Wildlife conservation safari in South Africa

Planet

We are painfully aware that our mere presence is a burden on the biodiversity here, and therefore institute measures to limit our impact as much as we can. All of our accommodation is on the reserves within which we work and we endeavour to change and convert the accommodation environment into a sustainable system. While doing so we are continually showing our volunteers the environmentally friendly techniques we are developing and implementing along the way.

A portion of our profits goes towards our Fund, which help fund local community upliftment initiatives and the purchase of VHF collars and the collaring of priority species to enhance monitoring efforts on reserves we work on. Without your participation, we can not do the work we do: Helping to save priority species (many of them being endangered like wild dogs, cheetah and black rhino) by gaining scientific understanding of their role in the delicate African ecosystem.

People

All too often, communities that live around wildlife reserves are ostracized from conservation areas. Also, when rural communities are not helped to sustain themselves, or given adequate conservation education, we cannot expect these communities to do anything but look to protected areas for resources as a means of survival.

To help address these issues, Community Conservation Projects were initiated around four game reserves in Zululand where endangered species need protection. This work involves in-school conservation lessons, a Kid’s Bush Camp program, adult conservation seminars, Wildlife Ambassador Clubs and community game drives, which much of it focused around Rhino Conservation.

While anti-poaching and rhino rescue efforts are crucial to the immediate fight, the rhino war will be won through education in the end. When communities that live on the borders of rhino reserves understand why rhinos need to be conserved, how they can benefit from rhino conservation and why poaching is unsustainable, a buffer zone of friendly forces is created around each rhino population, making poaching less and less likely, until one day poaching is a thing of the past. We understands the need for community conservation education in communities that border rhino populations. That is why we manage community rhino conservation projects in five game reserves that protect critical rhino populations.