More than one thousand park rangers lost their lives while on duty during the last decade. Working in harsh conditions and poorly armed, their struggle is yet decisive for the future of us all. Following the death of SAKANDE Salifou the 12th of January 2019 while patrolling in the W National Park of Burkina Faso, […]
What Model for Wildlife Conservation in Africa: private reserve, conservancy, national park?
Wildlife conservation through the creation of national parks and reserves is a necessity to protect natural habitats from human activities. In 1872, Yellowstone was the first national park, many others followed since. Nowadays, several management models exist for conservation in Africa with heterogenic results. Numerous threats pressure natural habitats: poachers, conflicts with farmers and economic […]
A park ranger’s daily life in West Africa
Call him park ranger, forest ranger or simply a nature defender. His mission: protect an area rich in biodiversity such as a national park or a private reserve, sometimes risking his life to do his job. What does the daily life of a ranger look like? At what time does he get up? What kind […]
[Infographic] Africa’s Wildlife in Danger
Africa’s extraordinary wildlife is declining at an alarming rate. We are losing the war against nature depletion. With this infographic, we wanted to remind you how bad the situation is for most of the large mammals in Africa. Mainstream medias focus on elephants and rhinoceros while the situation with other species is even worse. Bonobos, […]
Poached elephant found during our mission in Niger
We were back in the W National park of Niger in Mars after one of the Lion Squad team leaders died of typhoid. But this was not the only tough moments we had to deal with in the Nigerien bush as a male elephant was killed by a poacher, here is what happened. One day, […]
Are cheetahs going extinct ?
The Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF), a Namibian foundation involved in Africa’s fastest animal protection, asked the CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna) to reclassify again the cheetah as an endangered species due to the sharp decline of their population. Studies on cheetah’s future The CCF director, Laurie Marker, insisted in […]
Operation Arrow : fighting poaching in Namibia
In september 2016, a Wildlife Angel team flew to Namibia for an anti-poaching training operation. The goal of this trip was to train a group of rangers coming from different reserves of the country. We gathered in Wameru, a reserve where you can meet the largest population of namibian white rhinos. There, the participants received […]
Anti-poaching in Niger : Lion Squad Operation
Last november, a Wildlife Angel team went to Niger, north-west Africa, for a training program in the W national park . Further to an audit handled in the Benin and Niger areas of the park, we made some recommendations to Niger’s curator. Being aware of the poaching problem, he asked us for a partnership to […]
Giraffes now listed as endangered species
Less giraffes in Africa Known as one of Africa’s greatest symbol and as the tallest animal on earth, giraffes are now recognized as a threatened species. The IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) states that the number of giraffes felt by 40% in thirty years. Consequently, biologists decided to put giraffes population under supervision and […]
Destocking Ivory?
A few weeks ago, the governments of Namibia and Zimbabwe petitioned the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) to remove elephants from Cites protection, which currently prohibits them from selling elephant ivory. They believe this prohibition, established by the International Convention in 1989, has been an extremely expensive experience without any result. Especially […]
Selous opposes Tanzania and WWF
A power struggle has recently been initiated between the Tanzanian government and WWF. The international NGO is preparing a report regarding the Selous Reserve in Tanzania. The Selous region is the largest protected area of the country and has the largest concentration of African elephants on the continent. However, the term “largest” is probably exaggerated […]
Kenya burns Ivory
In this Saturday, April 30, 2016, Kenya is preparing for an event concerning the global conservation community to fight against poaching and illegal ivory trafficking. Uhuru Kenyatta, Kenya’s president, decided to burn nearly 105 tons of ivory from stockpiles of the country. Elephant poaching Before going into the details of the operation and to […]
Europe ignites Southern Africa
Within the framework of its policy to fight against crime against wild species, the European Commission is working on a project of prohibited entry in the European territory for the hunting trophies coming from African countries, even those which were acquired by obeying the applicable law in the various countries concerned. Southern Africa is not […]
Mohawk slaughtered, Sylvester saved!
Another two very recent stories whose action takes place on the African continent and which perfectly reflect the harsh reality of the human / animal conflict. Because they face the demographic explosion of the continent and the shrinking of their habitat, wild animals are increasingly disturbed and their behavior becomes unpredictable. Regardless of the region […]
Environmental Crime conference in Paris
Tuesday, March 15, 2016 was organized by Thomson Reuters and the FITS (International Forum for Security Technology) a conference on environmental crime. A crime increasingly worrying From the start, gentlemen Neyret Lawrence, Professor of Law at the University of Versailles Saint-Quentin, and Damian Martinez, Europe Director of Thomson Reuters, have set the debate by […]
Two Italian citizens killed during an anti-poaching operation
An anti-poaching operation that turned bad An Italian hunting guide, Claudio Chiarelli, on the right of the picture, and his son Max were shot dead in the Mana Pools National Park in northeastern Zimbabwe. Participating in a joint operation with an anti-poaching unit of the park, they were mistaken for poachers by another unit patrolling […]
Better in horor
The South African government through its Minister of Environment has finally given the statistics that everyone was waiting on rhino poaching in the country. The authorities were pleased to have reversed the slaughter curve thanks to the many radical measures implemented. “We are very pleased to announce that, for the first time in ten years, […]
Birth of a new traffic
You all know the determination of Wildlife Angel to denounce the actions of poachers on elephants and rhinos. Yet there are sometimes events that seem anecdotal or insignificant and can have tragic consequences. Some theory… “The flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas.” This metaphor, also called butterfly effect, is often used by scientists […]
A pilot killed in the anti-poaching War
An NGO in Tanzania announced yesterday that a British helicopter pilot was killed by elephant poachers. Roger Gower, 37, had taken part in an anti-poaching operation with the Tanzanian authorities when the criminals he hunted fired on his unit. Hit by AK47 gunfire while on patrol supporting troops on the ground, he nevertheless managed to […]
Received ideas on Chinese medicine
Those who are involved each day in the fight against poachers and traffickers of animal species threatened, whether NGOs such as Planet Tiger or Wildlife Angel, often incriminate traditional Chinese medicine as the cause of rhinos and tigers misfortune. Let’s try to really understand the Chinese medicine precepts on the use of animals. We will […]
LRA is financed by poaching
I mentioned in a previous blog post the links between poaching and terrorism (see the Jihad white gold). The proof is once more made that terrorist networks have deliberately opted for wildlife trafficking to finance their exactions. Joseph Kony, the formidable Ugandan warlord responsible for the abduction of ten thousands of children, and the massacre […]
Botswana doesn’t joke
At least one poacher was shot dead by the BDF (Botswana Defence Force) on the border between the Chobe National park in Botswana and Zimbabwe. Two other poachers managed to escape towards Zambia, where they came from, but they were stopped by the authorities from Zimbabwe. According to the representative of an NGO based in […]
Accomplices of animal abuse #2
This is the second part of our investigation on animal abuse. This is much closer to us than what we might think. During the end of year festivities, Strasbourg, European capital but especially capital of the world of the Christmas market, has organized many activities to satisfy numerous tourists and incidentally fill the pockets of […]
Accomplices of animal abuse #1
This article is the first in a survey about our passive attitude regarding animal abuse around the world. January is a suitable time for the departure of European tourists to the countries of Southeast Asia. Thailand, India offer many attractions, particularly those relating to animals: reptiles farms, monkey parks, elephant rides. When someone is interested […]
A shepherd to divert cheetahs
During six weeks we honored six dog breeds that behave admirably in anti-poaching operations. I would like to highlight the work of a dog breed not very well known but extremely efficient in the conservation of wild animals: The Anatolian shepherd also called Kangal. Since many years, Namibia is facing big problems with cheetahs and […]
Namibia between corruption and poaching
At least two ministers and a senior official in the northern region were probably involved in poaching activities on rhinos and elephants in the Etosha National Park. The Executive Director of Namrights, a Namibian NGO whose mission is to uphold human rights in the country, Phil Ya Nangoloh, said to have made shocking discoveries during […]
Malawi in turmoil
The Malawi government has finally decided to officially recognize that elephant poaching has reached unprecedented levels in the country’s national parks and game reserves, causing a sharp decline in the touristic population in these sites. Actually, when you choose Malawi as a tourist destination, it is for the western beaches of the lake, but especially […]
Hunting and conservation
“Sport hunting is not poaching and can help conserve wildlife. ” It is a discourse that we hear regularly on the African continent. There was a huge increase of the recent interest in the problem of poaching, mostly from many African stories on macabre rhinos and elephants illegally killed for their horns and tusks. At […]
2 poachers killed in Zimbabwe
February 7, 2015, two poachers were killed by members of the Wildlife Management Authority of Zimbabwe and parks, during a clash in the Kapungashiri area on the southern border of the Park national Matusadonha. The public relations director of the Managing Authority of wildlife and parks of Zimbabwe, Caroline Washaya-Moyo confirmed the incident, adding […]
Mali : elephants in danger
In the Malian Gourma, which includes the regions of Mopti, Timbuktu and Gao, elephants are increasingly rare. Threatened by drought and poaching, there were 550 in the 1970s, and are now more than 354. If they cannot fight against the drought that killed in June twenty-one elephants, residents of northern Mali have decided to organize […]
Gyroplane for anti-poaching
The gyroplane is perfectly suited for all supervisory practices. Its substantial autonomy and ability to fly low and not too quickly, its simplistic safety profile, all these features combined with low investment and low operating costs, low CO2 emission rate and a controlled noise level, are a flying machine perfectly suited to surveillance operations. Sometimes […]