Additional reporting Abby Hook

Two of Kent’s biggest wildlife parks are celebrating their groundbreaking achievements in rewilding and conservation.

Today (March 20) is World Rewilding Day, and the teams at Howletts Wild Animal Park and Port Lympne Hotel and Reserve are hoping they can help raise awareness of the importance of rewilding.

Rewilding is the process of protecting the environment to support the return of its natural state, including bringing wild animals back to their native habitats - something that Howletts and Port Lympne have successfully done with hundreds of animals.

“The Aspinall Foundation specialises in reintroducing rare and endangered species and protecting and restoring degraded habitats,” explains Amos Courage, the foundation’s overseas project director. “We work in collaboration with Howletts and Port Lympne to reintroduce captive animals from the parks back into their natural habitat.”

Howletts in Bekesbourne and Port Lympne, near Hythe, have worked with conservation charity the Aspinall Foundation to breed more than 500 endangered animals, including gorillas, black rhino, clouded leopards, Javan gibbons, Javan langur and African elephants.

The team’s rewilding efforts have seen more than 75 critically endangered western lowland gorillas return to Congo and lions and cheetahs released in South Africa.

“We always had this dream of reintroducing animals from the parks,” says Amos. “It started with wild orphans whose parents had been killed and they’d been sold as pets. We were lucky enough to find a site, which used to have gorillas but they were hunted to extinction, so we reintroduced and restored the habitat. It just shows you can bring these animals back - but you need vision.”

Howletts is also currently working on a first-of-its-kind project to rewild the UK’s largest herd of elephants to Kenya.

“We believe that elephants belong in the wild,” says Amos. “They don’t belong in this climate, they need a lot of space in order to thrive. We also believe it will have conservation benefits - by reintroducing these animals we’re not only protecting their habitat but also they will send a message that individual animals matter, be it captive ones or wild ones.”

The wildlife parks have seen several success stories come from their rewilding attempts, including four wild-born cheetah cubs in South Africa.

One of their more recent rewilding projects is Joshi, a silverback gorilla who is now living in Congo.

“Joshi’s doing great,” adds Amos. “We’ve tried to pair him with a wild-born male who will teach him what to eat - he didn’t like the wild fruits when he first arrived. He’s not yet completely released - it's known as a soft release, so you spend a lot longer to make sure he’s confident, eating the right food, bonding with the right group and when all those things are ready we can release him.”

Both parks have plans to continue their conservation efforts in the future, including sending more black rhinos to Tanzania and Javan gibbons and langurs to Indonesia.

Howletts and Port Lympne offer a range of animal encounters where visitors can get up close to lots of the parks’ endangered species and learn more about the importance of conservation and being environmentally aware.