A New Coalition: African Wildlife Vets & ICORP Unite

Poachers Moon’ – the full moon illuminates the bush at every level, even casting shadows and giving away the normally well hidden wildlife under the cover of darkness, to where you can see almost everything, even when there are clouds in the sky. It’s during the beginning, the actual full moon phase, and the ending when poaching syndicates and their gangs , criminal activities peak, hereby creating long hours for our Ranger and K-9 units in the high risk protection responsibilities, ensuring wildlife stay safe and alive. ICORP senior staff and CEO took this time to lecture and teach the students of local veterinarian Dr. Dup, from African Wildlife Vets, all about anti poaching and what our Ranger’s do on a daily basis and especially during these higher than normal encounters because of the moon phase, full moon time of the month. The veterinarian students from all around the world were very interested in getting to know what the roles and responsibilities of our Counter Poaching Rangers are. The talk presented by the CEO Matthew Mc Donald was thoroughly enjoyed and the students found very interesting. The operations Sgt Chief Emmanuel enlightened the student group further about ICORPs work. Just before the veterinarian students joined our Rangers and their K9s on a night patrol, one of our K-9 units, Yster showed off his detection skills by searching for bones that had been hidden in the bush. After the outstanding display of detection by Yster, the group was split up into smaller groups, led by the Ranger’s and their K9’s into the bright moonlight. ‘It’s beautiful, but I don’t like it’ said Chief Emmanuel with a stern face. From years of working in Kruger National Park protecting rhinos he knows exactly what the full moon patrols are about. On their patrol the students got taught by the rangers on what to look out for - they checked the fences, listened to alarm calls of different animals and sadly found snares, which were set up to poach animals in the night.

ICORP believes that the word of poaching needs to spread around the world and we are very sure that this group of vet students with their interest in conservation, will make an impact to fight poaching and to protect the beauty of the African wilderness.

We are very happy to work together with Dr. Dup and his team and are looking forward to many more patrols and interactions!