The Little Prince isn’t about wildlife or conservation, but has the book influenced the way you live or your views on conservation?

I am a person who believes in chasing your dreams, ignoring preconceived ideas and narrow-mindedness. If you focus on your goals then nothing is impossible. The Little Prince is in many ways my bible. If you watch animals or birds behaving as they were created to be, you see that verbal communication might be important but that there are so many other ways that they communicate. Modern man has in many ways lost the ability to be silent, to just listen and watch what surrounds him. So, yes, The Little Prince has influenced me in every aspect of my life, from my own emotions and how I feel inwardly, to how I like to view our planet. It is the simplicity and innocence of that little prince and his love for a flower that makes the book so special to me. That is also how I feel when watching my hippos, or, for that matter, any wild animal that has not been domesticated or commercialised by man.

What are the preconceived ideas you have to contend with in working with hippos?

I live in Southern Africa where the people on the land, be they black or white, believe in ‘sustainable utilisation’, meaning that they see animals not as individual sentient beings, but as different species to be used for the benefit of the land, and in most cases to bring financial gain to the owners of that land. Yet, once animals are looked upon commercially, you can often open a Pandora’s box that is very hard to close.

Elephants don’t have to be culled to cut down on numbers. They can be moved to areas like Mozambique that wish to bring back the elephants that originally inhabited areas of that country. They can be given contraception – there are ways of controlling elephant numbers without the gun. Every one of us who loves animals, who feels the animal and does not wish to control it, is up against a thousand others who do not feel that way, and that is probably the biggest challenge of working with wild animals in any part of the world.

Tourism is a double-edged sword if mismanaged, but with the right outlook it could be the saviour of Africa and any third world country. Tourism, more than any other industry within Zimbabwe, is what brought the country wealth and employment and helped it become the great African country it used to be.

Has that all evaporated now?

Due to the political situation since 2000, the tourists have all gone. It is picking up a little bit, but for our National Parks to continue to nurture the true inhabitants of those lands, we need the tourist market to return. Donors are not as keen to help out in African countries that have internal political pressures. They would rather go to more stable areas. Yet it is often the struggling African country that needs the most assistance, but it is left to sink into oblivion. People forget that there are those of us still here who believe in a better future and want to see the people and the animals prosper again. We need our tourists back, we need donors to support the initiatives of pro-active, forward-thinking conservationists.

When taking people to the hippos, I ask them to try to experience the real animal, not to listen to the myths and the legends and the hunters’ tales of horror and fear, and ego-related bullshit, and just look at the animal for what the animal is.