"The bongos -- 14 females and four males -- are finally back in their indigenous habitats, in central Kenya," Mount Kenya National Park chief warden William Woodley told AFP, explaining that they were released from transport cages on Friday evening.

The bongos were captured from forests around Mount Kenya between 1966 and 1975 and taken to the United States for breeding purposes as it became clear they were threatened with extinction.

"Apart from professional poaching and rinderpest, other diseases claimed a great number of the bongos," Woodley said.

"Poachers from all over the world wanted the animal's trophies -- horns, game meat and skin, mostly along the slopes of Mount Kenya and Abardares forests in central Kenya -- and Cherangani ranges in the Rift Valley Province," he added.

Woodley said 72-year-old US national Don Hunt, who came to Kenya in 1953 as a trader, decided to become a conservationist later when he realised that the bongos were threatened with extinction.

Hunt, with American friends, captured at least 20 bongos and sent them to the United States for breeding, to save the rare species from extinction.

According to US veterinarian Mark Davis, "the returned bongos will be quarantined for 45 days for them to adapt with the area's freezing climate, before being released into the wild later."

The returned bongos will form the basis of a planned breeding programme that will lead to the eventual rehabilitation of the bongos to their original forest habitat on the slopes of Mount Kenya, Woodley said.

TERRA.WIRE