Avoid hugging or holding wildlife when taking selfies, Kenyans warned

Conservationists have warned Kenyans against taking inapproporate selfies with wild animals.

Kenya is listed among top 20 countries with inappropriate wildlife selfies, the conservationists said yesterday at Silver Spring Hotel during the launch of Wildlife Selfies report. 

The report warned against the increasing use of animals as photo props for wildlife selfies. 

Pictures taken by people while hugging and holding wild animals are classified as bad selfies.

Other countries that featured prominently on the list included the US, Tanzania and South Africa.

The report was developed after a study was conducted on social media platforms — Instagram being the focus.

The World Animal Protection worked with the Grassroots to track social media users, who posted images of themselves with wild animals.

Pictures posted with images of animals in their natural habitats as people interact with them are classified as good selfies.

Sixty-seven per cent of posts featured lions from parks in South Africa, Kenya and Tanzania.

Twenty-eight per cent of posts in which giraffes were in the frame on Instagram were shared mainly from Kenya, the report said.  

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