REPORTER: Emily Scanlan
TED RILEY: They're my soul-mates. They always help me clean my dishes. So clean sometimes you don't have to wash them! How about that, Emily?
Ted Reilly is a man who loves animals.
TED RILEY: No, don't fight.
In his lifetime he has single-handedly created a huge wildlife sanctuary in the tiny kingdom of Swaziland. His determination has placed him at the centre of a struggle between human life and animal life.
TED RILEY: We can get out - we can get out slowly, but don't turn your back on him.
When you see him with wild animals, he certainly has a familiarity and lack of fear that is quite extraordinary.
TED RILEY: They're getting scarcer because their range is diminishing - being invaded by cattle and the human sprawl. As long as you stand your ground, they won't close with you. But if you turn your back, that's another story. Don't ever turn your back on these things.
REPORTER: What would happen if you turned your back?
TED RILEY: They could grab you by the neck.
Ted was born in Swaziland. As he grew up, he saw that the big game was rapidly disappearing. Agricultural and industrial development was swallowing up the veldt. By the 1960s, when he inherited the family farm, he decided he had to try and reverse the decline.
TED RILEY: Unless something was done, Swaziland was about to lose its entire wildlife heritage. I suppose those are part of the reasons it made me commit the family farm, which I inherited, to nature conservation.
TV DOCUMENTARY: One thing that makes Reilly's task so urgent is the serious increase in poaching in Swaziland.
He set off to neighbouring countries to catch the game that Swaziland had lost - efforts that were captured by Anglia Television in the late '60s. They documented his single-minded and often single-handed pursuit of his quarry. Ted managed to bring back 22 species of game that had become extinct in Swaziland. More than 30 years later, not much has changed.
TED RILEY: This road's a lot of fun in the wet!
REPORTER: Why's that?
TED RILEY: There's no traction - you slip and slide all over the place.
Ted Reilly's success has been rewarded by the King of Swaziland and he's been given two much larger reserves - Hlane and Mkhaya - to look after as well. In fact, he's now the chief of all wildlife for Swaziland. But there's one animal whose return has given him particular pride and made him a controversial figure - the black rhino.
TED RILEY: An animal like this, as placid as he is, is quite capable of coming at us unexpectedly, just because he's a black rhino. That's what black rhino do.
Black rhino are one of the few animals that will attack a vehicle. Penetrating the floor with its horn, they are powerful enough to flip it on its side. These black rhino are extremely rare. In most parts of Africa, they're extinct. Rhino have been the main target of poaching for decades. Their horns are worth up to $15,000.
In the '80s, Ted's reserves were turned into battlefields. Heavily-armed networks of mafia poachers came after his rhino. Back then Ted fenced in his remaining rhino at night. His rangers defended them from forts modelled on those used during the Boer War.
TED RILEY: These are gun turrets, so that you can shoot from inside. People are after you and you're not safe at all, but... it's just a matter of outwitting them. A gun like this... Well, at that stage we had these R5s, which are automatic weapons, and it's a much smaller round than the AK-47, but it's equally as devastating. You don't survive one of those shots if it hits you properly.
Come nightfall it was often a pitched battle.
TED RILEY: We did have a couple of cases where we came under siege and the rangers were able to repel that from the top here.
By 1990, only two black rhino remained in the whole country. The king was forced to act. He gave Ted a royal warrant that allowed him to arrest and, if necessary, shoot to kill the poachers.
TED RILEY: It's the biggest honour that you can possibly imagine.
Since those powers came into force, not a single rhino has been killed. The royal warrant, still in force today, protects rangers from prosecution for murder as long as the poacher draws his weapon first. The law is controversial in Swaziland. It vests a lot of power in Ted Reilly.
MAHALAH MASUMBA, FORMER MINISTER FOR NATURAL RESOURCES: All these bits and pieces of law - the Game Act and everything, it is solely controlled by one man in a country which is a sovereign state. This is very wrong.
The former minister for natural resources, Mahalah Masumba, says Ted's men act with impunity.
MAHALAH MASUMBA: Even the rangers, they break the law when they come out of the reserve and kill people for killing the animals that have come out to destroy their food.
Ted admits his rangers have killed, but only in self-defence.
TED RILEY: You know, even if we weren't game rangers, even if we were civilians in everyday life, if a guy pulls a gun on you, I think you're entitled to shoot him, so I don't know what he was on about, but he was trying to make a case against us.
REPORTER: And he's still trying to make a case against you?
TED RILEY: He's still trying. Let him keep trying.
Ted is unapologetic about cracking down on the poachers.
TED RILEY: Our guys aren't to be messed with. If they come in after rhino, they'll get hurt. Then if he gets killed or maimed, who's to blame for that? He knows he's breaking the law. He knows what the consequences are. And that's why we've got a lot of rhino here today.
Today more modern surveillance towers have replaced the forts. But anti-poaching patrols are still serious business.
TED RILEY: The forts are more of a defensive thing, whereas this is more of a proactive thing. From here we go out and we launch attacks. They know each and every footprint of all the staff in the park and they can individualise these. So the security here is probably the best, I'd say, in Africa on rhino conservation and I think that's generally acknowledged by all the rhino experts.
On the way home we are treated to the Swazi sense of humour. Ted pulls over. He's spotted a rare species of frog - or so he tells us.
REPORTER: Can you see the frog?
TED RILEY: Frog, yeah.
REPORTER: I can't see the frog.
TED RILEY: It's very small. There it is there, there! Quite a long way away.
REPORTER: Oh, it's a long way away?
TED RILEY: Here's another one, here - just behind here. See? Walking.
REPORTER: Oh, you're pointing at elephants!
The elephant comes towards the car, forcing us back. She has another elephant to watch out for. Ted is clearly proud of his achievement in bringing back the game, but he feels he's only been able to do it because of his hard line on poachers. He just can't forgive their cruelty to the animals.
TED RILEY: And you can see the incredible struggle this animal put up - this high-tensile steel wire.
REPORTER: How long do you think the animal struggled for?
TED RILEY: Who knows? It went right through the flesh to the bone, so it was a long time. And then perhaps it was eaten by jackals, alive.
REPORTER: Have you found an animal in that state before?
TED RILEY: Plenty. It's happening now as I talk. It's all over Africa. People just don't know it, because they don't see it. This will give you a better idea. That's the bone of a young rhino - it got caught, struggled - struggled and this snare bit through the flesh into the bone - that must have taken maybe even years to callous to that growth.
The pain and agony is unbelievable. Out there there's no morphine and no vet or doctor to help you and no painkiller. You just take a very long time to die in absolute agony.
REPORTER: Does it surprise you that humans are capable of doing things like this?
TED RILEY: No.
REPORTER: Why not?
TED RILEY: This is what people do. People are the meanest - the meanest animal on earth.
MAHALAH MASUMBA: It's not that he's protecting nature as such. He's protecting his own interest, because these animals have become a source of living for him - it's business.
Ted Reilly has fought off every challenge to his animal kingdom. His animals are thriving because Ted met the poachers with equal firepower. But outside the gates of the reserve, a new challenge is threatening Swaziland's survival. This time it's one Ted can't keep out. The country has the highest rate of AIDS in the world. With 4 in 10 adults infected, many of Ted's staff have fallen ill to the virus. Ted supplied his staff with antiretroviral drugs.
TED RILEY: But unfortunately it's come late, you know. We were in there already and it's going to have a massive impact on us.
REPORTER: On your organisation?
TED RILEY: On every organisation.
While new life stirs daily within the animal kingdom, the nation around it is in crisis. The scale of the epidemic outside his gates may yet persuade this chief of wildlife that protecting the meanest animal of all is also worth while.
TED RILEY: They're my soul-mates. They always help me clean my dishes. So clean sometimes you don't have to wash them! How about that, Emily?
Ted Reilly is a man who loves animals.
TED RILEY: No, don't fight.
In his lifetime he has single-handedly created a huge wildlife sanctuary in the tiny kingdom of Swaziland. His determination has placed him at the centre of a struggle between human life and animal life.
TED RILEY: We can get out - we can get out slowly, but don't turn your back on him.
When you see him with wild animals, he certainly has a familiarity and lack of fear that is quite extraordinary.
TED RILEY: They're getting scarcer because their range is diminishing - being invaded by cattle and the human sprawl. As long as you stand your ground, they won't close with you. But if you turn your back, that's another story. Don't ever turn your back on these things.
REPORTER: What would happen if you turned your back?
TED RILEY: They could grab you by the neck.
Ted was born in Swaziland. As he grew up, he saw that the big game was rapidly disappearing. Agricultural and industrial development was swallowing up the veldt. By the 1960s, when he inherited the family farm, he decided he had to try and reverse the decline.
TED RILEY: Unless something was done, Swaziland was about to lose its entire wildlife heritage. I suppose those are part of the reasons it made me commit the family farm, which I inherited, to nature conservation.
TV DOCUMENTARY: One thing that makes Reilly's task so urgent is the serious increase in poaching in Swaziland.
He set off to neighbouring countries to catch the game that Swaziland had lost - efforts that were captured by Anglia Television in the late '60s. They documented his single-minded and often single-handed pursuit of his quarry. Ted managed to bring back 22 species of game that had become extinct in Swaziland. More than 30 years later, not much has changed.
TED RILEY: This road's a lot of fun in the wet!
REPORTER: Why's that?
TED RILEY: There's no traction - you slip and slide all over the place.
Ted Reilly's success has been rewarded by the King of Swaziland and he's been given two much larger reserves - Hlane and Mkhaya - to look after as well. In fact, he's now the chief of all wildlife for Swaziland. But there's one animal whose return has given him particular pride and made him a controversial figure - the black rhino.
TED RILEY: An animal like this, as placid as he is, is quite capable of coming at us unexpectedly, just because he's a black rhino. That's what black rhino do.
Black rhino are one of the few animals that will attack a vehicle. Penetrating the floor with its horn, they are powerful enough to flip it on its side. These black rhino are extremely rare. In most parts of Africa, they're extinct. Rhino have been the main target of poaching for decades. Their horns are worth up to $15,000.
In the '80s, Ted's reserves were turned into battlefields. Heavily-armed networks of mafia poachers came after his rhino. Back then Ted fenced in his remaining rhino at night. His rangers defended them from forts modelled on those used during the Boer War.
TED RILEY: These are gun turrets, so that you can shoot from inside. People are after you and you're not safe at all, but... it's just a matter of outwitting them. A gun like this... Well, at that stage we had these R5s, which are automatic weapons, and it's a much smaller round than the AK-47, but it's equally as devastating. You don't survive one of those shots if it hits you properly.
Come nightfall it was often a pitched battle.
TED RILEY: We did have a couple of cases where we came under siege and the rangers were able to repel that from the top here.
By 1990, only two black rhino remained in the whole country. The king was forced to act. He gave Ted a royal warrant that allowed him to arrest and, if necessary, shoot to kill the poachers.
TED RILEY: It's the biggest honour that you can possibly imagine.
Since those powers came into force, not a single rhino has been killed. The royal warrant, still in force today, protects rangers from prosecution for murder as long as the poacher draws his weapon first. The law is controversial in Swaziland. It vests a lot of power in Ted Reilly.
MAHALAH MASUMBA, FORMER MINISTER FOR NATURAL RESOURCES: All these bits and pieces of law - the Game Act and everything, it is solely controlled by one man in a country which is a sovereign state. This is very wrong.
The former minister for natural resources, Mahalah Masumba, says Ted's men act with impunity.
MAHALAH MASUMBA: Even the rangers, they break the law when they come out of the reserve and kill people for killing the animals that have come out to destroy their food.
Ted admits his rangers have killed, but only in self-defence.
TED RILEY: You know, even if we weren't game rangers, even if we were civilians in everyday life, if a guy pulls a gun on you, I think you're entitled to shoot him, so I don't know what he was on about, but he was trying to make a case against us.
REPORTER: And he's still trying to make a case against you?
TED RILEY: He's still trying. Let him keep trying.
Ted is unapologetic about cracking down on the poachers.
TED RILEY: Our guys aren't to be messed with. If they come in after rhino, they'll get hurt. Then if he gets killed or maimed, who's to blame for that? He knows he's breaking the law. He knows what the consequences are. And that's why we've got a lot of rhino here today.
Today more modern surveillance towers have replaced the forts. But anti-poaching patrols are still serious business.
TED RILEY: The forts are more of a defensive thing, whereas this is more of a proactive thing. From here we go out and we launch attacks. They know each and every footprint of all the staff in the park and they can individualise these. So the security here is probably the best, I'd say, in Africa on rhino conservation and I think that's generally acknowledged by all the rhino experts.
On the way home we are treated to the Swazi sense of humour. Ted pulls over. He's spotted a rare species of frog - or so he tells us.
REPORTER: Can you see the frog?
TED RILEY: Frog, yeah.
REPORTER: I can't see the frog.
TED RILEY: It's very small. There it is there, there! Quite a long way away.
REPORTER: Oh, it's a long way away?
TED RILEY: Here's another one, here - just behind here. See? Walking.
REPORTER: Oh, you're pointing at elephants!
The elephant comes towards the car, forcing us back. She has another elephant to watch out for. Ted is clearly proud of his achievement in bringing back the game, but he feels he's only been able to do it because of his hard line on poachers. He just can't forgive their cruelty to the animals.
TED RILEY: And you can see the incredible struggle this animal put up - this high-tensile steel wire.
REPORTER: How long do you think the animal struggled for?
TED RILEY: Who knows? It went right through the flesh to the bone, so it was a long time. And then perhaps it was eaten by jackals, alive.
REPORTER: Have you found an animal in that state before?
TED RILEY: Plenty. It's happening now as I talk. It's all over Africa. People just don't know it, because they don't see it. This will give you a better idea. That's the bone of a young rhino - it got caught, struggled - struggled and this snare bit through the flesh into the bone - that must have taken maybe even years to callous to that growth.
The pain and agony is unbelievable. Out there there's no morphine and no vet or doctor to help you and no painkiller. You just take a very long time to die in absolute agony.
REPORTER: Does it surprise you that humans are capable of doing things like this?
TED RILEY: No.
REPORTER: Why not?
TED RILEY: This is what people do. People are the meanest - the meanest animal on earth.
MAHALAH MASUMBA: It's not that he's protecting nature as such. He's protecting his own interest, because these animals have become a source of living for him - it's business.
Ted Reilly has fought off every challenge to his animal kingdom. His animals are thriving because Ted met the poachers with equal firepower. But outside the gates of the reserve, a new challenge is threatening Swaziland's survival. This time it's one Ted can't keep out. The country has the highest rate of AIDS in the world. With 4 in 10 adults infected, many of Ted's staff have fallen ill to the virus. Ted supplied his staff with antiretroviral drugs.
TED RILEY: But unfortunately it's come late, you know. We were in there already and it's going to have a massive impact on us.
REPORTER: On your organisation?
TED RILEY: On every organisation.
While new life stirs daily within the animal kingdom, the nation around it is in crisis. The scale of the epidemic outside his gates may yet persuade this chief of wildlife that protecting the meanest animal of all is also worth while.