Wildlife Conservation Gap Year Programs
Wildlife conservation gap year programs have always been a popular gap year activity. No matter what your destination, you can be assured that somewhere out there there is an exciting Wildlife conservation gap year programs waiting to temp you into action. With lots of choice available to gapers however, it can be tricky to pick the right project for you.
Ok, so you know you want to have a wildlife conservation gap year, and you also know that you want to go to Africa, but the next difficult decision is to narrow down your choice further, after all Africa is a huge place and there are projects in many different countries. East Africa has plenty of game parks and research projects but then again so does South Africa and Namibia.
To help narrow down the choice, you need to think about what sort of animals you want to work with. Do you want to do a marine conservation project, and if so what type of project? There are some really exciting (or scary depending on your point of view!) like working with great whites on a great white conservation project. This is a very hands on project in South Africa where you get to study and help conserve the great white shark.
If the idea of braving sharks is not your cup of tea, what about roaming the plains of Africa on a field guide course? Field guides are the major force behind wildlife conservation efforts in African reserves and play a vital role in education and raising awareness about conservation issues, their role, is very customer facing and they are trained to deal with wildlife in natural settings. Exciting job for sure.
Field guide courses can be quite expensive, some just want the wildlife conservation gap year experience, rather that working towards an actual qualification. There are some great options open to you in this case, Xtreme Gap year has some excellent projects in South Africa and Namibia that are particularly suitable in this case. Like the South Africa big 5 wildlife conservation gap year project, or the predator conservation programme.
You may or may not know that if you want to get near the big animals, you have to enter the ocean, in particular you may be interested in the Whale shark conservation project in Mozambique, this is a great opportunity to get you involved in conservation efforts with the worlds largest fish – yes it is a fish not a whale. Although at 18 metres long it can be easy to confuse the two.
Staying on the Marine conservation gap year program theme, a softer way to help with wildlife conservation efforts is to try some diving, especially a Divemaster course. There are plenty of places where you can do a Divemaster course, and different places have different advantages, but the main thing to bear in mind is that as a divemaster you learn alot about marine conservation, and you usually study for a longer period of time that when on a typical gap year conservation project, you assit in wildlife conservation by educating your customers about marine conservation issues when you dive with them.
All the above wildlife conservation gap year programs are available through Xtreme Gap Year contact them through their website or at info@xtreme-gap.com