Original subtitles

Balule is home.

It's not my heart, it's my whole life.

It's just a part of

me, it's my existence.

I have such a passion for the place.

Not only the environment, the nature, the

animals, the people that are around here,

the entire area just becomes a part of

who you are. So it's lovely.

Balule is a 55,000 hectare nature reserve,

and we form part of the

Greater Kruger Conservation Area.

This is an almost three million hectare

conservation area where Kruger National

Park, one of the world's best known and

most iconic, incredible nature reserves,

it forms the big body in this open

conservation system for the animals to

roam free and be wild.

Greater Kruger is iconic in terms of

conservation for the whole planet, not

just for South Africa or Africa.

The diversity of species,

plants, animals, everything

is of the best in the world.

Each and every creature is on this earth

for a reason and plays an ecological

role, and the entire ecosystem is

dependent on all these species.

It's the responsibility of humans to

provide sufficient safe space for these

animals to just exist.

Sadly, this entire Greater Kruger area

was hard-hit for the

senseless killing of our rhinos.

Balule, unfortunately,

suffered severe losses.

The dehorning of our rhino was something

that we were forced to do.

The dehorning operation,

it's the biggest conservation operation

that does take place in Balule.

The vets, the pilots, the

people on the ground, the rangers,

everybody gets involved.

And it is high energy, it's fast-paced,

there's always a lot of adrenaline.

The dehorning operation is coordinated

from the air by our head warden, Ian

Novak, who will be in the light aircraft

with our pilot Bruce McDonald.

One of our most experienced wardens, Rian

Ahlers, oversees the actual dehorning

operations on the ground.

We're here today in the most southern

part of the greater Balule. So we're

very much in our danger zone at the

moment, very much the most active from a

poaching point of view.

We've got the spotter

plane up with Bruce and Ian.

They're looking for most likely white

rhinos, it's mostly a white rhino area.

So we're just waiting for them to spot

the rhino, then we'll react, unless

they're circling in that airplane,

waiting for a ground crew to get past.

It's a vomit comet, that machine.

Guys, I guess, is this everybody, eh?

Looks like it. Just quickly, the

golden rule is that the communication

comes from the top down, is we'll get the

ground teams right to where those rhinos

are, into that area. There's no point in

us starting to dart when the ground

team's still five minutes out.

The ground teams are already in the

various vehicles. There's a lot of

communication that's required, you know,

a lot of pre-planning is required, and

lines of communication are very

important. Imagine there's a lot of

moving elements, there's a thick swing,

there's a helicopter, there's three

vehicles on the ground, and there's at

least 15 people running around. So we're

all excited, revved up,

and ready to rock and rock.

The entire team is excited when it's time

for de-horning, because it's one of the

operations that we do, where there's one

goal in mind, and that

is saving the rhinos.

And you know that for the next 18 months,

it's going to be okay. That's

a hell of a rewarding feeling.

Oh, yeah!... But I think it's just

watching and waiting.

So we just pulled into this grassy

airstrip over here, just as a bit of a

holding spot, and as we arrived up here,

we bumped into this beautiful cheetah,

which is a fantastic way

to start a Monday morning.

With these operations? Sometimes, you

know, weather conditions make it

difficult to spot the animals,

vegetation makes it also challenging when

it's very thick. So often, you just hurry

up and wait. But that can change

within a heartbeat. You can get the radio

call any second, and then we're running

for the rest of the day, so absolutely.

You've got to be prepared

to have a bit of patience.

.....If it's a small triangle, I would have

struggled to see. I don't know if that

makes sense. I know that's York. It

would be in York... But they can move eh?....

But so it's almost like those two

notches, like that, across....

I'm Zala..I'm

a rhino monitor in Balule. My role in

this is that I have to prepare the

individuals that we have to dehorn, and

then what we do is, at the dehorning, we

are taking off the horn, so that we are

devaluing the animals, basically, so that

we make them unattractive for poaching.

And it is working really well.

..Show me the bulls that are in this area and then

I'll tell you, then it's very possible

that I missed a small notch, you know?...

...This guy? No. He's around?

But all of these have to be done, so I

think you would see the regrowth is big...

Obviously, the dehorning itself, you

know, we don't want to do it. We want to

see these animals as they were made

through millions of years of evolution,

to just enjoy the bush and just be

themselves, you know what I mean? They're

stunning, iconic rhinos. So, in the end

of the day, I'm happy that they're safe,

but I'm also sad that

they cannot be natural.

Are you calling me?

OK, copy that.

They've got three white rhinos.

Operation like this is hugely expensive.

One doesn't realise how much finances get

thrown into a day of dehorning. It's

helicopters, it's vets, it's the drugs.

It all adds up. If you cut costs, you

should rather not do it, because you're

going to run yourself short, and that's

where animals' lives are

second best to the finances.

So I thinks from a vets

point of view, there's very critical

moments that happens very quickly. The

vet needs to decide what amount of drugs

needs to be administered while we're talking

in the front, and he's trying to stay in

his seat in the back while we're throwing

him around. There is so many things that

can go against the vet in that moment in time.

Well, they've just darted the Rhino.

We've had notification that the

dart's in, and now we wait.

Expertise that we've got from helicopters

and vets on site, we've probably got some

of the best in the world doing African

wildlife work. We haven't lost a rhino

yet, and I don't expect us

to lose one either.

The thing with the teamwork is with

anything. Everyone's got their role to

play, and one can't be done without the

other, but the ground crew, what's

critical with them is ultimately the

rhinos' safety is in their hands, and

the vet on the ground that gets there

first, he's got a hell of a

responsibility because you've got to

stabilise that animal as quick as

possible. We don't want to be injuring or

even at worst killing any animal because

we're trying to do this operation, so

we're very conscious of that, and nobody

takes chances, and the rhino's safety is

paramount in all of this.

...Try and get him...

...Yeah, I'll just try to turn him...

...I'm just going to try to turn him

actually completely. Push him

all the way...

...Okay, one, two, turn. You don't want to

turn that's fine. I can't get out of the way

quick enough for this....

....Just give him 40

milligrams he's quite light.

Sometimes they're not completely stable

and sure in their walk. Sometimes they

just crash down on the side.

...Yeah, we'll have to sort the legs out.

I'll just let him relax full....

If you look at a rhino in its natural

environment, they're going to sometimes

roll on their back. Like, it's not

something that they wouldn't do. I mean,

it looks a little bit rough, but it's

nothing bad for them. We then quickly put

them in an appropriate position so that

it's okay for their legs.

That's good, that's good. And now we're

going to go back up again. Huge bulls can

be up to two tons. So imagine them not

being positioned correctly. Then when

they wake up, they could have a dead leg.

...Almost there. Well done, guys. Lovely...

It's beautiful. Fred legs are fine...

We can also cause damage in their tendons or

something like that. So we're trying to

be very careful with that. That's why we

always position them correctly so that

once they're woken up, they can walk away

if they want to.

...Then I just need to

measure this and then I'm done....

My role is from the Balule point of view,

I need to ID every animal and do the

measurements of the horn, the

circumference and the length so that

everything is in a file for every rhino

so we can follow it.

So the vets remove the horn

simply with a chainsaw. The cutting of

the horn doesn't cause any harm. It's

actually like cutting off your

fingernail. The vets are also very, very

careful how far down they go because

there's a growth plate that we don't want

to damage. It doesn't hurt them at all

and then it grows back. That's why we

have to repeat it, obviously.

Once the horn is taken off the rhino,

horns will be marked, DNA will be

collected, a chip will be

put inside the horn as well.

It will be taken to

a high-secure facility that is like Fort

Knox and it will be stored there and that

is where it will remain.

I'd say this is just under two kilos of

horn and on the black market you're

looking anywhere between 60 and 80

thousand US dollars per kilo. So I'm

looking at about 150,000 euros right there.

It's very difficult to comprehend what

kind of value humans will find from this

piece of horn besides rhino. It makes no

sense. It's absolutely ridiculous.

The only thing that

needs rhino horn is a rhino.

You know, rhino horn has different uses

in Far East. The main reason is it's got

some sort of aphrodisiac or whatever

properties, but the other

thing is it's a sign of wealth.

If you have rhino horn bowl, it means

you're a wealthy guy, important person,

so it's status and then potential

aphrodisiac qualities, which is all nonsense.

This morning I was up at four....I was like,

did they think of this, did they think of

that, and I've got to stop being a mother

hen.. they have thought of it all.

I never get used to it. Absolutely never.

It's emotional every single time.

I really got the goose flesh. I'm still

goose flesh... It's every single

rhino's precious and every single one is

emotional. And no, four years later...

I'm not used to it. I'm not used to it at all.

We have to find a different solution along

the line. This is not sustainable long

term, but

certainly for now we have to.

I'm very fortunate that my parents

actually invested in this area way before

I was born. So I was basically since birth

exposed to it and from

a very, very early age.

I knew this is where I

belong. This is where I want to be.

When I got here 23 years ago, the

dynamics of the reserve

was totally different.

The fence between us and the greater

Kruger area was still up.

Balule is quite a fairly

young reserve compared to the

bigger other reserves

adjoining the Kruger Park.

There was rhino in the areas and pretty

much none in other areas.

And I was fortunate enough to be part of

introducing rhino. We released the first

three White rhino on

this side of the reserve.

And White rhinos really

started thriving in the area.

During the same time, we also had a

project with WWF, the Black Rhino

Expansion Project, that we reintroduced a

number of Black Rhino in here. And it's

really one of those projects that

everybody dreams about, being part of

something like that and being here the

whole time, seeing the population grow

and stabilise and start moving into areas

is really, really nice from the White and

the Black Rhino point of view.

It was a nice time to sit

at a waterhole and see rhino.

Mud bathing in the areas where

they should have been, but for years

wasn't. It's a nice feeling that knowing

you were part of making that happen.

I moved up here to live here permanently in 2010.

It was always a dream,

absolute dream come true.

And it truly was unbelievable. Every day

just became better than the previous day.

We knew about the poachings happening in

Kruger, some in other private reserves,

but there were no rhinos poached in

Baluli yet. And I distinctly

remember a friend of mine who's in

conservation asking me, "Have you had any

rhinos poached?" And I was like, "No, not

at all. No rhinos poached." It was so at

that stage of 2010, it was so far from

our frame of reference.

I think I had a sense of what was coming.

I think I had a sense. Also because of

what was happening in the rest of the

country, there was no way

we were going to be exempt.

We lost our first rhino in 2012.

It's like crime in town. It never happens

to you. It then came with a wave of note.

It was just too quick, too quick on us.

Nobody was prepared for the onslaught

that was...was hitting our rhino.

Our wardens were all people that came

into this for love of nature and for

wanting to contribute to conservation.

They had to become military commanders to

protect the rhino because they are the

last line between the

rhino, its life and death.

Every single thing that we revolved

around on a day-to-day basis revolved

around the security of rhinos.

So it was a major change for us. To the

extent by 2017, 2018, we literally

couldn't keep our heads above water, hey?

That's how bad it was, yeah.

We lost 17 rhinos that year. Imagine

dealing with 17 carcasses in one year.

And that's, you know,

one, two, three a month.

Annual census indicated a population of

around 60. And if you're losing 17 a

year, it would have been a matter of

years and we would have

lost our entire population.

That's a map of Balule, and every red dot

there is a dead rhino, a poached rhino.

There's no natural mortalities on there.

That's.. all of them are poached.

You know, there wouldn't be a week going

by that you did not end up at an autopsy

somewhere along the line. So it really,

you know, it felt like you lost control.

We were finding carcasses of about three

to five days old, and those carcasses

were generally located by vultures, and

that's probably the

worst place you want to be.

It means that first of all, you didn't

detect a gunshot,you haven't

detected an incursion, and you haven't

even picked up an exit.

So it literally means that you're in a

bad space right now.

At that point, these guys were like

ghosts, you know. We could....all we would

see is footprints and carcasses,

footprints and carcasses. You would get

little signs of them, but you would never

get the whole picture, and, you know,

they would get in carcass and get out.

There was no in-between.You just

couldn't get them or get a hold on them

or get any information about them.

I remember those days that it was insane.

We tried to just do what we can to try

and protect these animals, but sometimes

it just gets to a point where whatever

you try and do, they just keep on coming

and coming, and we're trying to do

something, but it's clearly not working...

but what else do we do?

You know, when you ask yourself questions

like that, you just sit and you look at

how bad people can be, how cruel people

can be, and, yeah, it's...

If you had to ask me what was the biggest

sort of thing that gets to you, that sort

of eats away at you, is the potential of

thinking there has to be other answers.

I picked up the phone and I said to

Sharon, she had just taken over as the

chairperson of Balule at that point in

time, and I said, "Sharon, have you got

an hour for me? "I want

to show you something."

There was a rhino carcass

discovered on one of our regions.

It's one of the most beautiful parts of

Balule , large, large wilderness area

There are no commercial lodges.

There are hardly any roads.

Just the day after it happened, he says,

"I want to go and show you exactly what

happened, "so that you can understand."

I've never...I've been to carcasses, but I've

never kind of walked

through an entire process.

And you could see the rhino came down to

drink water at this little pan, and they'd

sat there waiting for him, and when

he came down to drink, they shot him.

We followed these tracks, and on the

grass, you could just see

this dark, horrible blood,

on the bushes and on the ground, and this

animal was running away.

He ran away probably one and a half, two

kilometres before he dropped and died,

and then this horrifically hacked face.

It's a site that is

incredibly difficult to deal with.

We both stood there, and said to each other,

"There's definitely

internal involvement, "because there is

no way that strangers would come in here,

find that pan, "and know a rhino is going to

come and drink there." So we acknowledged

that we definitely had unfortunately

compromised individuals amongst ourselves

that we're working with in this reserve

that's involved.

And I'll tell you...

her and I sat crying there.

But Sharon said to me that weekend, which

was one of our meetings,

she would change things.

And that's where it started.

Colin, for many years, a

strong, amazing, dedicated warden,

was a broken man, seeing the tears

in Colin's eyes and tears rolling down

his cheeks and the raw emotion.

And Colin asked me, "Sharon, please can

we dehorn our rhinos?"

They are being dehorned, and this is the

result. They're being killed. If we

dehorn them, they'll be alive.

That was the day I decided I'm going to

drive two things. It's the integrity

management within this reserve, and

motivate for the dehorning.

One of the boldest decisions we made was

to basically start immediately, to

literally start polygraph testing, I

think it was two weeks

after we made the decision.

And that was critical, to be able to weed

out the people that are working within

the reserve but are actually involved in

poaching. Through information sharing or

even in the actual killing of our rhinos.

..."Have you been approached by any poachers

to assist them with the

illegal killing of a rhino?"

"No."

Unfortunately, we had a lot of failures.

We had a lot of compromised individuals.

It was a very hard and harsh process to

manage and to deal with the results.

Dehorning took a bit longer to be able to

implement with Kruger and our neighbours, etc.

It was a difficult period, but six

months later we dehorned.

What's really exciting is that it's a

collaborative effort amongst the Greater

Kruger. Multiple reserves all

participating in this.

The stress levels are exceptionally high

and we need to just do something drastic

to get better control over the situation.

There was a lot of scrutiny on us because

it was with us in Klaserie

being the first to do it,

there was a lot of attention and, you

know, every aspect of the project

had to be planned and double checked.

I'll never forget that day in my life,

because the first day of dehorning and we

found this big bull known to York, our

prime bull, now numbered A1.

A1. The sad thing is it was extremely

exciting. We were trying something new.

We were convinced it's going to make a

difference, but we were doing

it for all the wrong reasons.

So the entire process I had this, you

know, this absolute sadness that we got

to do what we got to do.

We're a little bit apprehensive really

because the last thing you want is to be

now adding to the death toll because

you're doing an intervention. So we also

were confident, based on the knowledge

that we had, that it wouldn't make an

impact on their social structure and or

their ability to defend themselves. You

don't know until you've actually done it.

I just cried when that first horn came off.

That chainsaw to us.... It really

was an unbelievably emotional time that

for all those reasons that we have to do

this and then that we had gotten where we

were and then that just that relief when

you believe.... it's going to be safe.

For the next year, year and a half.

It was actually a very interesting feeling.

I was expecting to be overcome

with emotion and, you know, there was a

lot of tears all around me. But for me it

was a different feeling.

To see those horns off and in a bag and

getting locked away and out of the hands

of potential poachers

was a great feeling.

It was a very happy feeling because

something dawned on me when A1

stood up because that's the first time

I've seen a rhino without its horn alive.

.. And that was something.

To see an animal breathing and walking

off and happy with its horn off, that's

something that will be with me forever.

We actively did it until the end of the

year basically with every rhino that came

in. And we put it out there, you know, we

made sure that everybody knew we were

doing it. And there was a

mark difference immediately.

It was just incredible how all of a

sudden you kind of got out of that

frantic mode and you started realising we

haven't got a carcass this week. Two

weeks we haven't got a carcass. Three

weeks we don't have a carcass.

Unfortunately we did lose rhinos again.

But then you realise, you know, it's

not the silver bullet.

It's not the only answer.

At that time the regions within Balule

were fragmented and everybody was trying

to protect their own backyard.

So as long as they're breaking in in my

neighbour's house, it's okay. But I'll

only protect my situation.

There were some regions that were better

at anti-poaching than others. I want to

see some hand signals, Morris. Keep your

formation nice. All right. The Rian

section was very, very good at

anti-poaching. The Rian lost no rhino.

But then we had regions that,

they were chasing poachers,

but no results.

There was quite a bit of

conflict, differences of opinion. At that

time the head warden then decided to step

down and resign. And we appointed Ian

Nowak as head warden of Balule.

And we all brought in to the concept of

working as a collective.

...."So I think what we'll do is we'll split

up into two teams. Then we've got that

drainage now and that drainage now"....

When I first took over there was a lot of

islands. My job was with the warden

corps, the guys at the coal face.

My job was to get these individual armies

to roll their workers' divisions of the

same army. The goal is to protect the

animals and to apprehend the suspects

irrespective of where it's happened. And

once they're on this

reserve it's all of our problem.

We started to work in terms of the

anti-poaching of rhino.

And we started to look at how we could

better the situation. We got rid of

all of our service providers for

protection of rhino. And we took it back

in-house and we did it ourselves.

Whether we like it or we're not, it's a

reality, is that it's a war.

And when those poaching teams come in,

you'll have two operatives with AK-47s.

One with a 458 and the other one with an

axe or a knife. And the AK-47s aren't for

the animals. Those are for the rangers.

So it was critical that our team was

trained correctly to protect themselves.

And also that the equipment that they had

protects them to the best of our ability.

When you start considering that, how

do you send anybody out into this

environment? Where you can bump into

any one of the big five any time.

And you bump into a lot of poachers and

they open fire on you.

..."Okay, let's go."...

..."Okay, make safe."...

Those operatives that

are doing their job are fathers. They're

also sons of mothers. To send them out

there without protection and correct

training, it's just irresponsible.

We then started with all these new

interventions. The guys trained

themselves up to be extremely effective

with their canines.

The situations that

we're involved in that are potentially

extremely dangerous. This dog can

save your life on most operations.

Colin spearheaded some nighttime

capabilities because poaching happened at

night. How do you respond if you have to

wait until first light? It's

too late. Poachers are gone.

We started changing our tactics so we

could detect gunshots when they were

taking place. And then we started

aggressively reacting to those gunshots.

Added to that we added the canine aspect.

We added the dog aspect and the dog

aspect brought a momentum to it. We now

could track at higher speeds at

nighttime. Previously they had told us

it's impossible to track at nighttime.

But in the Balule, we were forced to do it.

A lot of technology got deployed.

This thermal drone is an absolute game

changer for us. Not only from a wildlife

monitoring perspective but also from a

security perspective. You can't hide a

heat signature in the bush.

We fly this drone at about 150 meters

above the ground. And as you can see, it

pops up very vividly. We've

discovered something very unique here.

For the first time we were on the front

foot and not permanently on the back

foot. It was a very, very progressive

phase for Balule in

combating the onslaught.

We had never gone any sort of length of

time without a loss.

We started talking about it and said,

"Geez, you know what? We might actually

make a year." And then we

had a loss in October of 2020.

A rhino went down in one of our regions.

And with the agreements between all the

wardens and what we agreed to do, the

security protocols, that is what assisted

us in arresting the poacher who took that

rhino down. The poacher that we arrested

used to be one of the

employees of one of the regions.

He was actually dismissed for failing his

polygraphs. And we knew

he was involved, obviously.

That incident just was actually

everything coming together that we've

been working so hard for.

Trespassing is not the charge you want to

get these guys on. We made a very crucial arrest.

You want to get them for what they've been doing.

And that arrest, we arrested them with the

horn. And we DNA'd that horn to the

carcass. And for me, that was the one

that didn't die in vain.

An arrest means nothing because there's

a million more people. Yes, that's right.

But there's a million more people that

know if they come in here, you're going

to get arrested. You're going to get

caught. And that's our mission.

We managed to go from that for two years

without a loss, which is something we

never thought possible.

When we hit the two-year

milestone, it was a little bit unreal for

me. I was like, wow, it's really an

accomplishment to get

to that point.

That's a huge, huge turnaround when one

considers where we were before. We've

gone from literally from the worst

performing reserve in the open system to

the best, not close to the top, the best.

It does feel nice. And yes, you can feel

proud that you're part of that process,

that there's now no more carcasses.

It doesn't mean there won't be any more

carcasses. But the point is, what we said

is we said we have to find other

solutions to this and move forward

together.

Thank you all for joining us on this very

special day in the

history of our reserve.

That's extremely sad that in South Africa

we have to resort to taking

conservationists and ecologists who are

our reserve wardens and adding a military

aspect to their roles.

This should never have had to happen, but

we had no choice. The war on rhino

crime engulfed our lives completely. It's

consumed our working hours.

It consumed our family time. And it put

good men and women's lives at risk.

People say the rhino belonged to South

Africa, so it's their problem.

I differ on that.

The Kruger National Park

is a World Heritage Site.

So everything within the borders

therefore belong to the world.

And therefore it should be a world problem,

not just ours.

It is not for you the wardens, all of you

guys. We would have lost this species

from the African landscape.

And I think that would have been one of

the worst tragedies the

world could have experienced.

Thank you and let us maintain our dedication

to the open system.

As later today the sun will set and

tomorrow it will rise

and bring another day.

But our wildlife will still have the

expectation of being

kept safe by you guys.

Well done. Thank you all.

Thank you so much.

Well, you know, it's

difficult for us from the air to know

who it is. We can't see notches, but we

kind of guess and I said to Bruce, I

think, that's A1 because he's an absolute

tank. And that's his territory and

there's not going to be another tank in

his territory.

It makes you happy because on the law of

averages had we not done what we

did. Maybe he wouldn't be around.

You know, four years down the track and

most of them are still here which is great.

....Ah, come on....He's going to point down here

which is not ideal, but it's not the end

of the world....

This was the very first

bull we ever did. When we did it the

first time, we hoped it would have the

effect that it has in

terms of reducing the poaching.

And it's been overwhelmingly positive. So

now we're doing it with

a lot more conviction.

"One, two, three. One, two, three."

..That's perfect. Okay, now back up.

Okay, when you're ready...

...Well done, guys. Good job.Perfect...

..That's nice. Good effort...

The rhino's plight is my mantra. It's my

everything. It's everything I love, eat

and breathe for. And people don't realise

what's happening to this iconic species.

I don't think any human could have a need

for a product if you know that's the

origin. This is not possible.

Fundamentally, we're not solving the

problem. We are saving that rhino's life.

That's what we're doing. We're not

solving the problem. And that's why every

time we dehorn, I'm like, when are we

going to get to the next point?

When will we get to the point where we

don't have to deal anymore?

That will be a real success.

There's no one specific thing that works

against the onslaught of killing of

rhinos. We just always have to be

prepared and be prepared to take each day

as it comes and address it as such.

We are doing as much as we can to look

after them. And we will carry on doing as

much as we can to look after them every

day. And that's our job out here. And

that will stay our job.

I don't think rhinos will die out.

I think our society is such that we can

protect a species

that it won't go extinct.

But in the natural situation, in a

natural environment, in an open system,

our rhinos are in trouble.

There's a time when we hit rock

bottom, and we are fortunately riding

a wave right now. The real question is for

how long? How long

before the onslaught is back?

If you had to ask me, what would I say to

a reserve that is sitting where we were

five or seven years ago? Because make no

mistake, we were all in the same boat.

We are just on different

parts of our journey.

We should support and

learn from each other.

So if a reserve has done something and it

has been successful, and we can employ it

under our circumstances,

then we should do that.

For the benefit of the rhino, in this

case, and conservation.