volunteering at ZHDO conservation is a total life-changing experience it's about real people that's making a difference with the compassion and the sacrifice that they do for these animals it's all about the animals by us animals always comes first it's such a privilege to work with these animals and to come close to them and to see them and to learn their behavior to be able to feed them to prepare food for them to clean the camps to see what that they eat what that they live it's absolutely the only place in the world where you will get people that's so loving and caring but let's come see let's come see what what you guys do when you visit here our days start with our volunteer meeting where we discuss the plans for the day ahead the past that need to be done in any animal news after the meeting we go to lion's side or cheetah's side depending on which team we are on lion's side team spends the next two hours cleaning the animals and closures we clean water balls poop scoop and collect any leftover bones and feathers in the small cat enclosures we clean around the animals sometimes they are still in bed sleeping running around and playing or even following the volunteers around to say hello and make sure they are doing a good job after we had done cleaning the small cats and closures we moved down to the lower bit of the farm or the leverage that locked in a section of the enclosure while we clean the empty sections then swapped around so we can clean the rest of the enclosure the line and tiger enclosures are cleaned separately during feeding time but every morning we check that their water balls are clean and fresh and collect any discarded bones in the feeding camps after all of the cleaning is done we check the perimeter fences of the big cats and wish them a good morning meanwhile cheetah team are busy in the matroom preparing the food for the 28 different cheetahs each cheetah has especially prepared meal according to their health age and weight we load the food onto a pickup truck and drive to the animals the cheetahs usually hear the vehicle approaching and are normally already invading by the fence we then unload the balls and begin feeding our cheetahs one at a time with the help of our staff members this sometimes includes giving certain animals that are required medication as we closely monitor their behavior and strive to ensure all our animals health the cheetahs set team return to the matroom and help put the washing up and cleaning afterwards group activity then begins at 10 a.m every day the group activity can be different depending on what the day's priority is and then both all of the volunteer and staff working together to complete a task or project group activities can include cleaning two dot camps like you can see right now we walk in lines to be most efficient that can also involve general farm work that needs doing like the ging trenches to head water pipes building shade structures or creating enrichment for the animals at lunchtime we then head back to the restaurant at the volunteer village to eat and refresh for the afternoon ahead which usually continues with another group activity at 1.30 p.m. here for example we removed the weeds and one of our cheetahs camps and again she decided to pay us a visit which provides us with extra motivation to make the animals lives as best as we possibly can last but not least we feed our line-side animals in the afternoon at roughly 3.30 p.m. and try to make it as fun as possible by hiding their food in the trees for enrichment like with cosmol right our biggest cats are fed three times a week so their meals are large this time however they only got a snack for enrichment finally after feeding we return to the meet room to help clean and then have the rest of the afternoon free to spend time with the animals before we had a home to the volunteer village where we can relax with a pool go out for dinner or toast marshmallows by the fire thank you for your interest in our conservation project we hope to have to join our team very soon