Snake Education and Community Awareness Program (SECAP) is an initiative born from the partnership between Save The Snakes and the Hoedspruit Reptile Centre. Our aim is to mitigate human-snake conflict and promote the conservation of snakes through education and outreach.

Our goal is to engage and educate learners, healthcare workers and members of rural communities about snakes and snakebite, create more awareness about snakes that are found in the greater Kruger to Canyon Biosphere Region, and how we can live in harmony with them.

What We Do

We currently have 5 main projects (cogs) that make up our conservation model:

Schools Project: aims to educate learners at schools in the area and create a positive attitude towards snakes.
Communities Project: focuses on educating learners and members of various rural communities about snakes and mitigating human-snake conflict within these communities. We do this through building valuable partnerships.
Healthcare Worker’s Project: involves working with local hospitals and clinics to ensure healthcare workers are comfortable, prepared and better equipped with dealing with snakebite.
Antivenom Bank: which is currently at the Hoedspruit Reptile Centre and aims to provide antivenom to individuals or to hospitals and clinics when someone has been bitten by a venomous snake or scorpion.
Snake Relocation Training: aims to work with identified leaders in rural communities to become snake relocators, our 'snake rescue champions', as we teach them to safely rescue and relocate snakes and teach others within their community about snakes.

1K+

Learners educated

200+

Healthcare professionals educated

500+

Surveys conducted

10K+

People reached through our efforts

Education

Education is at the core of what we do and by engaging with learners, community members and healthcare workers around the Kruger to Canyon Biosphere Region and sharing our knowledge about snakes, we hope to ignite an appreciation for snakes and mitigate any conflicts between humans and snakes.

Outreach

Human-snake conflict is often the greatest in rural communities and our goal is to mitigate this through our education efforts and by working with other organisations and initiatives to showcase the importance of snakes within their community. By forming key partnerships, we can work together to promote harmonious living with the natural world.

Snake Recues

Our experienced team members are always available to rescue a snake from your home, gardens and anywhere else where you it might feel like a problem. Give us a call and please avoid any interactions with the snakes and please do not kill the snake.

Antivenom Bank

Antivenom is crucial for treating snakebites and the HRC Antivenom Bank currently has polyvalent (adders, cobras and mambas), monovalent (boomslang only) snake antivenoms and scorpion (Parabuthus) antivenom. In the event of a potentially dangerous snake bite or scorpion sting, immediately go to hospital. We will make the antivenom available to support medical professionals at the relevant hospital.