephants due to be relocated over the next 10 days were shot with tranquilizer darts from a helicopter near Narok town, some 150 kilometres (90 miles) south of Nairobi, a zone notorious for human-wildlife conflict.

Once the giant animals fell asleep, conservationists carefully winched them up by crane onto trucks for the journey to the Maasai Mara, from where they had been cut off by widening settlement, increasing farming and deforestation.

"The greatest challenge to Kenyan wildlife conservation today is Kenya's population growth," said Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) director Julius Kipng'etich. …

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More information:

• Packing their trunks! Kenyan elephants move home after wrecking havoc on African village