A passion for wildlife conservation and a love for dogs has led to the creation of a non-profit organisation that trains puppies to protect endangered species.

Dogs4Wildlife, based in Carmarthen, supports frontline conservation efforts across sub-Saharan Africa.

Founders Darren Priddle and Jacqui Law train and develop specialist conservation dogs to support anti-poaching rangers.

“There is no better feeling on this planet than to know that our dogs are saving lives,” said Jacqui.

Darren and Jacqui are professional dog trainers and have been developing operational working dogs for 15 years.

Darren said: “Our love for dogs and our commitment to developing them for specialist work helped us to decide ‘why not?’

“If we are able to train dogs to track people in this country, then why can we not train dogs to help protect our wildlife all across Africa and that’s where Dogs4Wildlife was born.”

The dogs are bred in-house and go through “extensive and advanced training” and a development programme that starts from as early as two days old.

“Relationship is key when deploying a dog to work with anti-poaching rangers,” Darren added.

“We do a lot of relationship building, a lot of conditioning in terms of the patterns of behaviour we want from the dog.

“Whether that be human scent tracking, specialist detection work or operating in a control base on a wildlife reserve.”

The team then “impart all of that knowledge and experience” to the rangers once the dogs have been deployed to a wildlife reserve.

The team has trained and deployed 15 operation dogs to five sub-Saharan African countries including Zimbabwe, Tanzania and Mozambique.

They also provide consultancy and specialist training to different organisations, including the Akashinga, an anti-poaching group in Zimbabwe.

In October, one of their dogs Shinga tracked a poacher 4.5 km (2.8 miles) straight to his front door after a warthog was killed in Zimbabwe.

The team’s work in Africa not only supports the anti-poaching rangers but also communities in the area.

The aim of the programme is to inspire the future generations “to love and support the natural world that surrounds them”, said Darren.

“Whether that be human scent tracking, specialist detection work or operating in a control base on a wildlife reserve.”

The team then “impart all of that knowledge and experience” to the rangers once the dogs have been deployed to a wildlife reserve.

Sunil Dharmabandhu 

Carmarthenshire, Wales, UK

At this Time of the Year, the “Season of Goodwill towards men”, please spare a thought for the plight of 103 ROHINGYA Refugees including 25 children found drifting in a rickety Boat and apprehended by the Navy.

The Rohingya are an extremely persecuted minority in Burma/ Myanmar, where they are being openly murdered by the Military Government of Myanmar, For NO REASON whatsoever, except ethnicity, (they are minority Muslims), although they have lived in Myanmar for several generations.

The 12 crew members of the boat have been remanded. They can barely make themselves understood due to the language difference. They can’t speak English.

Apparently, they were apprehended by the Navy in Sri Lankan waters near Trincomalee and first reports indicate that they never intended to make Sri Lanka their destination. They were probably heading to a Muslim majority country. Of the three boats that set out, two sank, and everyone who could, clambered onto this one boat.

Reports said that many of them were suffering from acute hunger at the time of “arrest”. These people completely fit the description of REFUGEE, whom Sri Lanka is duty bound to provide safe protection under the Geneva Convention. Conventions and Legalese aside, what happened to the so-called “smiling welcome” with which we supposedly greet Foreigners? Is that fake smile dependent on the dollars that the tourist is carrying?

I appeal to the new Government of Sri Lanka to set aside the opportunistic behaviours of recent past Presidents, humanitarian attitude. Our unassuming and transparent President knows what it is to face hardship. Please sir, look at the Rohingya as fellow Humans’ in distress. Let’s recall during this Christmas Season that the Pope himself called the Rohingya “The most persecuted people on Earth! Jesus himself was a Refugee whose family fled to Bethlehem. The Muslim Community too, also have a special responsibility These people ARE NOT CRIMINALS. They need our protection.

Jayanta Kurukulasuriya

The first and only tsunami that Sri Lanka experienced was on Boxing Day(26th) of December 2004. My wife and I, as usual, went down to Modara in Moratuwa to purchase our seafood requirements of seafood from our familiar fishmonger, Siltin, from whom we had been buying fish for a long time. Sometimes we used to take a couple of friends of ours. But on this day, it was only both of us that went on this trip.

We made our purchases and were returning home and when we came up to the Dehiwala bridge, many people were looking down at the canal from both sides of the bridge. This was strange, as normally if there was something unusual, it would be on one side.

Anyway, we came home unaware of anything that had happened. A school friend of mine (sadly he is no longer with us) telephoned me and asked whether I was aware of what had happened. When I answered him in the negative, he told me to switch on the TV and watch. Then when I did so and saw what was happening, I was shocked. But still I did not know that we had just managed to escape being swept away by the tsunami.

Later, when I telephoned Siltin and asked him, he said that both of us had a narrow escape. Soon after we had left in our car, the tsunami had invaded the shore with a terrifying wave and taken away everything of the fishmongers, including their stalls, the fish, weighing scales and money. The fishmongers had managed to run to safety.

This had been about five minutes after we had left. So, it was a narrow shave to have escaped the wrath of the demining tsunami( the name many Sri Lankans came to know after it hit our island very badly}

HM NISSANKA WARAKAULLE