Conservation

While watching the larger game animals go about their daily lives on the reserve is what draws many people to the bush none of it would be possible without the underpinning smaller animals, invertebrates and especially the flora. So ensuring the health of our reserve depends in a large part on ensuring the health of the trees and vegetation, which in turn depends on water.

To this end we have undertaken aerial photography of the reserve, walked countless transects logging vegetation types and distributions, studied fish species in the river and more. This has enabled us to build up a detailed picture of the ecosystem, its strengths and weaknesses and allowed the development of an environmental management plan covering everything from boreholes to fires, alien species to bush encroachment.

The visible legacy of the farming days is disappearing as we regenerate waterholes to remove troughs and allow arrow-straight cut-line roads to overgrow in favour of new bush trails that meander through the veld. But our ambitious conservation programme has really only just begun.

Future years will see more species reintroductions, following on the success of our wild dogs, so that the diversity of this part of Botswana is returned to its natural state. This will require careful management of the bush to ensure sufficient grazing exists all year round even in the driest years and that we have the right balance of plains areas, woodland and everything in between. In doing this we will draw on the vast experience of our reserve management team and their contacts throughout the conservation industry to ensure we access the best advice and current practices so that Limpopo-Lipadi becomes the world class reserve we believe in.