DANA BAY NEWS - Dana Bay Conservancy members and several volunteers filled a number of rubbish bags with litter during their anti-snare walk in the Dana Bay area on Saturday, 24 August.
The walk, supported and attended by Leon Rossouw from Wildlife Crime Information Network (WCIN), had 33 people follow various trails on land next to Flora Road in Dana Bay, which is government-owned.
Dana Bay Conservancy chairperson Erika van der Westhuizen said all the snare walks are controlled events.
"We communicate to residents and all other relevant parties about when these walks are taking place. Volunteers sign indemnity forms because there are some risks," she said.
Several trail routes were marked out by some conservancy committee members and Rossouw before the walk, so the group could split up into smaller groups to cover a larger area.
Some of the volunteers and members of the Dana Bay Conservancy on Saturday, 24 August.
"We did not manage to walk every trail but we did the bulk of them. We didn't find a single snare, which is a good thing, but that is not to say there aren't any," said Van der Westhuizen.
"We did find some skin in the past few weeks in the area we walked on Saturday. It is a concern to us. But we feel the animals are skinned there, but caught somewhere else. We don't really understand what happened there, which is also why we decided to walk that area," she added.
Van der Westhuizen said the walkers also found tyres left over from illegal beehives that had been removed from the area a while ago. The tyres are used as stands for the beehives. She said she had organised with the municipality to remove the tyres. The bags of litter picked up during the walk were removed by the municipality on Saturday afternoon.
Talking more about the area and the purpose of the walks, she said the suburb of Dana Bay is an urban conservancy and was registered as such by Cape Nature in May 1998.
Leon Rossouw shows Erika van der Westhuizen some rope found in the area before disposing of it.
"The residents live side-by-side with wild animals due to municipal green belts running through Dana Bay. Wild bushbuck, grysbokkies, porcupines, guinea fowls, buzzards, owls, and many other animals, co-exist with the locals. The suburb isn’t fenced in, which means animals move freely around between green belts, houses, streets, estates, farmlands and ultimately to other areas," she said.
"The animals are mostly active at night when they will be foraging for food. When these animals move around after their food sources, they become targets for poachers," she said.
She said the conservancy has control over the green belts and are working closely with WCIN, the municipality, Cape Nature, and some residents, in monitoring these open spaces.
"But, we don’t have control over the animals and, as they move, they also move onto private property."
She said they were trying to get permission from one landowner to perform an anti-snare walk The landowner told the Mossel Bay Advertiser said there were a few reasons he had not given permission. He said he was still thinking about it and that the Advertiser should call him back in a few weeks.
To become a volunteer, or support the conservancy, contact Les Bridgland (082 582 4516).
Willem Human and Connie Franzsen search for rubbish and snares.Information about poachers:
• Poachers don’t discriminate when setting snares; any animal will do.
• If poachers come across a tortoise when checking on snares, they will also take it.
• Snares are inexpensive as the materials used are readily available and cheap.
• Sometimes the poacher sets so many snares that they forget where they are. Animals caught in the snares will die a gruesome death; starvation, asphyxiation, dehydration or die of injuries
• The meat is used or sold as “bushmeat”.
• The rest of the animals parts could be sold for medicinal purposes.
• Feeding of animals by locals could potentially make them easy targets as they become pacified and trusting.
• Sometimes dogs are used to track or chase down wild animals.
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