Addo Elephant National Park

The Addo area is rich in history. Wildlife and nomadic tribes, like the Gonaqua, lived in harmony. Following the arrival of Dutch settlers in the 1700s, these tribes were decimated by a smallpox epidemic.

In the same period, the Xhosa people started moving slowly along the coast from the foot of the Drakensberg Mountains. They extended their territory from the Sundays River to the Mbashe River in the Transkei between 1700 and 1850.

In the late 1800s, Dutch farmers started colonizing the area in large numbers. Threatened by the elephants' presence so close to their crops and water, a battle between man and nature ensued. The government appointed Major PJ Pretorius to take care of the problem. Between 1919 and 1920, 114 Elephants were killed in an attempt to exterminate the herd once and for all. Sixteen elephants survived.

A public outcry finally forced the government to pay attention to their disregard for the animals. In 1931, with only 11 elephants left, the park was proclaimed with 2 000 hectares to conserve the animals.

The park expanded from its mere 2 000 hectares in 1931 to a mega park of 164 000 hectares. It includes five of South Africa's nine biomes and conserves the "Big Seven," which extends the Big Five to include the great white shark and Southern right whale. The 600 wild elephants are, however, the main attraction. In the early years of the reserve, as an effort to persuade the elephants to stay (as they kept returning to the farmlands in the area), rangers started to feed them citrus fruits from the local farms. It was a huge success.

The feeding continued long after the development of elephant-proof fencing in the 1950s. By the 1970s, the citrus situation had become dire – the elephants showed signs of severe addiction to the fruits, becoming hostile and aggressive towards each other and the rangers, and destroying the natural vegetation in the process. In 1979, the feeding stopped. Until recently, no citrus fruits were allowed into the Addo Elephant National Park.

The Addo Elephant National Park encompasses just under 170 000 hectares that stretch across the Eastern Cape, from the warm Indian Ocean to the vast open expanse of the Karoo. It includes the evergreen Sundays River Valley, the dunes of the Woody Cape coast, the Bird and St Croix island groups, and the Zuurberg Mountain Range. The diverse landscapes also contain many archaeological sites, such as the middens found on the Alexandria dune field and the rock art found in the caves of the Zuurberg Mountains. The analogies between the artifacts found in the different areas also substantiate that the nomadic tribes traveled immense distances across this area.

The park has expanded over the years to conserve five of South Africa's nine biomes: the Albany Thicket, Fynbos, Forest, Nama Karoo, and the Indian Ocean Coastal Belt, and also expanding to make it the world's first "Big 7" conservation area. Their ongoing commitment to the varying ecosystems promotes a sustainable and inclusive eco-tourism industry and economic development in the Eastern Cape region, and plans are underway to expand its borders further. Upon completion, it is envisaged that the park will expand to conserve 240 000 hectares of land and a further 120 000 hectares of protected marine area.