By Kate Robey | Charitable Trust Operations Manager
Dear Supporter,
Until now, the warden and anti-poaching team on Karongwe Game Reserve had only one reliable pickup truck and one quad bike between them. This situation made it extremely difficult for the team to do their job, both day to day field work, fence patrols and maintenance as well as have an effective response plan when there was a security breach on the reserve.
The rhino poaching crisis in South Africa is deepening, with 1215 rhinos poached in 2014, compared to 668 lost in 2012 and 1004 lost in 2013, and Karongwe is by no means immune, every tiny little preventative step helps.
The two additional ‘Bombardier’ Quad bikes acquired, thanks to your generous donations, literally double the mobility of the anti-poaching team on Karongwe. This makes a huge difference both in their ability to maintain an intense presence across the reserve as well as respond appropriately to incursions when they happen.
Increased mobility allows us to, in the case of a poaching incursion on foot, track the poachers within the reserve as they seek out their quarry, while another can monitor the nearest boundary fences for attempted exits and a third can even patrol roads outside the reserve to try to contact a potential support vehicle. This makes it much easier to stop the poachers!
It is impossible to poacher-proof large tracts of land such as this, but the property’s vulnerability is about the sum of its deterrents, and these donations have had a significant positive impact in this regard!
Thank you for your continued support.
All the best,
GVI Limpopo
Links:
By Tyrone Bennett | Head of Alumni Services
By Sophie Birkett | Head of Operations
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