From a distance : Botlierskop

The akward nipple of Botlierskop always catches my eye and I feel like repositioning it once more.

"Botlierskop Private Game Reserve is situated on a 3000ha game reserve between the Garden Route towns of Mossel Bay and George. This beautiful safari and game lodge is set amongst spectacular mountain ranges on the Garden Route area of South Africa.

The Botlierskop safari and game reserve comprises of over 26 different species of animals and more than 200 different species of bird.
Wildlife at the Botlierskop Game and safari lodge includes the rare black Impala, elephants, rhino, buffalo, giraffe, mountain zebra, eland and lions.(in an separate enclosure as we breed with the black impala).

The Botlierskop Safari Lodge was named after one of the spectacular rock formations on the game reserve. This odd shaped "koppie" is a landmark in the area.

In the late 1700's Mossel Bay was developed as a busy export harbour for wool, ochre and ostrich feathers. According to legend, the "koppie" on the Botlierskop game reserve was used as a look-out point. When ships came in, the owner made a huge fire on the top of the "koppie". This was a sign for the nearby farmers that a ship was coming in so they could get ready to bring fresh supplies to the ships.

Botlierskop Private Game Reserve was bought by Dr Dirk Neethling (now deceased) in 1996. He has been in the game farming industry since 1960 and saw the opportunity to reintroduce wildlife in this part of the Garden Route.
As mentioned earlier, Botlierskop game reserve is today a leader in the field of breeding with the rare black impala.
For this very reason the lions are in their own, private camp at Botlierskop and can be viewed on the 4x4 game viewing safari.

The gentle giants of the bush are also part of the family at Botlierskop Private Game Reserve. The elephants that joined the Botlierskop team are orphans surviving a culling program in the Zambezi Valley."


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Sadly the following happened on the 27th January, this year:


" A rhino was poached in the Western Cape for the first time at the Botlierskop private game reserve near Mossel Bay on Thursday, the reserve owner said.

Reserve owner Arnold Neethling said a white rhino bull, about 12 years old, was found poached at 09:30 on Thursday morning with its horns chopped off.

"We spotted it last night at about 19:45 and this morning on the daily checks we found it dead in the middle of a field."

He said it must have been done in the middle of the night when there was a lot of rain because it was in quite a busy area.

"We are hoping that someone saw something. If anyone saw anything they can go to the police or come to us."

He said it was a "real tragedy" and what bothered the most was that it was being done by organised crime

"This is a problem that the society of South Africa would have to solve," Neethling said.

"Once poachers have killed all the rhinos they would simply move onto another species."


It is incomprehensible why authorities do not seem to be able to do anything about this situation that has now reached out of hand proportions.