Volunteering in South Africa - The Big 5 Wildlife Project

In short, this experience has been absolutely amazing. The program is based at the Garden Route Game Lodge near Mossel Bay. This is where guests leave for game drives throughout the day. It is the job of the park rangers and volunteers (like myself) to manage the game reserve and all of the animals. As a volunteer, I worked with Piet, the volunteer coordinator. Piet is a great person to work with and teaches you everything you want to know about the animals on the game reserve. Some of our daily tasks included cleaning out the elephants' boma, cutting down small trees to feed the elephants, and feeding buffalo and cheetahs! We also completed other common tasks that were needed at the time.

It has been a special time for the reserve because they recently doubled in size. We made gates at the boundaries of the new land, while other workers took down the old fencing, opening up the entire reserve. Although there is no more fencing, the animals have a mental barrier as to where their boundaries are. We guided buffalo into the new land by feeding them a little bit at a time, and encouraging them to follow the truck to get more food. This was a hard task because the two days we attempted it, the buffalo were nowhere to be found. Every other day the buffalo had been right out in the open, but of course they are hiding the one day we need them. We eventually found them and, after a lot of teasing with food, the buffalo were finally in their new territory.

The next day we had to shoot a zebra that was injured with an infected leg. The park rangers gave him a few weeks to heal, but the leg was getting worse, so they made the decision to put him down. After shooting it, we brought the body to the reserve's butcher shed and skinned it (I actually just watched). The skin will be sold at the curio shop and the money put back into the reserve. We took the rest of the zebra to the butchery where they prepared and sold the meat. Although this may seem like a sad story, the animal was clearly suffering and this is all part of running a reserve. We later relocated another male zebra to lead the female zebras that lost their dominant stallion.

The game lodge has a reptile park with caged snakes that guests can visit. Because they are caged, they must be fed. Piet gave me th task of shooting birds to feed to the Green Mamba snakes. We drove around in the back of a truck until we found a flock of birds. I missed my first shot, but I soon hit one and then two! I had never shot anything before, but felt this was a good experience because the birds were put to good use.

These were just a few of the many things I experienced as a volunteer in South Africa. Although there was a lot of work to be done, it was all so exciting that it didn't seem like work at all. There was also plenty of time to relax. I often sat in the front yard of our tents, overlooking a small pond. Every evening dozens of animals walked right in front of me, which was amazing to experience after a hard day of work. The sunsets were also breathtaking, and on a quiet night I heard lions roar!

I am extremely grateful to have participated in this wonderful experience. It was like nothing else in the world!

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