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This episode is a conversation with Matt Shirley, a conservation scientist with a particular passion for and interest in crocodiles. I met Matt on a shoot, where he was the animal expert and I was brought in to deal with some pretty challenging technical problems, in order to capture crocodile behaviour which had not only never been filmed but had never even been observed in the wild before. Unfortunately, I can’t say any more as we are signed up to an NDA…. So I got to know Matt on a long journey into the jungle of Gabon, it took us 11 days to go from Libreville (the capital) to the point where we could record on camera. Matt’s expertise and knowledge of the local conditions and people were formidable. A child-hood passion for reptiles led him to work with crocodiles, but Matt also works on pangolins and forest-dwelling tortoises, primarily in the forests of West Africa. His research has led to the recognition of 3 new crocodile species. However, it is his work as a conservation scientist which I found most fascinating. The work he has done and the conclusions he has drawn, might be uncomfortable for Western observers who passionately want to protect and save all individuals from under-pressure species. Yet, for anyone who has spent time and worked in those challenged eco-systems and been confronted by the poverty of the people trying to survive within or alongside them, it is hard not to see the sense in positions that advocate meaningful management rather than preservation at all costs. In particular, Matt discusses the example of the American Alligator, which was almost extinct by the 1950s, but recovered so well there are now millions of them across the Southern States. It was a story I had never heard and one which upsets many preconceptions about how to save species.