Don't Spook a Rhino - Simon Jones (Helping Rhinos)

In this episode, we sit down with Simon Jones, the Founder and CEO of Helping Rhinos, a UK-based organization dedicated to developing habitats, protecting rhinos from poaching, and educating the world on their importance. Simon shares his personal experiences and encounters with these magnificent creatures, insights into the incredible work being done at rhino orphanages, and the inspiring story of the Black Mambas – an all-female anti-poaching unit. We also delve into the crucial role of fundraising in ensuring the survival and protection of rhinos. Tune in for an inspiring conversation on conservation, community, and the fight to save one of the world's most iconic animals.

Transcript

Ethan Leaman (00:00)
Hey everybody, welcome back to another episode of Wild and Unprotected. Today's episode is a little different than ones we normally do. Normally we have a lot of marine biologists on this show, but today is a particularly fun one. We have Simon Jones, the CEO and founder of Helping Rhinos. Hey Simon, welcome to the show.

Simon Jones (00:19)
Hi Ethan, glad to be here, thanks for having me on.

Ethan Leaman (00:22)
Yeah, I know we've been working through trying to get this one done. You're out in the UK and I'm out in the West coast of the United States and it makes it a little difficult to record podcasts. So thank you for taking the time and working with us.

Simon Jones (00:34)
No, thanks.

Ethan Leaman (00:34)
So I think we should just dive right in. Let's get to know you a little better. Tell the audience a little bit about yourself.

Simon Jones (00:40)
Okay, well, hi everybody. set up Helping Rhinos in March 2012. So we've been going for, for what I guess, 12 and a half years now. I'm not quite sure where that time was flown by. Prior to that, I'd been dabbling in conservation work, probably more on a voluntary basis, but my professional life prior to...

to helping rhinos was in the corporate sector. So I worked for American Express for 24 years, And I was actually doing, as I mentioned, voluntary conservation work. Kind of ramping that up a little bit, I was actually working here in the UK in a big cat breeding center. And in 2010, I actually went out to South Africa for six weeks and did a conservation project.

then I'd taken a year sabbatical working with the big cats here in the UK and halfway through that sabbatical is when the place I'd visited in 2010 had a particularly bad rhino poaching incident. So long story short, I kind of felt it was in the time was now to stop talking about and moaning about what was happening and trying to just do something about it. So very quickly I decided

I needed to do something with regards to addressing the rhino poaching crisis, which in 2012 was just really beginning to ramp up to its height then. And sort of fairly quickly helping rhinos was born

But there was certain elements that I felt was important that coming together, I couldn't find a way of really influencing things like international education. Obviously, you've got the fundraising element of what we do. So, they all came together and Helping Rhinos was born in March 2012. So I kind of was part -time charity, part -time corporate for a...

couple of years from there on before then getting rid of corporate life for once and for all and really throwing my life and soul, I suppose, into trying to protect rhinos and do what could be done to overcome the poaching crisis.

Ethan Leaman (02:42)
That's awesome. You know, I was talking about recording our episode to someone and their first question was, you know, how do you go from kind of the corporate world working for American Express and then ending up in conservation and working with rhinos? It's not something that you hear every day.

You never get opportunities to get out. I can speak from experience. I worked in the corporate world up until I decided, you know, I really wanted to do something while I do have a marine biology background, The corporate world was the only way really for me to actually,

put a roof over my head. So my path is kind of similar to yours and a lot of our team members here at Wildscape are kind of in the same boat and are still working in the corporate world. So it's really, really nice to have someone on the show kind of as almost a role model to say, it is possible to be able to step away from what people call the grind, the nine to five, to be able to do something that they can be really passionate about.

Simon Jones (03:37)
Yeah, and that's the key, isn't it? I guess, you know, I would say to people, if I could have turned the clock back 20 years would have made a very different decision 20 years earlier. But, having said that, I think as much as I was really wanting to get more into the conservation side and definitely not in the corporate side, I think there's life learnings that you, I got through those years.

And you look back now and I'm like, well, actually, but if that hadn't have happened as much as I didn't want it to happen at the time, if I hadn't have had that happened and that experience and a few years of doing X, Y, Z.

Ethan Leaman (03:58)
Mm -hmm.

Simon Jones (04:10)
so you look back and you think, whoever, whoever thought that all of that was leading down this road to, helping rhinos, at some point in the future that we didn't know about at the time.

Ethan Leaman (04:20)
Yeah, I mean, I definitely can relate to that. think, you know, starting and leading an organization, it's a lot more difficult, than people would think. I think the first thought is, know, yeah, I can go in and do that. You know, I'm incredibly passionate. It's what drives me to wake up in the morning. And people don't understand all that goes into creating an organization, even at first, let alone leading it.

so I can completely understand and almost relate. don't think I could have started Wildscape, or even done a show like this without having several career milestones myself in kind of the corporate world. it teaches you, how important structure is for the most part, especially kind of when you're climbing up, that, you know, corporate ladder, so to speak.

So I definitely can understand that. think that's an incredible call out.

Well, I think we can we can get into the helping Rino stuff. So let's get to the point where we talk about how you started helping Rino's and exactly what the organization is.

Simon Jones (05:12)
Thank you.

Yeah, sure. like I just mentioned, alluded to just now, it started on the back of a particularly bad poaching incident at a reserve called the Karika Game Reserve in the Eastern Cape of South Africa, is where two years previously I had, been doing some voluntary work on a conservation project. when this rhino poaching happened, it was kind of like for me the perfect storm.

I was kind of thinking I wanted to do stuff with more animals in the wild. the first time I went to Africa in 2005, the classic question they always ask is what animals you want to see. And mine was definitely a rhino for reasons. Even today, I struggle to articulate why. I still got this picture of the first wild rhino I saw, kind of laying down behind a tree. It's an awful picture, but it still remains the first wild rhino that I saw. So it's still in a frame somewhere.

So that emotional connection, the fact that it was rhinos, the fact that poaching was suddenly massively on the increase.

just was, okay, as I said before, time to act. And it started off really as a do -it -yourself webpage, blank piece of paper and a Facebook page, and had no idea where it was going. As an international NGO, our role is very much fundraising. It's different ways that we could operate, but I realized very early on, I didn't want to just replicate.

So rather than just be a grant giving organization and have lots of grants and donations that we give out, we just decided to truly do some research across where we could have a biggest impact as a small organization to start with. And we formed sort of partnerships with project partners.

on the ground. so we work with fewer partners and we sign partnership agreements with them when we try and bed ourselves into those partners.

as much as we would love to be out there feeding rhino orphans doing fence patrols and such likes, that's not where our strength is. It might be where our passion is, but it's not where our strength and experience is. Our strength and experience is in that ability to do things like the fundraising.

the more administrative side. So that's kind of what our role was. And we started off just setting up things like online adoptions for some of our partners. And that starts to generate a little bit of revenue. how do we get out there and get our name known and going out to events and spending seven, eight hours on the stand somewhere to just try and get the name known a little bit. So that's kind of how it started. And then we've built up from there. if I fast forward,

12 and a half years ago. So from a blank piece of paper to where we're at now, we now have registered offices in the, well, we're headquartered in the UK. It's where our sort of most of our team is, but we have a registered office in the US, registered office in the Netherlands. We've gone from that blank piece of paper and nothing to bringing in around, you know, half a million pounds a year.

And then, you know, and actually we're just now, we're going through our, you know, we've got, we were a board of trustees, of course, here. So, our board's going through, we've got new members joining the board. We were actually just finding it in the process at the minute, finalizing our five -year plan you know, our goal is to go from half a million a year to five million a year in the next five years to really have a significant impact to what we want to try and achieve,

so that's kind of how Helping Minders started fast forwarding to where we're at now. You know, and as you mentioned, Ethan, it's, you know, people often say, you know, you're brave to pack everything in and do what you did. It never kind of felt like that to me. It just felt like that was the passion that I had. And that was kind of like what was calling to make sure that something needed to be done. I think if you, you know, and of course there are changes. My wife had to go through quite

quite a lot of lifestyle. I think even now I probably, I didn't earn any money for the first two years that I started here. And I think even now I'm probably on about 20 % of what I would have been on at American Express. But it goes to show, money isn't always everything. Sometimes that sort of sense of fulfillment in you're giving something back to the world and making a difference.

is really important. that's kind of where we're at now from a helping rhinos perspective. We've kind of at the start of the next rung of the ladder, we've built lots of good credibility where we're operating in the field. And we have big, big, big games and big goals to 10 times that impact, if you like, over the coming years.

Ethan Leaman (09:38)
Yeah, that's awesome. And I don't think people understand, you know, the roles that fundraising NGOs play in conservation and how important that it actually is.

I would say that's one of the most important pieces of the conservation ecosystem is because, the people who are skilled at fundraising and understand their place and where they can make an impact drive the entire industry. In my opinion, it allows, you know, organizations like us to go out and create content and work together It allows.

all of our partners to be able to be in the field, to have facilities, to be able to have salaries to wake up and actually do the work. On an earlier episode from the season, we had the Red Panda Network on. And our guest basically had said, his name is Terrence. He had said that their leader had told them, you know, conservation doesn't happen on an empty stomach.

And if, fundraising NGOs, don't play the pivotal role that they do, no one gets fed, no one wants to work in conservation. And at the end of the day, none of this great work happens. So it's a pivotal, piece to the puzzle. And I'm very appreciative of it, because, does so much good.

And, to me, that's something that doesn't get appreciated enough.

Simon Jones (10:55)
No, I think that's right. But, you know, I think the conservation world is exactly that. You know, we lose a lot of good people, skilled people, because the conservation world just cannot afford to pay what the corporate world pays.

And someone said to me once, you know, conservation is hard and people need to understand it's hard. You know, we talk about conservation, we talk about environmental issues, we talk about, saving our planet, which effectively is what conservation is trying to do. You know, we're looking at ecology, biodiversity is, is essential for addressing climate change and such likes, And yet if you ask most people, they think about that side of conservation as an industry, they think about

charities and they think about fundraising, you know, if you think about car sales, you know, no one thinks about somebody having to go out and raise money so that somebody can sell secondhand cars. It's kind of it's an industry that's designed to make money. it frustrates me hugely that that, you know, really the one area that that actually will dictate whether this

human race as a future on our planet or not is relied on handouts from other people and cannot be isn't seen as a sector of the business world if you like,

That isn't going to change, unfortunately. But we should probably backtrack up from this sidetrack because we could be able to out -talk.

Ethan Leaman (12:07)
Yeah, but I think this is a really good conversation because it's not one that's had, very often. So I think this is a side quest that's a good one to accept. And I think even to kind of expand on it and go down the road, you know, a little bit further, you know, I think it's awesome that you hit on, you know, GDP and how that's a measure of success for countries. And I think that's something that really developed.

Simon Jones (12:15)
Yeah.

Ethan Leaman (12:33)
Within the last 40, 50 years, if that's something that's like the primary indicator of success, I was watching a documentary on Walt Disney and him going through the design for the Epcot theme park in Florida, in Walt Disney World.

Simon Jones (12:55)
Thank

Ethan Leaman (13:00)
Originally Epcot was never meant to be a theme park. It was meant to be kind of a city of the future, you know, that was more sustainable, that was more, you know, I don't want to say conservation friendly, but I think, you know, eco -friendly is, you know, a big portion of it, you know, utilizing monorails to travel instead of cars. And it was really, you know, as the name states, when you break it down, the prototype city of tomorrow.

Simon Jones (13:15)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Ethan Leaman (13:29)
And we go from that being, you know, kind of the measure of success of how your country is growing, you know, leaning into, you know, different practices that, that move technology forward, that move, you know, really move the needle to only tracking what brings in money, which is, which is wild to me that that's, that's the case, because there's, so many things that we can be doing.

that are not only fulfilling to the people that are working on those projects, but moving us forward both within our ecosystems and our planet. So, it's

Simon Jones (14:03)
Yeah. And a of those businesses that bring in the money that means countries deemed a success because its GDP is great is unfortunately some of the industries that has the biggest negative impact on the sustainable future of the planet. you know, the two things don't not only do they not go hand in hand, sometimes they contradict each other completely.

Ethan Leaman (14:25)
Exactly. think the biggest example of that is the oil companies that have some of the largest grant programs.

When I discovered that for the first time, just kind of sat back in my chair and was like, really? So you get away with what you guys are doing just because you have the larger grant programs out there? I mean, don't get me wrong, know, unfortunately, their money spends all the same, but I just think it was kind of ironic because it's so backwards.

Well, we'll end the side quest and we'll get back on topic here and we'll talk about helping rhinos. Let's talk about kind of the core concepts of what helping rhinos, what you guys do as an organization.

Simon Jones (14:59)
Ha

Yeah, so as I mentioned, we are essentially fundraisers and, know, and the problem is, is the problem is so big. If you look at the threats to rhinos, there's three key threats to the future of rhino on our planet. So poaching is the big one that everyone, everyone's aware of, or these most people are aware of as the biggest threat, because it's immediate, it's there, we can see images of rhinos with their...

their faces hacked off for their horn. And in cases people watching who don't know, that's why they're poached. They literally just poached for the horn. And the horn is compressed hair. It's nothing other than keratin. So the same substance as our hair, our fingernails. And right, if you go back to 2014, which was the of the height of the rhino, current rhino poaching crisis, we were losing over 1200 rhino a year.

that's between three and four rhinos a day being taken out on average by poachers for nothing other than the horn. So they would often, know, the rhinos would be shot, killed, and the poachers would come in, take the horn and be gone. It's not like there was nothing else, part of it, that they were interested in. And part of the reason was the use of rhino horn in traditional medicines, typically in Asia, you we talk about Vietnam and China being the biggest sort of...

destination countries for rhino horn. It's been used for trinkets and dagger handles and cuedites of cuate gum, if we go back historically. But the question then is, we suddenly then that coincided with an increase in a rise in

middle level wealth within some of these countries So any rhino horn that's purchased is done so on the black market under the counter. And so now what you found is suddenly this rhino horn became a bit of a status symbol because more people could suddenly afford it

so then it started taking a life of its own and it really started to grow. at its height, rhino horn was the most expensive commodity. the, would cost you more per kilogram to go and buy that kilogram of rhino horn than it would have done gold or platinum, heroin, cocaine.

which was just crazy when you think it is just keratin. So now you get this whole spiral, now it's become much more than just traditional medicine, now it's got this whole status symbol. We've got examples of wealthy businessmen offering, having their business meetings and offering their clients or prospective clients ground up rhino horn in a drink, because it's deemed to cure anything from a common cold to cancer and just about everything in between.

And I always use an analogy for that. it's a bit like somebody owns a Ferrari at a business meeting and offers you a lift somewhere in their Ferrari. They don't really want to give you a lift in their Ferrari. They just want you to know they've got a Ferrari. And it was the same thing that was the same with Rhino Horn. Now that has died down. The good thing was...

Ethan Leaman (17:52)
Mm -hmm.

Simon Jones (17:57)
fashion status symbols, they contend to follow fashion cycles, as opposed to traditional medicines, which is steeped in thousands of years of history. so at least, we're seeing that that that price come down, as I said, it was, it was going away between 65 and $100 ,000 per kilogram, now we're looking about just under sort of about $18 ,000 per kilogram, which is just, still ridiculous. And we are still losing.

more than one rhino a day, close to two rhinos a day. So the numbers have come down, but you can imagine we're still losing that many rhinos a day. So that's kind what we're looking at is how do we address that going forward? looking at anti -poaching patrols, anti -poaching dogs.

you know, trying to keep them safe, what new technologies out there, how can we stay one step ahead of the poaching syndicates? And, and how do we really keep on top of that? So and how do we, what can we fund and who do we work with? So there's, there's one element there. And that's the bit everybody knows about, the second one, that's the bigger threat, and actually, longer term, I genuinely believe is a bigger threat than poaching, maybe not quite so immediately, but that's lack of habitat. And it's quite interesting when you look at the

the different countries of where rhinos are. So if you take the African populations, for example, 72 % of Africa's rhinos are found in South Africa. And that's where the vast, vast, vast majority of poaching happens in South Africa. If you take Kenya, for example, we've got projecting in Kenya, where we're working.

You know, that particular project that we work with Alpeggio to Conservancy have not lost a rhino to just over seven years to poaching. And Kenya as a whole doesn't really lose that many rhinos to poaching. What they are now starting to do is run out of space for their rhinos. And we're starting to see rhinos because there's too many rhinos above what we would call carrying capacity. So how many rhinos ecologically can be sustained in a certain area.

And now, so rhinos are coming into more contact with each other. The bulls are becoming more territorial because they're coming into more contact. You see many more deaths of rhinos through into fighting. So, it's a lack of habitat is a problem. It's gonna be a growing problem. The human population is continuing to grow.

So that pressure on that land and those wild spaces from the human race is going to become more and more on the wildlife. And we have to find a way to make that work.

we have to find a way where humans and wildlife can coexist and both benefit from the land at the same time. And then the third element is what we call disengaged communities, if you like. over the years, if you think about safaris and you think about wildlife, and lot of wildlife and wildlife conservation is now in ring -fenced areas.

where we sort of try and fence the animals in and you know the old National Park approach fencing animals in and people out to a certain degree. then what happens is is then the people that are benefiting from that wildlife tends to be the sort of already more wealthy side of communities and the poorer communities that living on the borders of where all this land is that the indigenous people from there they tend you know they've not really

Ethan Leaman (20:58)
Mm -hmm.

Simon Jones (21:06)
benefiting financially, which is why a lot of them end up being drawn into poaching. So we have to find a way to to engage and inspire. We talk about inspiring people. How do we inspire local people to be a part of conservation? we've got to get them engaged and make them want to be a part. And ultimately, they need to own conservation and not people sitting here in the UK or the US. You know, we need

African people to be owning and running conservation. And that's got to be the long -term goal if there's to be a sustainable, successful approach to this. So they're the three areas that we focus on. And looking at that, kind of create what, looking at creating what we call rhino strongholds. So areas that focus on each of those. So where can we really focus on that protection, know, state of the art technology to try and keep rhino safe? We now have GPS trackers on.

a lot of the ankle collars of rhinos. see lots of people may have seen, you know, the old fashioned collars on necks of elephants or lions or cats. We can't do that with rhinos. They've got a big lump on the back of their neck full of muscles. So you just can't do that. they end up on the, you know, on the, on the foot collars. Which I'll tell you a little bit later, perhaps, you know, can lead itself to awkward situations, especially if the rhino is laying on the,

Ethan Leaman (22:16)
Mm

Simon Jones (22:26)
device that's transmitting a signal. But I think that protection side is important of what we do. And then it's how do we find, there's a lot of, there is a lot of loss of land and human encroachment. There is also a lot of degraded land that can be restored for wildlife habitat and used for multiple purposes.

There's a lot of work that we're doing on how do we find that land and how do we restore it, what's involved in that. And alongside that, there are a lot of dedicated wildlife areas that through the nature of how the business has grown over the decades, are privately owned and have fences around them. So you create this environment where the wildlife can no longer naturally migrate from A to B to C to D. The only way of getting it from A to D is to tranquilize it.

put it in a trailer and pick it up and release it in location D. We have to find a way to let the wildlife take care of themselves a little bit more, which means dropping fences and then you've got a whole political environment that we get into as well, which kind of leads us into what we do with inspiring communities. It starts with education. We've built and opened one school that borders one of the reserves we're working in.

We're in the process of building a second. We've got plans for third and a fourth school at the moment. So that's sort of inspiring local children and teaching and conservation is really important. But also, you know, how do we engage with the elders in the communities as well? And as I said before, how do we make conservation deliver something that's of value to them and their communities? And that's how we go forward. So that's kind of what we're doing with our rhino strongholds. In a nutshell, it's creating

Ethan Leaman (24:09)
Mm

Simon Jones (24:12)
wild spaces for wildlife.

Ethan Leaman (24:14)
Yeah, and I think that's an important concept too. You know, that that's underserved kind of in the conservation community. I think a lot of organizations are just created. You know, and I think you predominantly see it from people, you know, in the in the US, the UK, where they'll, you know, kind of uproot themselves and move themselves into that environment. And they'll do all the work and don't allow much community involvement. I think, you know, there's

There's probably a lot of red tape around why that doesn't happen. So I love that approach of creating, you know, these, these strongholds within the community that can, that can really make impact. I think is really key to being able to provide.

the correct resources or inspire the right people because you understand the root of the problem.

Simon Jones (25:06)
Yeah, yeah, exactly. It's big and it's complicated and it's, know, I mean, we're looking at programs in small areas where this needs to happen to. But even those projects are going to take, you know, 10 years or plus and take, I say it's not even tens, it's hundreds of thousands, if not into millions of dollars.

That's when it comes back to this is a multifaceted approach. You need the people that have the passion, then you do still need the people that have the money that we spoke about earlier. Conservation can't survive with those people that are passionate about it, but don't make that change because you do still need that money to come in.

Ethan Leaman (25:45)
Yeah, I don't think people understand, you know, when you start either a nonprofit, a charity, an NGO, how stressful it is, especially at first when you don't have a constant source of revenue and you're relying on grants

you almost feel like you're letting people down when you have to request volunteers, just people doing some of the stuff out of the goodness of their heart. It is not for everyone at all.

Simon Jones (26:10)
No, no, it's definitely, it's definitely not. You it is, you're absolutely right. It's tough. and this is where, know, social media is a great thing because, I go and visit our projects probably once, twice a year, and that's what social media sees as my job is being out and being with rhinos and seeing rhinos and talking to people around.

95 % of my job is standing in front of a computer trying to work out where we're going to get the next level of next amount of funding from, which isn't quite as glamorous as the public persona of running a rhino charity is.

Ethan Leaman (26:44)
Yeah, yeah, I think that's one that's excellent for transparency. most people see an organization that creates conservation based content and they're like, my gosh, you're out in, you know, in the field or on location filming or you're recording the show. You know, it must be amazing. That seems so fun. And a lot of the times I have to level set.

And it's a very small fraction at that. A lot of it is you're sitting in meetings, finding the next grant, you're working with the board, to find that next person to network with. You're sending these long emails, trying to convince someone that you're worth, their funding or their time.

Simon Jones (27:25)
Yeah, exactly. know, and it is the difference, I suppose, is you at the end of the day, if I look at what I did in a corporate world, it's not a lot different. It's just at the end of the day, you're doing it. You know, the beneficiary is something that you care about as opposed to something you do. You know, that's kind of our approach. We're a charity.

Ethan Leaman (27:46)
Yeah, I agree. Your quarterly earnings calls are a lot different than in the corporate world.

Simon Jones (27:50)
Yeah, exactly. It's more governed on how many anti -poaching devices, how many Ranger patrols, how much milk can we provide for the orphans and such like.

Ethan Leaman (28:00)
Yeah, that was a good little tale in that conversation. I really don't think that people people understand that I love the shareholder bit. I was literally thinking that as you were bringing it up that you know, it's the shareholders are just different. The process is the same. So I'm so glad you said that because I was about to interject it. That was awesome.

Simon Jones (28:15)
Yeah, Yeah, cool good.

Ethan Leaman (28:24)
So let's talk about the next subject that we have in our discovery call when we were kind of getting to know each other before we got to our recording session. You talked about the black mambas. Now I know in the US that'll create a particular smile on the West Coast thinking about sports and Kobe Bryant, but I think it takes a little bit of a different meaning for you and your organization. Let's talk about the black mambas.

Simon Jones (28:51)
Yeah, sure. yeah, the black mambas could, know, different parts of the world, different things. However, when we talk about black mambas, we're talking about the first all female anti poaching unit that was set up in the world. And actually, they set up about the same time as helping rhinos was set up. So we've kind of grown together. I mentioned earlier on that we have a number of projects that we partner with.

And the black members is one of those. So these black members operating the Greater Kruger National Park area. And they set up at a time, as I said, when we did some running putschings at its height. And that was the epicenter, I mean, the stress levels of everyone on the ground and being a ranger, which used to be ecologically con...

conservation focus, suddenly you needed to be military trained to be a ranger in Africa and particularly in that part of Africa just to try and help protect the rhinos. And we tried lots of different innovative approaches and there's a guy called Craig Spencer who came up with this idea to take what is one of the most underused resources traditionally within Africa, which is the women that typically stay at home. And how do we, can we train those ladies up to be rangers?

and on the front line of the war against the Rhino Pachers. And there was a lot of controversy, I think, at the time. So we started off with just six ladies, and that's grown to 32 now, and they're unarmed. So they're on the front line of what's effectively a war zone, where you've got Rhino Pachers coming in with hunting rifles and AK -47s.

I'm more than happy to take out anyone that gets in their way. And we're putting a lot of unknown women on the front line. So their role is to be a presence, to be seen, to build relationships. And that's what they do. They watch 20 kilometers a day up and down a fence line at the start, at the end of the day, looking for signs of insurgents.

footprints coming in, gaps in the fence, really, know, and they would do stop and searches of vehicles coming in and out of the gates, but really to try and disrupt the landscapes and have a visual, be a visual deterrent. And they had a lot of success, you know, they relatively quickly, they reduced poaching and not just rhino poaching, but poaching generally within their area of operation by 63%.

Why they're called the Black Mambas? Well, you know, they're all Black women from the local community, so they named themselves because they wanted to be seen as,

The black mamba is a fearsome, a much feared animal, I should say. So that was how they came up with the name of the black mambas. they've got a lot of, because they were quite unique, a lot of international publicity. We have a lot of people in America still.

contact us about the black members. run the sponsorship scheme. We didn't call it adoptions. We thought adopt a black member when they're of adults. Adults didn't seem quite right. So we made our initial fundraising with them sponsor a black member. You know, now we go out, we get grants and we fund them. We funded another team, is now not just doing patrols, but is more proactive at disrupting the landscape, like a crime prevention unit as opposed to an anti -poaching unit. So there's a lot of

Ethan Leaman (32:10)
Mm

Simon Jones (32:18)
you know, a lot of good work that's being done.

I genuinely believe it's as a result of the publicity that the black members got is that we've seen a lot more women come into a much wider range of conservation roles. You know, it's no longer the women are just coming to clean the toilets and change the beds in the lodges. You know, they're getting more involved in day to day conservation. So, you know, I genuinely believe that the black members have had an influence in that because, you've got a lot of women who've seen this.

international publicity from these ladies and think, yeah, okay, it may not be exact model, but actually it's, it's, can get involved in conservation in some way. So I think that's really important, you know, and then now what we've seen with the members as well, we, know, they launched something called the Bush Babies Program, which is their education outreach program. So again, running as sort of side by side, and you would go out to 10 schools in the local communities of where the members operate and, you know, give conservation lessons.

So, you know, and then that's led itself to, okay, well, what happens when they leave school? So then we created a Scouts program. And so there's a lady called Louane who heads up the Bush Babies program and she's a force of nature, I have to say. She's so driven and determined to make this a success and she really has done it, I have to say. So, yeah, so that's kind of the Black Mambas and the Bush Babies, just one of the projects we work with, but one of the original projects that we started working with.

Ethan Leaman (33:39)
That's such an awesome program. And it's no shock to me that there's been particular interest from the US. Seeing where the culture is in the United States right now and the kind of emphasis on Black culture, especially here, I think is huge. I think there's a lot of positives that come from that. Of course, along with the negatives, but I think a program like this,

is something that's really good to highlight, know, strong Black women, doing work in conservation that is very difficult, especially unarmed. I didn't know they were unarmed, so that's wild to me. That's just like, yeah, go put yourself at risk with little to no protection. That's a level of badass that I probably will not be able to comprehend.

Simon Jones (34:24)
And I think just to highlight on that, because that comes with a lot, we call them the all female anti -poaching unit and they are, but what they are is a cog in a wider anti -poaching unit. know, if we get signs or not signs, but if we get reports of poaching activity, the black members are not the first unit that we send out. They're there to try and, as I said, disrupt the landscape and see signs. And if they find signs of incursions, then what they'll do is they'll call for the armed backup units and then the armed unit backups come and they may still support the armed unit.

Ethan Leaman (34:33)
Mm -hmm.

Mm

Simon Jones (34:54)
So, you know, I think that's an important point to make. We're not sending these women out on their own with no backup, completely unarmed, you know, there is a little bit more to it than that.

Ethan Leaman (35:00)
Yeah.

Yeah. And I think that's a really good point to make, know, an important distinction. But, you know, I also think there's, there's, you know, still kind of an element of risk involved, even getting to that point.

Simon Jones (35:19)
it's not just poaching either. They're operating in a big five environment. they could walk around the corner into an iron or an elephant or a rhino or something. So it isn't just the threats of the poachers. They have to learn. They have to be taught how to operate in that environment and how to deal with that situation when you come out of the corner and face to face with a lion, as well as

Ethan Leaman (35:28)
Mm -hmm.

Simon Jones (35:45)
looking for poaches and trying to apprehend poaches.

Ethan Leaman (35:48)
Yeah, well, that is an absolutely amazing program and I love hearing about it.

So another topic that we had set for this episode that I was really excited for us to be able to talk about was an additional partner of yours. And that's talking about the rhino orphanages. And that's something that doesn't get spoken about a lot. was the first I had heard about it when we talked about it. So let's dive into that a little bit.

Simon Jones (36:15)
Okay, So we partnered with the Zululand Rhino Orphanage, which is in KwaZulu -Natal, a region of South Africa. And actually in itself was born out of disaster. So we were originally working with another orphanage and that particular orphanage was attacked by poachers one night. And this had attacked the staff.

they actually killed two of the rhinos that were two weeks away from being released back into the wild. So anyway, so long story short, we decided that, you we needed to move the rhinos. And in fact, at the time rhinos and the hippo that was at the orphanage to find a new site. So we found a new site and then had to create from scratch very quickly, like within two or three months, a new orphanage facility.

which is what we did and moved the surviving rhinos and hippo across to what is now the Zululand rhino orphanage. we've been working with them since the start. And it's fascinating, there's a lot to learn about rhino orphans.

And of course, the one thing you want when you're doing that is to get a rhino in that you can care for, but at the same time, the last thing you really want.

a rhino in because you know if a rhino comes in it means it's its mum and know 95 percent of the reasons why it's lost its mum is because its mum's been poached and you know so it's heartbreaking and these little things come in and they're stressed rhinos are very prone to stress a lot of rhinos actually die because through stress so they

it creates problems within their stomachs, creates ulcers and they can often die from that. Even adults when they get stressed can die of that and certainly we see it with the orphans as well. that's a real, know, that's been quite an eye -opener and our facility has gone through different waves of how many orphans we have in and at a point we would

we released some animals back out into the wild, which we take very seriously where we're gonna release them to, because obviously we need to make sure it's somewhere safe for them to go back to. And we're not just putting them back into the hands of the poachers that killed their mothers.

The rhino poaching hotspot, which for a decade had been Kruger National Park in the north of the country, moved south to KwaZulu Natal. And as the only dedicated rhino rescue and rehabilitation center in the area, then we were taking in all rhino orphans.

We've had facilities hit by poachers in the past. So the security around it is huge. All I can say is it's a lot compared to what we've ever had in the past. We also keep the location of the orphanage as top secret as we can. Because again, if you think about poachers coming in, if they're going to poach a wild rhino, they might have to trek for days to try and find that rhino. If you come to an orphanage, by nature of it being in an orphanage,

Ethan Leaman (39:05)
Mm -hmm.

Simon Jones (39:08)
it's in a relatively small area until they're released back into the wild. So, you know, they don't have to go tracking for far. So we try and keep the location secret. We try and keep how many rhinos are there secret. But, know, we have got to a point I was out in April and was actually joining the team out there on a rescue that came in on one day. The next day we had two more coming in. So we've suddenly going through a phase at the moment where we are finding more rhinos.

One of the reasons for that is the rhino orphans have always been there. We've just not had enough patrols either on the ground or in the air to find them before it's too late.

So, you take all of that into account and consideration, and it becomes this of, you know, this nightmare scenario that you're creating now with all of these orphans coming into a facility that we've got to care for.

As I said, we're the only dedicated facility and we rescued six last year. And that's because we didn't have the patrols to find them. So they would have been eaten by hyenas. So, you know, one anti -poaching method that is used increasingly is proactive de -horning. So as I mentioned before, rhino horns like hair and fingernails and...

just like if you cut your hair and fingernails, if you don't cut them too low, they'll grow back. And a rhino horn's the same, it has about a four year growth cycle. So you have to dehorn every two years to keep low enough horn to try and be a deterrent. So in the state -run park, is where most of the poaching was happening, a place called Kruhuli and Filosi in Kozulunetal, and they've just started to dehorn. Now by nature of them dehorning,

we're putting more helicopters in the air to find the rhinos, which means suddenly we're finding a lot more orphans. now we are, it feels like every three or four months we're having to go for new appeals because we need to expand and we need to expand again and we need to expand again.

At the time that we're recording this, we're in the middle of an appeal of a little rhino called Lazula who came in, who actually was the rhino that I joined on the rescue for. And he came in and he didn't calm, settle as much as we would have hoped he would. And it turns out he has cataracts in both eyes. He's kind of nearly blind. now we have to think about that. So you want to bond a rhino with another rhino as soon as possible when they come in. If you're very careful who you bond him with.

Ethan Leaman (41:29)
Mmm.

Simon Jones (41:40)
He doesn't know the area, so we have to now create specialist fencing in his bone was in his area so he doesn't harm himself. So all of these things are sent to try us. You we've taken in, for example, most of the rhinos we rescue a white rhinos because they're normally the ones they had the most numerous species. And they're also more out in the open. They're more social. So they tend to be the ones that are poached more. But, you know, we have taken in a black rhino recently as well.

Ethan Leaman (41:55)
Mm

Simon Jones (42:09)
we don't really want to mix our black and white rhinos, so that becomes a whole different operation again. So yeah, so there's a lot going on with the orphanage.

I mean, if anyone wants to see what goes on in orphanage, there's a UK actor called Peter Egan, who is in Downton Abbey, which I think they come across to the US. He came out with us last year and made a film at the orphanage. So the film's called Keratin. So if if people want to go to our YouTube page, and it's a 25 minute film, it obviously, it gives a lot of insight into the orphanage and actually completely unplanned.

that's quite an interesting film. It also does a dehorning procedure as well. So it kind of looks at the whole picture of rescuing rhinos and what's needed to be done to protect them.

Ethan Leaman (42:52)
Yeah, just the concept of a rhino orphanage is, you know, kind of mind boggling because you kind of want to think about it of, that's an amazing thing, you know, that, that, you know, someone is doing, or there's a facility that's out there that's taking in these orphan rhinos. And then you think on the flip side of it is that that's horrible that we're even in that situation, you know, to have to do it. So it really provides some mixed feelings. I'll have to check out, that video.

Simon Jones (43:17)
to

Ethan Leaman (43:17)
Another piece that you had talked about was, that you're finding, more

Orphans. know tracking, is something that's, you know, relatively, I think, new to the space, as technology has grown, as it's become more available. Let's talk about, the tracking technology and potential campaigns that have kind of come from that.

Simon Jones (43:37)
There's lots of different, you know, we're still very much in a research and development phase to a certain extent in terms of this new technology that's coming out. you know, back in the old days, the original way of tracking a rhino was you put an ankle collar on it would be a VHF signal and you'd have a

antenna that you would go on your vehicle and you kind of twist this antenna around and wait for the beeps and the beeps would tell you what direction and how far this signal is I was out with one of these devices once I think we were about three hours tracking this rhino Trying to find this deep and eventually we found it but what we actually found was the collar and the collar had come off the ankles that we've been three hours tracking this collar

But, so that was the old fashioned way of doing that. You you had to be in a vehicle to do that. But some of the new technology that we try and experimenting with is more GPS technology. So a collar...

with a transmitter that sends a signal every, can send them as regularly as every 10 minutes, you start to be able to track an animal's behavior. I'm sure we've all seen on wildlife programs, know, GPS collars on birds of prey and such like, and now it tracks their whole flight patterns. There's something similar to a rhino on a rhino. There's risks with that. So, you know, what you...

Ethan Leaman (44:45)
Mm -hmm.

Simon Jones (44:49)
got to make sure is that the software that's running those, that GPS signal and that tracking software is completely bulletproof and hacker proof because

there's a lot of money being made by criminals and criminal networks out of rhino horn. So what you don't want is something that can be hacked in and is, and is transmitting the exact location of a rhino to someone so there's a lot of work we had to do from a security perspective before even being confident enough to trial it.

But we are now trialing it and we have got that confidence and it is proving to be really successful and this is where technology can really help.

So you have drones on standby in places that you can mobilize to send out and see. And I think we need to get better at that sort of proactive type of security it might help us catch a poacher, but it isn't gonna help us save the animal because by then the animal's probably already dead.

So it's how do we how do we use technology to do that? And then how do we use technology to reduce the cost of security for rhinos and that's the other thing, you know, the cost of security the number of ranges that's needed The number of patrols you need 24 hours a day Is so vast that actually it's you know, people are Disinvesting a lot of places that have rhinos are disinvesting in rhinos because

It's not worth the financial risks to them and it's also not worth the security risks to them. So I think all of this technology will help us get to a better place where...

Ethan Leaman (46:21)
Mm -hmm.

Simon Jones (46:22)
we can hopefully have rhinos that aren't quite so expensive to keep safe on someone's property

Ethan Leaman (46:26)
Yeah, while you were going through that, I think the first thought in my head, which, at this probably moment in time probably sounds, so far fetched, but,

we, we're not that, that far away from, a world where humanoid robots, can relieve, a lot of that cost, of, Rhino protection, I can see a path forward where, know, 10, 15 years from now, when, when there's companies, like Boston dynamics that are pushing, the forefront of

what can be done with this technology? You have mass production companies like Tesla, that are working on, humanoid robots that are in their factories. robotic figures like this that could lower the cost of protection, you know, tenfold.

I say all that to highlight, how important, you know, technology is to making this, a sustainable practice because you're right. You know, the, financial implications of running security programs like that are, unlimited investment with no return really outside of, know, you're doing the right thing. so, you know, the, continual growth of technology is a key piece in my opinion.

Simon Jones (47:27)
Yeah.

Ethan Leaman (47:34)
to creating sustainable programs that actually can provide large impact at scale.

Simon Jones (47:40)
Yeah, absolutely. think we all recognize that's the way it has to go because the poaching syndicates for sure are going to be doing it and using new technology. we have to stay one step ahead or least try and keep one step ahead.

Ethan Leaman (47:53)
Mm

Yeah. Well, I know there was another story that we wanted to tell before we dive into one of our favorite segments of the show. You had a rhino calf story that I know you wanted to talk about. This one, you know, might pull at the heartstrings a little bit.

Simon Jones (48:12)
Yeah, so this was really just a story that pulls it all together. And this was before I set up Helping Rhinos. Actually, I mentioned right at the start that I did a six -week conservation program at the Cricker Game Reserve way back in 2010.

while I was there, one of the white rhinos gave birth to a calf. And typically when a rhino gives birth to a calf, they'll go into the thickets and, you know, try and keep the calf safe for a period of time and then he come out into the plains. Anyway, so we'd heard that this calf had been born.

while I was out there and three days later we heard that the rhino had bought the calf out into the open. So we went and we sat quite a way away.

you know, up high, just looking down onto the plain at this calf. And we sat for, I don't know, about five minutes or so watching this calf. And we just, and I just thought, you know, as I said to you earlier, for reasons I can't, never been able to articulate, I don't know why it was rhinos. So to see this three day old calf, even from a distance was just amazing. then we actually, we didn't see this mom and calf again for, calf was a little boy we found out.

We saw her again exactly one week after she was born. and this time she was out in the open and was clearly a lot calmer. So we were able to get much closer to this calf. And we sat for about an hour just watching this calf try and keep up with its mom as its mom was grazing. And this calf kept sitting up like a dog would, almost sitting up on its backside with its legs like that.

And it was amazing. mean, well, that time I was amazing video and photos, you know, if look back now, I wish I had some of the recording and the camera equipment I've got now that I wish I'd had then. And as I said, to this day, it was one of the best experiences of my life because, know,

Back then I wasn't doing healthy rhinos. I hadn't come into that much interaction, especially with baby rhinos. So that was having them. And so we stayed in touch with the people who were running the conservation program we were on. And I think it was about three months after I got back, I was in contact with them and you know, and this little calf was called Clint. And I said, by the way, how is Clint doing? Have you got any pictures you can send me?

to which the response came back that was along the lines of, man, I didn't realize you didn't know, but the poachers had come in and attacked and killed his mum, which was just in itself was heartbreaking. So this was back in 2000, so was the back end of 2010. So back then, there weren't rhino orphanages. So the little calf, Clint, was taken to a...

a site that close by that we felt was probably the best equipped to try and hand raise the calf. But as I we didn't have the experience of raising calves and we didn't know then. So he came back to the the reserve, what we would now under know to be way too soon. And he didn't survive and he died as well.

Somewhere deep inside, think that poaching of his mom and Clint not surviving somewhere was, had been eating away for two years inside of me before helping rhinos. So it's still even now at this time, I everything, I've been involved with, seen many, unfortunately many rhinos that have been poached, but that one story is still the one that.

that sort of is a bit like a dagger in the heart because it was the first time and the first sort of real introduction to that that poaching crisis

Ethan Leaman (51:54)
Yeah, I mean, that's definitely one of those stories that hits you straight in the chest and it's tough to hear, you but I also, I think it's commendable that that was kind of one of the catalysts that's grown into a program that I think has probably helped a lot of orphan rhinos who are in a similar situation that might not.

have made it if it wasn't for the organization that was kind of spurned from that.

Simon Jones (52:22)
Yeah, more than you realize probably, I tell the story quite a bit, in these sort of forums and it's always the one thing I come back to. So, yeah, it's sad, but as you say, hopefully some good comes out of it.

Ethan Leaman (52:37)
Now I think it's time to move on to probably the favorite segment of the show where things, you know, get a little unhinged. We'll move on to the the wild stories segment of the show for those listening, possibly for the first time, the wild stories segment of Wild and Unprotected is really where we allow

Simon Jones (52:44)
Yeah.

Ethan Leaman (52:55)
our conservation partners and guests to let loose and have fun. Sometimes it is appropriate, sometimes it is not appropriate. We really like this segment to be a peek behind the curtain to what life is like in conservation, know, those stories that don't get told in mass media. So Simon, what do we have for our wild story segment today?

Simon Jones (53:14)
Yeah, I mean, it's difficult with rhinos to know the right stories. There's a couple of and they're not that wild. mean, one of them, I guess, had the potential to be but I'll share both actually linked to tracking rhinos on foot, which is, in itself, it can be a challenge. the first one is actually as a

As I set up Helping Rhinos, I went back to different parts of South Africa for two weeks, specifically rhino conservation project, just to immerse myself in what really goes on in the field. And part of that was tracking rhinos. So we would often start the day by climbing a mountain. Now I'm not great with heights, so that was a challenge for me in the start, climbing this mountain to try and get a high point with this antenna VHF signal I was referencing earlier. So we were trying to see, could we get a beep? Where are the rhinos that have got a collar on?

we climbed this mountain and I was like, right, then we got to get back down again. So that was just to get the direction. So we got the direction and then we were off in the vehicle and we get so far and then we said, right, we probably need to get out and track the last of the way on foot.

So we're tracking on foot and you've got this antenna and the guy is leading the program. We're following it, he's going beep, beep, but much quieter than that. he was like, because you can tell, if you're experienced with these things, you can tell how loud it is as to roughly how far away the rhino is. So we're on foot going through the thickets and we can hear this beeping and it's very quiet. And then all of a sudden the beep goes from this sort of beep.

and it's like really loud and it's like, I he just froze. And what had happened was we were tracking this rhino thinking she was like probably 20, 30, 40 meters away and had, but was laying down on the collar. So it was, it was muffling the signal and then she heard us coming. So we spooked her. She stood up, which means now the

Ethan Leaman (55:05)
there's muffling the signal.

Simon Jones (55:11)
and you would literally just round the corner from us. So at that point we were like creeping back to the vehicle and it was kind of that, it was a good reminder for someone at the time who was very new to that sort of stuff of how dangerous it can be. And then I guess the other point was one of the first things Helping Rhinos did was provide some of this tracking software to it.

a reserve in the greater Kruger area. I'd gone out and they wanted to show us, wanted to show me, I guess, how they, how successful they were using this telemetry and how important it was to them in the tracking of the rhino. So, and they just, they've recently introduced a number of about 19 or 20 black rhino into this area. And black rhino are a lot more feisty, a lot more aggressive. It's often said, if you get charged by a white rhino,

it'll go past you and just keep running. Whereas if a black rhino goes past you, it's like, just turn around and have a go from the other side. the other thing, then we, again, we were on a vehicle and we were getting these signals, but they were far and, you know, and they were desperate to try and show me these rhinos that we could find because of this telemetry equipment we funded. And again, we'd been out about three to three and a half hours and we're soon to give up. But then we kind of got a fairly strong signal in the vehicle and they said, right,

Ethan Leaman (56:07)
Hahaha

Simon Jones (56:30)
through there we're gonna go and track them on foot. So this was I think my first experience at the time of tracking black rhino on foot. And when you track rhino on foot, like if you want to get from point A to B, you would never walk from point A to B. You would pick out a route that goes along a line of trees or has got trees along it. And you always have to have identified your safe tree. So that safe tree is a tree you can climb very quickly if the rhino charges at you or it's a tree.

you can dive in the middle of and worry about the thorns and pick those out afterwards. So we stopped and you could see, so there was me and four other rangers who were there and they said, well, we could go in, but you could see them looking, there was no trees, there was some little tiny shrubs around and there was nothing like that. we've got, and we haven't got very far in, I guess about 50 meters into this, not so thick, thick hit. And suddenly we heard the snorting of rhino.

and the thundering of hooves coming towards us. And I remember just looking over and seeing this black rhino just charging towards us. And at the point where we heard the snort, one of the rangers was like, run for the fucking vehicle. Which is like a back of your pickup truck. And I remember these five of us went just different directions. They say, if you do, don't run. At this point, they were running. And they were like, so, you know.

Ethan Leaman (57:41)
Hahaha

Simon Jones (57:56)
I remember looking around and the rhino diverted off long before it got to us really. mean closely enough that you could see it coming towards us but far enough away before it got. It was a mock charge, not a serious charge in all honesty but it's certainly got the heart rate going on. So we got back to the vehicle and I got shorts on so there was blood coming all out my legs where we'd run through all the acacia shrubs and such like. And the funny thing was that I had my

I've got a camera with a 400mm lens at the time with me. One of my board members was with me at the time and she's like a semi -professional photographer. She couldn't come with us because she had a white t -shirt on which is just too risky for tracking black rhinos. So she had to stay on the back of the vehicle. And then as we got back and everyone was like out of breath and you could see the adrenaline running through these ranges. And she said to me, did you get any pictures? And I was like...

No, I was too busy trying to run for my life. But more to the point, did you get any pictures? Because you're there with your camera on the back of the vehicle. No, we were too busy laughing at you. was one of the one of the funniest stories.

Ethan Leaman (58:55)
You

Simon Jones (59:06)
So, yeah, so I guess, I guess as someone who grew up in Europe, in the UK, has lived always in the UK, you know, when you go at GoTowns to get in Africa and go on some of these sort of real Bushman experiences, it's quite an eye opener. It certainly gets the heart, the heart pounding.

They're the stories when you have a, you we were saying earlier, you know, most of our time is spending in front of a computer. So when you have a bad day and you get another email that says, sorry, you've not been successful in your grant application. You remember those types of things and the opportunities that the sacrifices you made has afforded you those positives, suddenly outweigh the negatives. So I don't know if that's wild enough, but they're the kind of the wildest stories I have.

Ethan Leaman (59:46)
Yeah, yeah, I agree.

I mean, honestly, you know, the the wild story segment, I think is dubbed that way because of how our show started with talking about swimming through whale shark poop and dolphin sex and all types of stuff that popped up. But, you know, one of one of the key portions of this section, you know, isn't necessarily

Just being wild as it is, you know being real of what it's what it's like, you know a big portion of the content that we create is And whether that's wild whether that's you know real It doesn't matter and that's you know, really what the segment is for at its core

is to be able to tell those stories that inspire and provide context and reality to what life is like in this world. And honestly, I would say getting charged at by a rhino, even if it's a mock charge is a pretty wild story.

Pictures first, safety later. but no, those, those were great. Thank you for those. well, I think we're at a good point to.

to start wrapping up the episode One of the things that we love to do is make sure that our listeners have the opportunity to either get involved or support. So tell us how we can support and how our community can get involved with helping rhinos.

Simon Jones (1:01:09)
Yeah, thanks. Yeah, I mean, with Rhino poaching, really is, you know, it's an international problem. And the solution is internationally, it takes all of us in different guises. So, I would encourage everybody please to go to our website, which is helping rhinos .org. There's a lot of work, a lot of information there.

generally about rhinos, there's a lot of more information about the work that we do and who we work with. And of course you can make a donation there as well, which we rely on to keep going if it's not, we don't have the support of people around the world. We spent a long time talking about my journey and but none of that would be possible without the support of.

hundreds and thousands of people who support helping rhinos around the world. And if we don't continue to have that support, we won't continue to survive. We've recently launched our Rhino Guardians program, which is looking at people making a regular annual donation to help us to keep going and doing what we do.

And actually coming up at the end of September we have our Rhino Champions appear which this year is called the Lost Rhinos help us find them We did it last year for the first time and we we were successfully raised a hundred thousand pounds So we've we've gotten even more ambitious this year

And we're going to need people to really get behind us and help us with that campaign or that appeal. And it's based around some things I've been talking about. So the lost, we talked earlier and the lost rhinos in terms of rhinos that have been poached, over 10 ,000 rhinos over the last decade have been poached. We talked about the lost orphans we've not found.

But that in itself is there's more to the lost rhinos than just that. There's so many rhinos, not only the ones that we know we've lost, there's those we know we haven't lost. So if we've lost over 10 ,000 rhinos, even if you take a crude number and say, 5 ,000 of those were female, well, imagine if all of those poached had gone on to have numerous calves of those females.

So if you take all the rhinos that have been poached over the last decade and say, well, if you think each of them might have gone on and had a legacy of eight, for example, and you multiply that by what the rhino population would be now, our rhino population would be two to three times what it is now, just on that alone.

So we we've got a lot of rhinos that that we either need to go and find or that we need to bring back you know we haven't whole podcast we haven't actually talked about the northern white rhino which is in our reserve property in Kenya the last two northern white rhinos in the in the world you know so we've lost a whole species that originally roamed in central Africa mainly through to

poaching to fund civil war. We need to bring back those species. We need to find ways of not letting that northern white rhino story be told again. So this September, 27th through the 29th of September,

is our The Lost Rhinos Help Us Find Them campaign. And we're going to need everyone around the world to really get on board with us. So please keep an eye out for that. Go to the website, sign up to our newsletters. We promise we don't bombard you with meaningless newsletters, but we will get information. And follow us on social media. We're on all the main social media channels. And we'll push out there as well. So yeah, please just get on board and keep following us.

and keep at least, I guess, even if you can't donate, then at least help us raise awareness.

Simon Jones (1:04:46)
So yeah, to helpingrinos .org and keep following us on social media on all the platforms we're just at, Helping Rhinos.

Ethan Leaman (1:04:54)
Yeah, well, we hope to send some support your way and and we hope that this episode of Wild and Unprotected is something that you guys can can use to really push push the Lost Rhino cause and campaign that you guys have going.

So we're excited to be a part of it. And I can't wait to see how much money you guys raise and hope that a lot of support comes your way.

Simon Jones (1:05:16)
Cool, and thanks, Ethan, and thank you for inviting me on and having me on. And again, for everything you're doing, because as we said, it takes everybody to be doing, everyone's own little part and some of the parts come together. So it's fantastic to be connected to you.

Ethan Leaman (1:05:33)
Yeah, well...

Thank you. No, it's this, get to do the fun stuff. I'm, kind of like you said, there's different cogs in the machine and I'm just a cog in a machine with a microphone and, enjoy the fact that, I get to be able to connect.

and hear so many amazing and wild stories, as a part of my journey. I'm the lucky one. I'm the lucky one to get to enjoy it. So, but I appreciate it.

Well, all right, I think that wraps up this episode of Wild and Unprotected. Thank you, Simon, for your time. This was a good one. Thank you.

Simon Jones (1:06:06)
Cool, thanks, Ethan. Bye.

Ethan Leaman (1:06:08)
Well, thanks to all the listeners out there and we'll see you in the next episode.