Night-time listening posts like this one on a hill in the south of the reserve are critical to their mission, visual policing and early detaction. Collette Ngobeni holds the spotlight bythe light of the full moon. The ladies of the first all female Anti-Poaching Unit in Africa, on patrol, making roadblocks and sitting in listening posts at night in Balule Private Nature Reserve.
Leitah Michabela sits on her bed after a morning roadblock shift, she and the other Black Mambas are given food, transport, a living allowance and a salary that supports around 8 people in their extnded families. The ladies of the first all female Anti-Poaching Unit in Africa, on patrol, making roadblocks and sitting in listening posts at night in Balule Private Nature Reserve.
Tlangelani Nkinika, 20 watches the car while Leitah Michabela, 22 writes down the car’s details in her ledger. In Feburary three poachers were arrested at this roadblock trying to enter the park illegally. The ladies of the first all female Anti-Poaching Unit in Africa, on patrol, making roadblocks and sitting in listening posts at night in Balule Private Nature Reserve.
Nocry Qolisile shows off her manicure. The ladies take great pride in their appearance, their uniforms and their hair, calling themselves bush “ambassadors”. The ladies of the first all female Anti-Poaching Unit in Africa, on patrol, making roadblocks and sitting in listening posts at night in Balule Private Nature Reserve.
Nocry Qolisile gets herself and her gear ready for redeployment from one area of the park to another. The ladies of the first all female Anti-Poaching Unit in Africa, on patrol, making roadblocks and sitting in listening posts at night in Balule Private Nature Reserve.
Collette Ngobeni prefers doing fence patrols, she says, “if I do the fence patrol I know everything about what is happening inside our park”. The ladies of the first all female Anti-Poaching Unit in Africa, on patrol, making roadblocks and sitting in listening posts at night in Balule Private Nature Reserve.
Collette Ngobeni sits for a portait near her bush camp inside of Kruger’s western fance. “Now I am not afraid of Elephants, they are my friends, when they are around, I feel safe because the poachers are scared of them.” The ladies of the first all female Anti-Poaching Unit in Africa, on patrol, making roadblocks and sitting in listening posts at night in Balule Private Nature Reserve.
Collette Ngobeni, like soldiers everyhwere, is awake at dawn getting ready for a patrol. She sleeps in this rough area for up to a week, patrolling at night during the full moon phase when poachers enter the park in greater numbers. The ladies of the first all female Anti-Poaching Unit in Africa, on patrol, making roadblocks and sitting in listening posts at night in Balule Private Nature Reserve.
Collette Ngobeni, like soldiers everyhwere, is awake at dawn getting ready for a patrol. She sleeps in this rough area for up to a week, patrolling at night during the full moon phase when poachers enter the park in greater numbers. The ladies of the first all female Anti-Poaching Unit in Africa, on patrol, making roadblocks and sitting in listening posts at night in Balule Private Nature Reserve.
Russel Baker, right, drives and trains the Black Mamba Team. He is a volunteer who used to work in the British Army. “Its an honor to work with these ladies, they are motivated and capable, its an honor.” The ladies of the first all female Anti-Poaching Unit in Africa, on patrol, making roadblocks and sitting in listening posts at night in Balule Private Nature Reserve.
Driving patrols go out most nights. Only by watching the park day and night can the ladies of the Black Mambas keep the poachers out. The ladies of the first all female Anti-Poaching Unit in Africa, on patrol, making roadblocks and sitting in listening posts at night in Balule Private Nature Reserve.
One of the white rhinos of Kruger National park. One is gunned down every eight hours in South Africa. The ladies of the first all female Anti-Poaching Unit in Africa, on patrol, making roadblocks and sitting in listening posts at night in Balule Private Nature Reserve.
In Kruger rhinos are gunned down like this almost every day. This the Crime Scene Investigations Unit (names withheld to protect them) doing a post-mortem on a poached rhino to get the bullet that killed it so it can be linked the rifle that shot it, and then maybe the poacher himself. Only with good investigations can poachers be brought to justice. In Balule they have not lost a rhino in 11 months, warden Craig Spencer believes that the Black Mambas are responsible for the drop in deaths.
In Kruger rhinos are gunned down like this almost every day. This the Crime Scene Investigations Unit (names withheld to protect them) doing a post-mortem on a poached rhino to get the bullet that killed it so it can be linked the rifle that shot it, and then maybe the poacher himself. Only with good investigations can poachers be brought to justice. In Balule they have not lost a rhino in 11 months, warden Craig Spencer believes that the Black Mambas are responsible for the drop in deaths.
In Kruger rhinos are gunned down like this almost every day. Only with good investigations can poachers be brought to justice. In Balule they have not lost a rhino in 11 months, warden Craig Spencer believes that the Black Mambas are responsible for the drop in deaths.
In Kruger rhinos are gunned down like this almost every day. This the Crime Scene Investigations Unit (names withheld to protect them) doing a post-mortem on a poached rhino to get the bullet that killed it so it can be linked the rifle that shot it, and then maybe the poacher himself. Only with good investigations can poachers be brought to justice. In Balule they have not lost a rhino in 11 months, warden Craig Spencer believes that the Black Mambas are responsible for the drop in deaths.
Craig Spencer, right, debriefs the ladies of the Black Mamba Anti Poaching Unit. The ladies of the first all female Anti-Poaching Unit in Africa, on patrol, making roadblocks and sitting in listening posts at night in Balule Private Nature Reserve.
At the Black mamba’s headquarters in Balule Private Nature Reserve, Craig Spencer, right, debriefs three of the Black Mambas after their patrol. The ladies of the first all female Anti-Poaching Unit in Africa, on patrol, making roadblocks and sitting in listening posts at night in Balule Private Nature Reserve.
This is part of our current partnership with the UK Guardian, LinkTV.org and public television station KCET
The Black Mambas are all young women from local communities, and they patrol inside the Greater Kruger national park unarmed. Billed as the first all-female unit of its kind in the world, they are not just challenging poachers, but the status quo.
The Mambas are the brainchild of Craig Spencer, ecologist and head warden of Balule nature reserve, a private reserve within Kruger that borders hundreds of thousands of impoverished people.
The private reserve’s scientists and managers have had to become warriors, employing teams of game guards to protect not only the precious rhinos but lions, giraffes, and many other species targeted by poaching syndicates. The Mambas are their eyes and ears on the ground.
When the poaching crisis started – in 2007 just 13 rhino were killed in South Africa – Spencer saw other reserves within Kruger “taking out the same old rusty tools that we fought this same old war with a hundred times over, rather than to say, Hey! Let’s get better tools, newer tools!” ….
We created a short film about it for public television in the USA, you can watch it below.
Jeff Barbee
Jeffrey Barbee is a photojournalist and award-winning film producer and director. He works for Global Post, presents the US national TV show Earth Focus for LinkTV and writes and photographs for the Guardian UK. His work also appears in the New York Times, the BBC, NOS Tv Holland, Smithsonian Magazine, RTL News, PBS, CBS, Al Jazeera, Time Magazine, Newsweek, Vanity Fair and others.
His 2012 film Creating a Climate For Change won best environmental film at the film festival of Colorado.
He is the Director of The High Cost Of Cheap Gas, a current feature film exposing the global gas industry.
He is the Director of Alliance Earth, a worldwide not-for-profit environmental and scientific reporting initiative and is a board member of the Mezimbite Forest Centre.
