Hi,

I understand some of you guys here at the forum have been hunting for elephant and I was curios about how and if the meat is taken care of. I realize of course the logistics problem of getting an ele out of the bush, but still, thats a lot of meat lying there..

Best Regards

Check out this thread:
Come And Get It! Or, What Happens After An Elephant Is Killed...(Lots of Photos)

-Bob F.

This probably should go in the humor forum, but please forgive me, it seemed appropriate.

The hunter decided to take a few days before his safari and do some sightseeing. Getting hungry, he stopped in a small restaurant. As he is sitting at his table, he sees a covered dish served to the person at the next table. The cover is removed with a flourish and there are two humongous round pieces of meat!
The waiter comes and asks for his order. He immediately says, "I'll have what that gentlman is having."
The waiter informs him that this is a special dish, Elephant "Oysters," and not available every day. He has heard that, tomorrow, a new serving will be available. The man agrees to come back the next day for that specialty.
The next day the visiting hunter appears at the restaurant, very hungry, and sits down. The waiter sees him tells him his order will be ready in 15 minutes.
The time passes; the dish arrives. With a deft swirl, the waiter removes the silver cover and reveals to small pieces of meat, about the size of large marbles.
"What is this?" the hunter inquires.
"Ahh, but you do not understand," the waiter says. "Sometimes the hunter is not a good shot and the Elephant wins."

No problem...takes about 4 HRS and nothing is left but the blood!

Roscoe's right. In my case, they even swept over the bloody areas with branches so no one would even know what happened in that particular spot. A sort of, "Leave No Trace" as the Boy Scouts would say.

KJL,
To be specific. After hunting the elephant and taking the photos in the Mamili Reserve at the bottom of the Caprivi Stip in Namibia, I cut the tail off for trophy and to enjoy as elephant tail stew the next night (Our hunting vehicle a refurbished South African military transport truck (SAMIL) had a freezer.) We then drove over to Malengalenga village that is on the north edge of the Reserve, and the village chief named a dozen men as the harvest team. I paid for gasoline or diesel (can't recall) for the school principle's pickup and we headed back. The team arrived in early afternoon and spent 24 hours taking out what must have been 2,000 kg of elephant chunks. My PH, Ken Morris, did some repairs on knife wounds from overeager butchers. Had some delicious grilled elephant at breakfast the next morning when we returned to help turn the beast over and eventually to shuttle back home members of the team and the last load of elephant.
The elephant tail stew was delicious, cooked in a cast iron pot (poikekus sp?). We also took a chunk of filet about three feet long and seven inches or so in diameter. If you have cooked a pot roast of beef, you'll recall that when it's done, the beef fibers tend to separate. Elephant also does that only the individual fibers are about three times the size of beef. It's a coarse meat, can be tough, but is very flavorful.
Regards, tim

Tim,
you talk about the filet...I was amazed at how small the Back Strap was on Elephant. I expected the mother load of all straps....I bet it was less meat than cattle. As for eating, we had the cheek meat...I will stick to Eland!

It took three hours from start to finish with an experienced recovery team and four and a half with a less experienced team. Very little is left. Even the leg bones were taken. A happy, singing, joking crew! While there was the big comunal pile everyone had their own stash too, even the game scout.

I also had elephant stew made from meat from the cheek. I thought it was excellent. The PH told me that the cook must like me because he stewed it an extra day!

JPK

Thanks guys for the info and great stories!