In June of 2004, I shot a nice Buffalo in Zimbabwe. Planning on having a shoulder mount done, I had the skull and cape shipped to the U.S. In April, I got a call from Coppersmith in Atlanta that the crate had arrived. Since it was a raw skull and cape, it had to be sent to an approved taxidermist for processing. Instead of the one that Coppersmith was going to send it to, I asked to have it shipped to my local taxidermist, who does a lot of African work. Coppersmith called the taxidermist, and checked licenses etc, and shipped the skull and cape to my taxidermist as requested.
Last week, I got a call from an investigator with the Department of Agriculture. They are saying that my taxidermist, who has the proper license, is not registered with veterinary services, an therefore I may have to ship my skull to another taxidermist to have it "processed" prior to being mounted. In addition, I can be fined up to $2,000.00 for allowing this horrible transgretion to occur. The investigator met with me today, and I gave him a picture of my skull at the taxidermist, and he seems to think nothing will come of the whole mess, but what a crock of horseshit to go through!!!!!!. I understand worries with hoof and mouth disease etc, but a dried skull and salted cape, that has been inspected and released by customs should'nt be of great concern. Whatever I kill next week in Tanzania will be mounted "over there", or it can stay there.
On a lighter note, the rest of my goodies from RSA last year made it here this week. They are all mounted etc, and will be here when I get back from Tanzania.

Thanks to everyone here for all of the kind words and well wishes to JudgeG and I on our trip. Right at this moment, he is airborne between Detroit and Amsterdam. I leave Thursday. We will have plenty of pictures, and tales to tell I'm sure.

Dale: Sorry to hear about the mess. Can't you just arrest them? I'm with you on taxidermy. I had my stuff done in RSA and they turned out great and now my buffalo and other varmints are going to the same taxidermist in RSA. Good luck buddy, when you see Ernest, please send him my very best and a kiss from my better half. God luck! jorge

Goes to show even on this side of the pond we are not safe from officialdom.
Good luck on your hunt and keep the judge out of the sundowners.

1115, if any of us gets sick on a hamburger, we are going to blame you!

Jorge, Blacktailer, 500grains,

I will give him your best, but kisses are not an option, especially after a few sudowners that I cannot, under any stretch of the imagination (you shoulda seen what he did to a really good bottle of bourbon at my house last night) keep him away from, and he ate a steak as big as his butt cheeks (trust me, big steak), and didn't keel over from it, so I guess I haven't poisoned the environment with previously unkown bacilli from Zim.
I'll be glad to get to Tanzania on Friday, so I ain't gotta worry 'bout the U.S. Gummint, and there bullshit for 7 fun filled days chasing Mbogo.

Jorge,
When the rest of my stuff is delivered and hung, there will be another party with beef brisket and other goodies. Bring your wife this time.

Well Dale, we'll be looking forward to that get-together and I promise another bottle of single malt! have a wonderful time. jorge

One of the big complaints about hunting RSA is the cost of pack and dip. It runs about 50 bucks an animal and 125 bucks for the paperwork for the whole shipment. Plus maybe another 40-50 bucks for the messenger service to deliver the papers to the veternary office.

It is an additional expense and a kind of a pain in the ass due to the additional requirements that RSA puts on the visiting hunter. However they do meet the legal requirements for import to any taxidermist (except swine and primates, they require agri permits).

I know at one time the dip pack company in Pretoria had several dozen Buffalo from Zimbabwe that were missing portions of the paperwork and could not be shipped. Andreas told me he did not expect Zim to ever provide the proper paperwork and that these hunters would not liklely ever see their trophies in the USA.

I also know people hunting in Namiba were just shipping trophies to themselves or packing them in a box as luggage. Most cleared customs and federal F&W in Atlanta without a problem. Then a few had the boxes siezed and many of those have to this day never been able to get their trophies from US customs. The paperwork from Namibia was never sent, never existed, or was not handled properly.

RSA is a very strict country where the paperwork and process is concerned. But they also want to be as near 100% certain that the exported trophys are trouble free and meet the requirments of the US government. The last thing they want is to have all trophys turned away much like the USA did to Canada where importing meat and trophys is concerned the last few years when the Mad cow issue came up.

Imagine the devistation to the RSA economy with the loss of hundreds hunters if not thousands of hunters a year,.... the minute the US F&W shuts down trophy imports from RSA. This will happen in Zim or Namibia eventually because of the lack of effort from those countries in the export process. Just wait and see when a crate of trophys arrives and it has some contagious problem! I hate the idea of the dip pack expense, but I also think in the long run it will save RSA from a serious event.