ECO-TOURISM
Enjoy and leave
only footprints
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Echoes of the Past
Before the advent of the European settlers in the last two
centuries the plains of the present day Free State was teeming with
large herds of antelopes. Human habitation was confined to pockets
close to rivers and water sources, with the plains mostly void of
permanent human habitation. The legacy of our past is that a massive
slaughter of animals has taken place within the first fifty years of
settlement. The scale of this event is only paralleled by the
slaughter of the bison on the North American continent. Where in
today's Free State cultivated farmlands stand for hundreds of
kilometres, it is difficult to conceive the large herds of game
numbering millions of animals that existed only two centuries ago.
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Traditional
Free State
Hospitality |
The historical records of only one commercial firm in Kroonstad
shows that during only a few months of 1855 they exported over
55,000 game hides. The sad fact is that for the small price that a
hide fetched in 1855, the entire legacy of Africa has been lost.
Today farmers are adopting conservation and most farms have land set
aside for the original species that once roamed these plains freely.
An increasing number of farms have been totally converted to game
and wildlife and although in biological terms they represent only
pockets of what this habitat looked like, at least some species and
habitats are being preserved. The
Zoutspruit game
camp offers a fascinating view of what this area must have looked
like only a few centuries ago.
Pockets of Conservation
Today many farms have set aside areas for conservation purposes. The
conservation is driven increasingly by a profit motive which has
both a positive and a negative side. The positives are that our
heritage is being conserved and that since it is commercially
viable, the conservation efforts are self sustaining and viable over
the long term. The negatives are that at best only pockets of
conservation exist between extensively farmed tracts of lands where
excessive agricultural cultivation together with extensive usage of
synthetic fertilizers, insecticides and the planting of genetically
modified crops are applied. Emphasis is given to the larger antelope
species with a commercial value at the expense of the other 99% of
species consisting of smaller mammals, reptiles, amphibians, birds
and the diversity of plant and insect species that have made up this
eco-system in the past. In fact very little data is available
anywhere on what species should really make up the bio-sphere of the
Free-State plains and in what proportions they should exist. All the
large (and often even the small) predators has been eliminated from
the system, leaving only man as the ultimate predator. Even if
smaller species are re-introduced in an area, they would exist as
isolated populations on ecological islands surrounded by vast and
barren tracts of agricultural land. For example it is inconceivable
that a chameleon will be able to cross the wasteland of a ploughed
maize field for a distance of five kilometres in over 30 degrees
centigrade heat with absolutely no shelter, food, vegetation or
water in its journey towards the next 'island' of conservation. This
will ultimately lead to a dramatic loss of genetic diversity in most
species and it does not create viable populations that have a good
long-term chance of survival. Such are the sad realities of our
modern age
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