Ossendryver is the founder and developer of Latest Sightings, a crowd-sourcing website that provides updates on animal sightings in the Kruger National Park. The website has won several awards and created an online community of thousands of users – and Ossendryver is only 17-years-old.

Ossendryver told guests that the site utilises the power of social media to enable Kruger visitors to share the whereabouts of animals with other holiday makers, thus increasing their chances of spotting the diverse wildlife that populates the vast park, especially the Big Five. The teenager said his website was created last year, after one of Ossendryver’s numerous visits to the world-famous game park. “Whenever we came here I used to beg my parents to stop every car passing and ask them what they’d seen. After a while they got irritated, so I was thinking… what’s an easy way of getting people to share their sightings without having to stop every car?”

He said when he returned home, and after two weeks of hard work, he created his first wildlife-tracking iPhone application (app).

 “He was chosen by Treehugger.com, in of a list of 21 kids around the world who will ‘save the world from adults’.”

Ossendryver added many people visit the Kruger National Park for years and never see a leopard, but with the help of his website, they easily spot two or more leopards in one day.

“The members can report movements of any wildlife while scanning the open savannah – except rhino, whose whereabouts are banned from the site due to poaching. It’s a huge problem, there’s poaching more or less everyday,” he added.

His numerous accolades include being named the youngest virtual honorary ranger from South African National Parks.

Ossendryver said Latest Sightings combined social media such as Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, BBM groups, a website and an iPhone app, to inform visitors to the park where interesting animals and birds have just been spotted. “Not yet a year old, Latest Sightings has over 80 000 members in its community, across all the media,” he said.

He added the site had become an integral part of wildlife research for KNP Wild Dogs, the Endangered Wildlife Trust, and the Leopard Identification Project.

In closing the lecture, Hazel Cohen announced that Ossendryver has been made the Eco Ambassador for the Endangered Wildlife Trust. “He was chosen by Treehugger.com, in of a list of 21 kids around the world who will ‘save the world from adults’,” said Cohen.

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