African Wildlife & Environment Issue 79

FAUNA, FLORA & WILDLIFE

having a break with a trails group on an exposed ledge of coking coal where we were watching a breeding herd of elephants drinking in the river next to a raft of hippos.We stood up and walked into the riparian vegetation and within half an hour had seen a Pel's Fishing Owl sitting high up on a Jackal Berry tree branch and an African Finfoot swimming alongside the bank. In a strip- mining scenario all this natural beauty would be gone. In the northern part of the KNP there are numerous natural ecosystems that converge and the biodiversity and scenic beauty is amazing, being part of the current 6% plus we have under Protected Area status. The people of South Africa and the world have a responsibility to protect these wilderness areas and support the rangers and research staff, who are the custodians of this priceless natural asset. A proposal in the mid-1990s to dredge-mine heavy mineral ores in the dune forest on the shores of Lake St Lucia was vehemently opposed by conservation-minded public opinion through various environmental organisations, and after a

entire surface is destroyed and the surrounding environment is polluted during the mining process. Acid Mine Drainage (AMD) is also a serious environmental concern associated with opencast or strip mining. This occurs when sulphide- rich rocks that contain ore are broken down from exposure to water and air at the surface. According to Greenpeace, more than 40% of all mining worldwide is surface mining. Rehabilitation of these areas is slow and costly and often nigh on impossible to get it back to what it once was. Being one of the wilderness trails rangers on the Nyalaland Trail in the northern Kruger National Park (KNP), my colleagues and I were very aware of the coking coal that lay below the surface in this incredible Wilderness area. Years prior, there was a big drive to de-proclaim parts of the northern KNP so that this coking coal could be strip-mined. There was huge public outcry and push-back from environmental NGOs, and fortunately the National Park remained sacrosanct and the mining application was rejected. I remember sitting near the Levubu River

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