Growing up at Cape Point gives you a different relationship with the outdoors. For Steve Mecinski, better known online as The Flying Dutchman, nature wasn’t a place he visited. It was home. He was born and raised inside what is now the Cape of Good Hope section of Table Mountain National Park, where his father […]
Badingilo National Park sits within one of the largest land mammal migrations on earth, but on the ground, that movement is rarely visible. From where the team is based, most wildlife sightings come not from patrols, but from the air. “We’re on the southwestern edge of the migration,” says African Parks’ Law Enforcement Mentor for […]
Roberto Serrini has a simple rule when arriving somewhere unfamiliar. “Grab a beer and talk to a local,” he says. “The more perspective you get,” he says, “the easier it is to be happy on earth.” He doesn’t believe in elaborate itineraries, spreadsheets, or endless restaurant lists saved on your phone before boarding the flight. […]
Some conservation work happens in stillness. Think tracking footprints, watching waterholes, and lots of waiting. And some of it moves fast, with helicopters overhead, teams on the ground, and, at the centre of it all, a two-ton animal waking up inside a crate. At Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife, both are part of the job. Within the […]
Mount Kenya doesn’t make conservation easy. It’s cold, steep (the mountain’s highest peak reaches 17,057 feet), and unpredictable. Patrols move through dense forests, across open moorlands, and over rivers that swell without warning. In some areas, communication drops off entirely. In others, the only way to reach a fire is by helicopter, because on foot, […]
Growing up, Toast Coetzer spent most weekends on his family’s farm in Cradock, Eastern Cape. His parents would pack a picnic, drive to a far corner of the farm, and spend the day walking with little plan. They’d stop to turn over rocks, look at tracks, and identify birds. “You don’t realise it at the […]
In Zambia’s vast Game Management Areas (GMAs), where people and wildlife share the same space, conservation is less about boundaries and more about balance. Musekese Conservation works across landscapes where legality, livelihoods, and wildlife protection intersect in ways that are often messy, political, and human. “We’ve always found that the traditional ‘boots on the ground’ […]
Chrisjan Visser is on the road when we speak, driving back to Hoedspruit. He spent six years there, first as a field ranger, later as a dog handler, before moving on, as many in conservation do. “I’m just going back to see some old friends,” he says. Hoedspruit is where his career took shape. He […]
“You’re in the forest for a minimum of seven days at a time,” says Yoann Galeran. “Sleeping out there. Moving constantly.” Galeran has been working deep in the Congo Basin, in Dzanga-Sangha Special Reserve, since 2018. He started as a ranger trainer, supporting law enforcement operations through a specialist conservation organisation. Today, he serves as […]
At twelve years old, sitting in the back seat of a game viewer in northern Kruger, John Kinghorn didn’t know he was starting something that would shape the rest of his life. The drive had been quiet. Somewhere near Shingwedzi, a spurfowl flushed from the side of the road. “I didn’t quite know what it […]
