How are safari guides so good at things like distinguishing the game from the shadows and camouflage of the trees?

How do they spot the mob of birds circling the sky while enthusiastic safari tourists' attention is elsewhere?

It's often the case that safari guides have honed their senses during time spent as a poacher. Many of the tracking skills they learnt earlier in life can be transferred to a new career helping western tourists safely understand the beauty of the African wilderness.

Bill Adams, director and founder of Safari Consultants, a company which provides tailor-made African Safari holidays, is well aware of how local expertise can make educational holiday experiences even more enjoyable. Safari Consultants promote responsible tourism in Africa to help the wildlife survive for future generations to enjoy. They specialise in Kenya, Botswana and Zambia Safaris.

Bill explains that a lot of African tribes' people were at one time hunter-gatherers. A lot of tribes still place great store by retaining these hunter-gatherer skills; skills which are hard to forget as they were learned at an age when most of us were learning to walk!

So how did it come about that poachers began to swap a bow and arrow for a safari suit and binoculars?

Many poachers' way of life began to change in the 1980s – about a decade after safari holidays started to become increasingly popular.

Bill said: "A lot of bush craft experts were employed by commercial backers in order to poach ivory or maybe hunt rhinos. Some of these poachers have ‘turned the corner'; they might have been caught by the security forces or national parks, they might have been friendly with people who ran photographic safaris and come round to a more western way of thinking and evolved into becoming guides."

Guidelines for safari guides

The Safari Consultants director knows how vital it is that guides adhere to rules so that those on safari can enjoy a responsible tourism experience.

He said: "We don't expect guides to crowd animals, harass animals or drive off-road unnecessarily. We expect our guides to pick up litter. If they're driving around and see a plastic bottle they would be expected to pick it up."

Monitoring safari guides

As Safari Consultants use so many safari camps within their African portfolio, each of which employ as many as ten guides, it can be challenging to monitor the quality of service provided by the guides. But the company has found an excellent way of evaluating guides' sense of responsibility.

Bill revealed that that Safari Consultants gets clients to understand the standards it expects regarding responsible tourism.

He said: "When our clients are on holiday they do a lot of the policing for us. When they return we ask them if there were any responsible tourism or environmental issues that we should be aware of and they comment or not as the case may be."

Ex-poachers' rich experience of their surroundings makes for some fascinating anecdotes around the camp fire. Some know what it is like to be charged at by elephants or lunged at by lions – and have the scars to prove it.

Your safari guide does not need to get quite so close to these big game animals now that they protect rather than hunt them!