Mission impossible. Damned if you do...

On Sunday, 30/03/2014

a hippo had to be killed at Heia Safari Ranch.

This lead to a vitriolic, uninformed Facebook postings,

started by this individual...

Andrew Dott

wrote on 31 March:

"I am not one for playing on Facebook but I have to share this with the world as I am pissed off about it. 
Last night Gaby from Heia Safari Lodge, had a Hippo shot in her Heritage dam,
 in order to make the water safe for a pending swimming event she has planned. 
This in a dam surrounded by game reserves and which provides the most natural habitat for Hippo, albeit a few kms from Johannesburg". 

He continued:
"She cites that they are a danger to her staff and guests, whereas it is all to do with making money on the swim. 
The Heia Circus is a joke and must be boycotted at all costs. 
Would the swimmers be happy to know that in order to partake in the event, Hippo had to be shot"??????
Swim events held earlier in the year went off without a hitch.
This particular event was cancelled due to flood debris
 and an influx of Hyacinth that made Lake Heritage unsafe for the swimmers. 
The event mentioned would have been held on Sunday MORNING,
the hippo was killed on Sunday AFTERNOON!
His "minions" then jumped on the bandwagon...
 They used the FB platform to publicly berate Gaby and by extension Heia.
I will not quote them here as some have already apologized for writing without knowing the truth
HOWEVER, what Andrew "forgot" this incident...
Both hippo were owned by the same person!
Why not pick on the actual owner of the Hippo?


Image from the online newspaper article

The hippo was roaming the farm for over a year and it was affecting their business negatively

06 December 2012 | Chemélle Barnard    

"We waited until the very last minute before the animal which had been roaming on our farm for the past year, was shot," says David Bain from the Brookwood Trout Farm in Muldersdrift after his brother Ken Bain shot a straying hippo on Wednesday 28 November.

Ken Bain, who shot the animal on the last day that his permit was valid, was away in Mozambique when the NEWS attempted to make contact with him for comment.

However his brother, David, who is the co-owner of the farm, agreed to speak to the NEWS.

According to David the hippo was roaming the farm for over a year and it was affecting their business negatively.

"For about a year now we have had no campers staying over on the farm due to the roaming hippo. We also had to cancel evening trips because of the hippo being active during the evening," says David.

David says Alex Richter did put lucerne out but had not been doing so for the past three months before the animal was killed.

In the previous article, published in the 7 December issue of the NEWS, Richter said that he had all his catching equipment in a shed on the farm and was ready to fence in a feeding area for the hippo with electric fencing

However, David said that the process had not made much progress as only the poles for the fence were planted six months ago.

When asked about another hippo roaming the area David said he had not seen the hippo but heard that there was one roaming near Kloofzicht Lodge, another neighbouring farm.

The NEWS contacted the Kloofzicht Lodge were an unknown employee confirmed that there had been a hippo on their farm too, however she could not recall when. Their operations manager was unavailable for comment at the time.

David also told the NEWS that Richter knew about the issued permit and after three months he still failed to do anything.

Residents in the Krugersdorp area had much to say regarding the issue.

Jeffery Bullet commented on looklocal by saying, "Let me tell you something about this so called owner of the hippo, he has no control over his animals this is not the first time he has lost an animal in the area. He has lost a baboon that ran around and bit 3 people before it was finally shot, he has lost a buffalo that hassled the neighbours for months and now a hippo. According to nature conservation that hippo stopped belonging to Richter the minute the permit was issued”.

“The permit holder then became the rightful owner of the hippo. The whole article above is a bunch of lies , everybody was given a chance to do something about the hippo, freeme was asked to help and they didn’t nature conservation was asked and they didn’t, the SPCA was asked and they quoted R30000-00 to have it removed (Why didn't Richter pay them to move it)." (sic)
To read the comments posted regarding this:
http://www.looklocal.co.za/looklocal/content/en/krugersdorp/krugersdorp-news-crime?oid=6608939&sn=Detail&pid=489864&Straying-hippo-was-bad-for-business

And he also "forgot" to mention this...

 

Farm Worker killed by elephant

Date:04 March 2013

A Hoedspruit farm worker was killed by an elephant bull in the York Region of the Balule Private Nature Reserve (PNR) last Sunday.

Mr Andy Dott, Chairman of Balule PNR, confirmed the incident. According to Dott, Mr William Bango (47) and another employee of Mr Steve Hearne, a private landowner in York Region, were working on a borehole when the elephant charged them. Apparently the two men ran away in different directions, but the elephant continued to charge Bango. The as yet unidentified bull trampled and tusked William and also tossed him quite a distance through the air. Dott said that although paramedics were called out, Bango died on the scene. “This bull will have to be put down, but we are still trying to identify him. We have had other eyewitness reports of a bull getting too aggressive towards vehicles in the area,” said Andy. “Bango’s family has been informed of his death and Balule PNR will be making a donation to assist the family to help.” Hoedspruit SAPS confirmed the death and said that a post mortem would be conducted this week.

— LiN News/Kruger2Canyon

My question to Andrew Dott:

I noticed that you "made a donation" to help the family...

Have you paid them any compensation for the loss of earnings of Mr. Bango?

David Batzofin:

While the Andrew Dott's of the world jump up and down, here is the other side of the story. As an aside @AndrewDott, why did you not make this much noise when a Hippo was recently shot on a nearby trout farm? Do dead trout not get you the publicity that you seem to be seeking? 

 Bianca Rogers:

This was addressed to Andrew Dott:

I find it very sad to see you posting about a subject where you do not have all the facts. Let me clarify a few points. The hippo have been a problem not only at Heia but n the Muldersdrift area for many years. 

On 2 occasions they ended up in 2 smaller dams at Heia and we were successful and managed to capture them and they were taken back to the reserve at Aloe ridge. This was a costly exercise. Yet we did it. They keep returning due to fences not being maintained by Aloe Ridge. We have been fixing the reserve fences (which are not ours) but have been unsuccessful of maintaining such a large area. Last year upon their return we had a boma built and spent 6 months and thousands on lucern trying to capture them, but due to the fact that they are in a big dam it was not possible. They have chased our staff members and almost killed them. On numerous occasions our guests have been threatened . The next swim event is only in October, so no, the hippo was not shot because of an imminent swim event. The hippo was shot because staff and guests are in danger on a daily basis and we are no longer willing to live with this risk of putting human lives at stake. The other way to avoid the danger would be to close Heia and then 100 people would be without jobs. I understand your anger, I too hate seeing animals being killed , everyone who knows my mom and myself know that we would do anything to help any animal in need. I have hand reared and tried to save a variety of species from a bat, owl, eland, impala, warthog, zebra, and even a hippo whose mother had been killed by a rhino. You were aware that a permit was issued as it was announced at the auction where you were present. The auctioneers announced that anyone was welcome to approach us to discuss and find alternatives.
Why did you not come and see us like the auctioneers suggested and said to us, 
is there an alternative or can I perhaps help, you judge and point fingers, yet you did nothing either. 

So therefore Andrew Dott with all due respect I hereby invite you to Heia for a coffee to discuss the above in detail if you so chose. 
If not I am sorry you are angry and do hope you find peace by knowing that killing the hippo broke our hearts too but human lives in this world unfortunately come first. 
Please stop insulting my mother and family on FB.

 

Nicolene Schulte

 Also read Bianca's status: as you are aware my mom and myself are also very conscientious conservationists. I would like to point out that the liquidator of Aloe Ridge came out the day before the auction to assess the situation with regard the hippo and gave us the green light- not because of a swimming event, but due to the threat to humans. The hippo was shot because it has randomly posed a threat for years already and we have had enough of this unknown. We are a hotel and conference centre, it has been called Heia Safari Ranch for 43 years and we have never been a “game reserve”. We have animals that pose no danger to humans roaming on the property. We are not a lodge like others where lion and hippo etc roam around. As for your comment on safety, a few staff have been chased by the hippo and could have been injured or killed.

 Heia has always been a venue with zebra and giraffe etc but never a “game reserve”. The tourism grading council graded us as a lodge . What we chose to do at our venue is our business, we have always been seen as a place where guests can come and stay and spend time and the lake was built by my grandfather for fishing etc and not for accommodating dangerous wild animals.

 At the time when my late grandfather completed the dam, he ensured that the Hippo pool at Aloe Ridge was always safely fenced and secured to ensure that the hippo remained in the hippo pool. Unfortunately since his murder, Aloe Ridge were not capable of maintaining their fences. We were never the owners of the hippo. Since the auction, no transfer of land ownership has been confirmed. We have lived with the hippo for a long time and no longer chose to do so. I don’t know what the hyacinth has to do with anything but we have removed and maintained the hyacinth for years. The only reason that there are so many at the moment is due to the extreme floods that occurred in march in the catchment area feeding water into lake heritage and with that additional hyacinth have come from upstream which is beyond our control. Regarding Heia Safari Ranch being a circus, you can say that on some days it is like a circus here, but a fun and happy circus shared by all. We yet again invite you to come to Heia Safari Ranch and meet with us to get a clear picture of the situation that has led to all the above.

This is the official press release put on on behalf of Heia Safari Ranch
This was posted on the News24 website(amongst others) and
the quality of the comments left by the readers defies description.
I am not going to comment on those,
except to mention one "reader" who turned it into a racial issue...go figure! 

Johannesburg - The killing of a hippo at Lake Heritage on Heia Safari Ranch in Muldersdrift was a last resort as the hippos in the area had become a threat to human life, general manager Gaby Burgmer said on Wednesday.

"Unfortunately the hippos in the area have posed a threat to both our guests and our staff for the past year. We have had instances where our staff have been chased by hippos," Burgmer said in a statement.

"Killing the hippo broke our hearts but human lives had to come first."

She said based on professional expert opinion the hippo could endanger lives so the ranch took the "extremely difficult decision" because it was not a risk they were prepared to take.

Burgmer said the ranch tried everything possible to save the hippo, but had no choice but to cull the animal. She said that on two different occasions hippos had made their way to a smaller dam at the ranch.

They were captured by professional game capturers and relocated back to Aloe Ridge.

Game translocater Koos Dippenaar said the problem was not unique to the ranch, but there had been problems over the last couple of years in the Muldersdrift area.

Hippos were first introduced in the area in the early 1980s and they predominantly bred male calves so there was an overpopulation of bulls in the area, he said.

He said because Muldersdrift was predominantly farmland and not bushveld the area was too small for the hippos and they were becoming problematic and immune to electric fencing.

"We have tried on numerous occasions to confine them or to dart them, but this has not proved successful. Relocation is also often not an option as they are so difficult to catch when in a river or large dam," he said in a statement.

"Last year we were faced with the same problem at two other estates in the area. Culling an animal is always our very last resort but in a lot of instances we have been left with no choice."

Dippenaar said they tried to lure the hippo out of the lake to relocate them but this was unsuccessful.

Burgmer said the decision to shoot the hippo was not taken lightly or suddenly.

"We have literally agonised over it for a whole year trying different solutions in partnership with Dippenaar," she said.

"Due to the size of the dam, all attempts to capture or relocate this hippo have been futile."

- SAPA

I would like to compare the current "outcry" about the Hippo 

with this incident that occurred at the same property.

 

A couple of years ago, I got a call from Gaby that the resident female giraffe was about to give birth.

I grabbed my camera gear and headed out as fast as I could...

Unfortunately the labour did not turn out as expected.

I spent the whole afternoon with Lady and at last her waters broke.

I got into a position to capture the new arrival as he(or she) came into the world...but that was not to be!

The length of the labour as well as the fact that only the legs were protruding led us to believe that Lady was in trouble and that this birth,if it happened was going to be very difficult.

She was taking a lot of strain and a call to the local vet was met with the suggestion to
 "put her down if the labour continued in this fashion"
But Gaby refused to believe that this was the only option

The following morning, her prayers were answered when a giraffe darting expert contacted Gaby

 and offed to help remove the calf and to save the mother.

 As time was of the essence, there was not much talking and as soon as the dart gun was loaded we took off to make sure that Lady was helped as quickly as possible

Lady was darted and the stillborn calf was removed.
It turned out to be a breach birth, and nothing could have been done to save the calf.
The vet worked with the utmost care and speed and would not even stay to have breakfast
(A six hour round trip for him and his team)

Eighteen months later,without any help, Lady gave birth to a healthy young girl.

Aptly named Little Lady she continues to grow and thrive at Heia.
If this does not prove that Gaby cares about the animals at Heia, then nothing else will...

People might respond that I am biased considering my history with Heia and the family.
However, I would like to assure readers that given my interest in wildlife and conservation, I would have been the FIRST to sound the alarm had I believed that this incident could have been avoided
I have taken time to respond to the original outcry as I was out of town and unable to access the Internet.
I have not edited any of the Facebook postings, aside from spelling corrections, and where necessary, I have referenced the source of the articles quoted.
The images used are from the property

Unless stated, all images are the copyright property of  and may not be used without permission