All language subtitles for the.reserve.s01e03.1080p.web.h264-cbfm[EZTVx.to]_track3_[eng]

So there's nothing more special
than

waking up early in the morning
of a

sunrise over the Drakensberg
Mountains here.

I think one of the most special

sunrises is the African sunrise.
There's

something heartwarming about it
and I

don't think words can
necessarily explain

that feeling. You know, people
pay big

money to come back every year to
Africa

to just witness what we see
every day.

One of the reasons why we start
with

these operations so early in the
morning

is one of the big ones is
obviously the heat.

We need to work on these animals
in

the coolest conditions possible.

We're out here this morning to
hopefully

locate this girl of mine that we

relocated last week from outside
the

reserve into Balule.

She's got a full horn on at the
moment,

so we need to get that horn off
ASAP.

She's being fitted with a foot
collar and

Bruce will go up quite soon with

telemetry equipment and
hopefully we can

find her and cut that horn off,

and get that target off her
head.

It's great to have Ian on the
ground today,

usually he's in the air with
Bruce.

I think he sometimes

misses out also on a lot of good
stuff

that happens on the ground.

..."Hi man. How are you? Good,
man. How are you going?"...

For the last few weeks I've been
in here so,

I never saw backs out today,

and I get to be with the ground
crew,

so it's going to be good. So
it's nice to

be here with everyone, see
what's going

on and also kick them in the
backside if

things aren't going the way I
want.

Yeah, there's nothing more fun
than being

involved with these operations.

You know that we're fortunate to
the

camaraderie between us wardens,
but

also, you know, the people that
we work

with, the vets and the pilots,
and it's a

really fun bunch of people. We
mates, all

of us, and it's the dream team.

..."Stand by"...

"Okay Joel, I'm going to send
the

ground team to that high rise on
the Tshukudu fence"

All right, we need to isal.

Yeah, Rian, he's got

good operational awareness.

And because he's got a good
presence and

a good understanding of what
needs to

happen, and he's a good leader,
that he's

the right guy to be able to get
people to

do what they need to.

Basically, because there's an
increased

poaching pressure again, there
is a sense

of urgency. You do feel like you
have to,

you know, do it quickly.

So yeah, it feels good

when you know it's done.

"I'm taking the foot collar
off."

So, between all of these people,
we've

got one Leatherman....Take note,
a

company Leatherman,

we need sponsorship.

We will react on every single
animal that

comes in that has substantial
regrowth.

We won't leave products out
there because

that product endangers that
animal's

lives. And every single Rhino is

important. Literally every
single one.

To lose one is one too many

And we'll do what it takes

to get them all cleaned up.

We all knew that we'd get hit
again.

And as long as we've got

Rhino, there'll be a threat.

Earlier in March this year,

we had an attempted poaching.

The Rhino was shot, the bullet
went

through the ear and into the
hump on the

neck. So it was an off-centre
front shot.

The Rhino's absolutely fine.
It's made a

full recovery. We actually
treated it now

during the dehorning. This is
that bullet

was wounded a while ago. This is
the

gunshot wound here... And we
treated him

about, what, two months ago?
Yeah.

And not much we could have done,
but he

looks fine. Looking good.

And yeah, this would have been
the prize

that the poachers would have
gotten. So

he was very lucky that day. So
this is a

good one for us to get... It was
the first

breach we've had in a long, long
time.

It was in an area that
historically we

got hit really hard in.

Scars, you know, it's the old
enemies and

that happens a lot in this

game, when catching them...

doesn't mean that that's the end
of them.

You often see those

guys straight back here.

That then led to a month later.

Actually having a loss in that
area.

I definitely thought that we
were gonna

get hit again. The biggest
factor was

just time. Time and where.

Where was it gonna happen?

I suspected in particular was
gonna be our

side of the reserve. And then

unfortunately it happened. Where
I

remember walking in and my hands
were

shivering like this because I
was like,

the first thing going through my
mind is

that there's a dead rhino lying
here.

When I walked in, I

remember there w..

just saw that little bit of a
back.

And I was just like,

shit. How? How, how, how?

You know, losing a cow is really
sad

because it's all her future
offspring. Plus

the current offspring normally
is either

an orphan or is killed as well.
And the

ability to add new ones is
severely

impacted with the loss of cows.
So yeah,

that's always heartbreaking

But we knew it was coming.

It's just really sad because,
you know,

she had a calf, it was her first
calf.

You know, they're just living
their

life and then suddenly they're
dead. And

you just, you feel

like you've failed them.

So once we find the rhino

carcass, it's a crime scene.

And it's officially a crime
scene until

when necropsy is being
performed, which

needs to be performed by

authorised professionals.

The animal is effectively
dissected and

metal detectors used to find
projectiles.

And the scene is completely
processed,

evidence bagged. And once that
is

complete, then the carcass is
left for

nature to take its course, which
is

obviously scavengers,

vultures and so on.

Jaques had to go back to fetch
the skull.

And that's important for us
because if

we're doing any aerial
operations in the

reserve and we find the skull,
then we

know it's from a carcass

that we have not recorded.

I felt it's important that I go
with him.

Moral support because he took it

very personally and it's really
important

that my guys know I'm

behind him every step of the
way.

It's amazing that this is all
that's left

of the, of that big

animal here just a while back.

It's a hell of a lot of a
different scene to last

time. I just can't believe
they've gone

through every single thing.

All these scenes are sad, coming
back to

the site like this especially...

It's our first one in so long.
You never

get used to it...Yeah, we need
to

just tag the skull and take it
back with

a case number and keep it in the
storage.

Yeah, I think we'll take them

both, ye..

Hell, there's nothing natural
about this.

I mean, what's happened to the
site is

natural, but what caused

the site is not natural.

Yeah, it's just, it's just a
reminder of

the plight that these

animals have against people.

Yeah, it's just power of money,
eh?

But just shows it's either

desperation or something.
There's

definitely, it's something that
they

want and that they're

willing to risk for,..

It's sad for me to see what we
as humans

can do just for greed.

When people do this, do they
have any

emotions? What's going through
their

mind? Like, do they feel
anything when

they do something like this to
these

animals? And I can only think
that

there's no emotions because they

literally keep on doing it. They
keep

coming back, so. Yeah,

...not nice.

That record that we got,

of a thousand and eighty nine
days,

it's actually unbelievable

The hard thing with that is um
getting back in

to that sort of space where

that's what's on your mind all
the time.

That's what you're thinking
about. That's

what you're processing. You
wanna forget

how it feels because it's not
great. It's

just not a nice place to be.

Whoever tells you it doesn't
creep in under

your skin, is lying, you get

emotionally involved with these
animals

and it's a horrible feeling to
see a

rhino with his face-hacked to
pieces.

It's not a nice feeling. It does
get

under anybody's skin.

I'm generally a person, I don't
like to

talk about things and I sort of
say,

okay, I'll handle it. Whether
that's

right or wrong, I'm not too
sure. But I

will tell you it affected me.

Your role as a

conservationist suddenly has..

Your time that you can spend
with your

family has suddenly

changed. You're on 24-hour duty.

The unfortunate thing is I was
in the

situation where I was finding a
lot of

carcasses because I'm the person
who has

to go on a follow-up operation
and now

try and initiate a rest after
that.

And I was pretty much fed up,
eh?

It makes you fed up. After a
while, I

point blank to refuse to
actually go.

You see, the poachers, they
won't cross

here because you see it's too
much to up.

...But I think what we can do
is, I

think it's a good place to check
anyway for tracks.

I went through a phase where

I got a fear for the moon, I
didn't

want to see the moon. People
were like,

oh, look how beautiful the moon
is tonight.

I'm like, no. If I heard
something that

sounded like a gunshot, I
freaked out

because I knew what it meant.

Even now, if I'm sitting and I
hear

something like a gunshot, I get
called.

Some of the oaks, they don't
realise how

bad it was. They weren't there
with it.

It's not against them, but it's
just that

we went also through a

period when it was quite bad.

Yeah, I think a consequence of
this whole

onslaught on rhinos that's
completely

underestimated is the toll it's
taken on

the humans that work with this.

It's sad because I saw a

huge change in a few years.

It's almost difficult to think
back to

that time. And it's also
difficult to

actually explain to people, what

situation we were all in back
then.

I think back of it, it was like,

in my life, it was the dark
ages. Yeah.

And I didn't have that front
line

experience like you guys did,
but I saw

what it was doing to you and
other people

and how hard you were trying.
And yet it

was just all too sudden, too
much to deal

with. We weren't prepared. I
mean, it was

devastating. But I remember you
saying to

me, you can't do this anymore.
Just

you're done. And that was the
day and I

thought, we're gonna lose people
like

you, giving up hope...And that
would

be the worst thing that will
happen to

conservation is losing

good people because of this...

trauma are you facing so
regularly? That

year we lost 18, I think. Yeah.

These guys are in very

manly careers. They're tough
rangers.

And I think it's a hard thing to

admit that you've got depression
or

suffering post-traumatic stress.
And I

have no doubt that anybody
that's dealt

with a carcass before has some
level of

post-traumatic stress.

Everybody

in the conservat..

during that time, went or are
still going

through the same emotions.

We big boys and have to wake up
the

next morning and carry on.

I'm married to a Canadian.

And we've got two kids, Emma and
Logan.

..."one with lettuce no
cheese"...

Logan can tell you

everything about helicopters.
Emma

will tell you everything about
art.

I remember when people would
say, "Nah,

when you have your first kid,
you know,

it's all emotional and you
change, but it

sure as hell just changes your
life. And

you think differently about the
world. So

during that horrible

time of losing Rhino,

you sometimes think back about
it and you

think, geez, I actually,

I missed quite a bit of,

the bit when they were at a
certain age

and you'll never get it back.

Times when you did spend with
family was

probably not quality time cause
your

head wasn't with your family.

I think during that time, one
was so

drawn into it work wise and
mentally that

you probably burned

yourself out without realising
it.

I would describe myself as

ninety percent of the time
always angry.

You know, you would be out or

in the office until one, two
o'clock,

sometimes nights through.

You get back home and that's
when it

would hit you again...With the
back

of your mind, that's where it

played with your conscience.

"You're coming, Emms?"

"Come sugar."

I think stress and you mentioned

post-traumatic stress. I don't
know much

about it and I don't understand
it. And I

don't think anybody in the
industry wants

to understand it either. Cause
you don't

want to know that you

possibly had it or still have
it.

What I would do different today
if the

same wave of rhino poaching
would hit us.

From a family point of view,
definitely

would have taken days and go
somewhere

and just switch off... It, I
think it

would have made a difference

mentally on a person. Yeah.

I dreaded the aftermath of a
carcass

because it's finger pointing,
it's

blaming, it's guilt.
Unfortunately, it

led to an incredible amount of
tension

and conflict between good people
and

between rangers and between
regions.

I think it's human nature to
want to

blame someone if something goes
wrong and

you don't know who to blame
because it's a

criminal force that you can't
pinpoint.

From the poachers perspective,
they can't

just arrive here and wander
around

aimlessly hoping to bump into a
rhino.

They need help to do that.

And their biggest key to success
is

internal involvement.

I looked very much forward to
the

implementation of the

integrity testing because

it was a way to protect your
honest guys.

Have you told any

poachers where rhinos are? No.

Have you been asked by any
poachers to

help them with the

illegal killing of a..

The polygraph test is a test
that records

your physiological responses to
certain

questions. We're not interested
if you

stolen a spanner from a
workshop. Is what

you want to know is about direct

involvement in rhino poaching.

Have you received any form of
payment

from helping anyone to

illegally kill a rhino? No.

That's a very successful tool
for us and

has proven itself over and over
again

since 2018. And it's made a
very, very

big difference to the guys on
the ground

because it's really important
that when

you go into a situation that you
need to

know that the guy next to you is
on the

same team..." When I ask you
questions, are

you going to answer me?
Honestly?..Yes"...

Security personnel was every six

months. And once a year for
large staff

and these people that have
access to

vehicles and can drive

around the reserve
unaccompanied.

Us managers do it first and it
goes from

there down, all the way down to
field

rangers, gate guards, everyone.

Have you been involved with the
illegal

killing of a rhino? No.

It's a fair policy because we
don't base

results just on an initial test.

And there's a process that we
follow that

if you fail the first test there
is a complete

and comprehensive interview

process in between the test.

And then the second test is
done. The

result then is if there's a
double

failure, we then act on it. And
every

time to date that there's been a
double

failure, it's been vindicated.
So we

believe one hundred percent in
the process.

Did you answer all

these questions honestly?

Yes.

We're not out to get people
fired. And

it's not a process to victimise
people,

it's a process to protect your
honest

people. And honest people are a
commodity

that you have to protect.

None of my field rangers failed
a

polygraph test, touch wood.

And I hope to keep it that way.
But I

think it shows as well.

The area of my field rangers,
patrol has

not, touch wood, lost the rhino
yet.

Just do a bit of patrol exercise
here.

Just formation patrol. We're
just

gonna go up here with the
clearing, nice

and wide, because it's nice and
open. I

want Morris, so we do some hand
exercises

and keep your eyes on

Morris. Let's keep going.

I'm proud to call in my field
rangers and

I'm proud to be part of

this team that I've got.

Got a good group of guys around.
They've

been with us for ages and I got
my trust

in them.

I chose my guys before,

and we went in a direction
before the

onslaught completely started.

So, you know, when Callan
started,

he started in an area that
already lost

quite a few animals and

that had a couple of bad apples

in the crowd.

My story here, you know, has
contained a

lot of backstabbing

from within my own team.

I've got a picture when I
started here on

my first day, and it's me and a
team of

rangers, and I thought we were,
you know,

operating as a team and
fighting, you

know, this Rhino poaching
together.

And now today, five years later,
there's

only one of them left, and the
rest have

all been fired for

being involved in poaching.

And that's where, you know, this
whole

betrayal comes in, but it is
part of the

game. And the longer you're in
the game,

you realise that that is a
reality.

My family actually owns a place
in this

area, so I've been

coming here my whole life.

I used to come here pretty much
every

single school holiday, and I
loved every

minute of it. You know, the
whole time I

was sitting at school, all I
wanted to do

was just to finish the term and
come back

here to the bush. One very fond

memory is that pretty much right
here

where we're standing, we used to
see

rhinos all over the place. I
mean, we

used to see creches of up to ten
rhinos.

There was this rhino, her name
was Mary,

and everyone knew her because
she had a

horn that went straight like
this, not a

curve or anything like that. And
she was

sadly poached by one of the
water holes.

So that one kind of hit home
because we

really knew her, and I've

known her since I was little,
so.

I guess it was a driving factor,
you

know, that when I get out of
school,

maybe I can do something about
it.

These were all poached

here, specifically on this
section of

Belule. And the scary thing is,
this is

only 13 skulls. And I mean, if
you look

at like the year 2017, we
actually lost

17 rhinos. So this doesn't even
represent

a year of poaching... when

we were at our worst point.

This is where the front horn
would have

sat, and this is where the back
horn

would have sat. And you can
actually see

here that they've, you know,
very

precisely taken a knife and
really, you

know, worked the horn off. And
you can

actually see all the

individual little cut marks
here.

There's a little cut here where
you can

see where they would have got
the back

horn off on this rhino. And this
is

actually the last rhino that
went down in

this section. We

haven't lost a rhino since.

A lot of my own guys

were actually involved.

And yeah, it does make it
difficult to

trust, but you know, you get
better and

better at learning as to who

to trust and who not to trust.

Themba is the only guy left

besides myself in the team that
was not

proved to be corrupt

or involved in poaching.

And he's actually been a ranger
since

2003. So I mean, he's going on
20 years.

I would say he's the core of our
team.

Afternoon Themba

How are you?

That's good. Okay, at ease.

How was patrol this morning?

Okay no, that's good. The reason
why I'm

calling you here today is I just
want to

talk to you before I speak to
the guys.

I'll speak to everyone this
afternoon and

give the position for the
observation

post. But I just wanted to let
you know

that the position that I'm
putting you

in, we found a very small white
rhino

calf, a few days old...Yes, so I
just

want you to stay in that area.
And if you

do find that calf, you must call
me on

the radio immediately, okay?

Then when you do find it, I

want you to stay with that
animal, okay?

Okay, I'll do so...Hundred
percent. Thank you, Themba.

Thanks so much. Thank

you. All right. Thank you.

Now, I know he has a hundred
percent been approached

by guys to get involved. He
would have

had pressure from guys within
the team to

get involved because obviously
he would

be getting in the way of what
they wanted

to do to poach rhinos.

And he just, he never wavered.
He never,

he just refused to get involved.

When I arrived here, and this
was before

I knew what was going on, you
would go

back to base and he was always
by

himself. You know, he's not
sitting and

having beers with the guys.

And I always just thought maybe
it's just

because he's a quiet guy, but
now that I

know what has happened here as
to why he

was like that, and very

interestingly, when I got rid of
these

guys, you know, Themba like came
out of

his shell and was a completely
different

guy to how I knew he

was in the beginning.

Since those guys have left, he's
had a

lot of death threats

and serious death threats.

Thanks so much. Stay safe.

And to you. Thanks so much.

I always give my guys who are
threatened

the option, you know, we'll do
anything to

help them. I mean, because they
are

literally risking their lives to
perform

their duty here. So it's only
our duty to

make sure we look after

these guys as best we can.

It didn't matter to him. He
always just

told me, you know, it is what

it is. It's part of the job.

He understands the risks, you
know, when

he did take this job and he's
happy to

carry those risks forward, you
know, in

order to protect the rhino. So
he's

really, really an incredible
guy. And I'm

very privileged to have him on
my team.

I think any field ranger that is
gonna

tell you he's never been
approached or

never been around a poacher

or never was worried is lying.

A lot of field rangers, section
rangers,

wardens, they find themselves in
a

financially difficult position

and they make the mistake once.
And that

one mistake getting

involved of it is your downfall.

As soon as you're part of that
and you're

in that ring of nastiness,
there's no way

of getting out of that.

Rhino poaching is an organised
crime

problem where people from the
rural

areas, low income earning, are
exploited

by the syndicates for their
gain.

A few individuals greed that's
driven all

this. They've identified a
market and

they've identified the product.
And to

get the product to that market
is evil.

It's a tragedy, what

it does to good people.

In that chain, so many lives are
ruined

of people and of animals

between the demand and the
supply.

Good morning, everyone.

So it's really an honour for us

to get to know our own people,

in our own area. And to support
you.

We want to understand how we can
make

this meaningful for

you, not for us, for you.

That's sad. We had some
community

engagements last year and a lot
of the

older women said their biggest
fear is

that their sons get involved
with,

especially rhino poaching.
Because once

you're in that criminal network,
there's

no escaping and they

remain criminals forever after.

You know, we know that Africa
has

extremes.You know, wealth and

poverty. And especially around
these

areas, our Western boundaries.

We can't employ enough people in
the

protected areas to make a
difference in

enough families. So there's got
to be

other ways that we can make
there be a

mutually beneficial relationship
because

it's very hard to see the value
of an

open area with no cattle

on when you're starving.

We are now working with an arm
called the

Balule Outreach Trust.

We have already done a study of
where do

our families, of everybody works
within

Balule. Where do they live? What
areas

do they live in? What is the
upliftment

programs that we need to
implement there

in those areas where our
families are?

Let's start charity at home.

Maseki is one of the areas that
the

Balule Outreach Trust is mainly
focuses

on with the purpose of providing
an

aftercare facility for

children, school children.

John Anderson, who's the founder
of the

Balule Outreach Trust, he
started it up

in 2012. He asked around in the
area

where the most indigent
communities are,

and this is one of them. In
fact, it's

one of the poorest communities
in the

country, not only in

the Limpopo Province.

On a day, there are usually two
hundred children

who come here after school, and
they are

given a cooked meal, which is
possibly

the only meal some of them have
each day.

This is pap, and it's made from

mealies. It's also known as
mealie meal.

At Maseki,

they are actually battling with
no w..

Their borehole pump is broken.
They get

odd supplies during the

week of water in tanks.

So it's really a difficult
situation for the

people in this area, but we like
to think

the drop-in centre is at

least a bit of a lighthouse.

So many of the children are
vulnerable

and orphans, the ones who come
here.

So it's nice for them to have a
really

secure, happy, comfortable place
for them

at least to come to after
school.

Looking forward, going

into the future, the children
have to

learn about the wildlife, how to
look

after it. Conservation is a
really big thing.

..." Are you putting the
chickens?"...

..."There's a rhino? "...That's
very important, so

that they can get jobs

going in the area.

Nature conservation is a new
name to most

of the people. They don't
understand it.

Most of the people are not that
educated.

They just understand that it's
animals.

Because of lack of knowledge, of

conservation, in them, they want
to kill

that animal, you see? Which is a
problem

that create even animal
poaching. But the

generation that is coming, at
least, we

see gradual change

when coming to education.

If you want to make true change,
you need

to get involved and you need to
educate

the long term and identify where
the

needs are. And if conservation
is our

area of need, well then we need
to make

it available to those

communities that are on our
borders.

This is the village of Sigagule,
which

as the crow flies, is a

kilometre from the Greater
Kruger

National Park fence line.

Our children sit on the swings
and they

will say, "indlovu!" that means
elephant.

"onyali" and they can look into
the

reserves and see them, but
they've never

experienced it. They just

never access it.

That tar road that runs between
the

community and the private
reserves is

like the Great Wall of

China. It separates them.

Unless there's a personal
understanding

and a value for conservation,
you're not

going to get anywhere

in breaching that bridge.

And the only way to build a
bridge from

the one side to the other is to
educate

why it's important to preserve a

chameleon, teaching the

value of a termite mound.

The trees leaves, ecosystems,
just for

them to understand ecosystems
that they

require to survive on instead of
this

scorched earth policy or
everything gets

taken out even the trees.

Three plus one. Three apples
plus one.

Show me. Put the apples on
there.

The centre around you has been
made

possible through the funding
that the

Balule Outreach Trust has made
possible.

It's gone from a playroom for
small

children where we started
teaching the

little ones who couldn't even
hold a

pencil how to read and write

all the way to a training

centre for young adults,

also sponsored by the Balule
Outreach Trust

where we do skills development

programs now, which is a
nature's art

guide. We take young adults from
21 to

35. So when they're finished,
they'll be

fully qualified nature's art
guides and

they can go out and get work.

I've learned how to love
animals. I've

learned. I'm not always... I
just wanted

to protect them because they're
becoming

extinct. I wanted to always
protect them,

but I was never that much into
them.

I learned how to love them while
I was

doing this course. I now know
the

ecological importance of size
trees and

termites, insects and that. So
now I can

be able to teach everybody out
there,

say, let's protect this and
that, let's

keep this safe for the future
generation,

for them to see the

importance of such animals and
trees.

This environment needs to be
protected

because it's helping explain an
important

role in our life. But if we
can't look

after it, then it will be a
challenge

because when we destroy it, we
are

destroying ourselves again.

We need each other, actually.