SA OKs culling of elephants
25/02/2008 13:37 - (SA)


Pretoria - South Africa says it will allow the culling of elephants for the first time since 1994.

In a government statement given to reporters on Monday, culling elephants is described as one way of managing growing populations.

The government had banned culling in 1994. South Africa's elephant population has ballooned from 8 000 in 1994 to more than 20 000 today.

The policy becomes official on Friday.

It's desperately needed, but I'll believe it when I see it.......This is the umpteenth time they've made that announcement but it always gets cancelled at the last minute.

I seriously doubt that will take place...especially not in photo safari capital RSA. It's not politically correct but it's desperately needed and RSA is the last place I would expect to see it. Many places need it far more than them anyway.

Might be something to it, hopefully anyhow, love who they chose to quote in this article, seems a bit biased to me.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080225/ap_on_re_af/south_africa_elephants

I quote..."She argued that when elephants are killed, the herd automatically breeds more, and other elephants move into the space of the slain elephants, resulting in a larger population than before the killing." That's magical.

She should move to the States and run for presidency on a ticket of "hope".

All of Africa needs culling of humans, goats, cattle and donkeys, but I don't see much progress in that area.

quote:

Originally posted by 500grains:
All of Africa needs culling of humans, goats, cattle and donkeys, but I don't see much progress in that area.

i think AIDS will ultimately provide for the "CULLING" of humans- if someone is too stupid to use a condom, evolution will remove the "stupid" gene from the population, given a little time. sorry for the off-topic comment, just my opinion.

quote:

Originally posted by yukon delta:
I quote..."She argued that when elephants are killed, the herd automatically breeds more, and other elephants move into the space of the slain elephants, resulting in a larger population than before the killing." That's magical.

She should move to the States and run for presidency on a ticket of "hope".

This qoute makes me think of a story i heard. the farmers in the Karoo called a meeting to discuss the pac jackals that kills thousands of sheep every year. Everybody was there nature conservation, ph ,outfitter, the minister and every Johnnie and his dog .

after hours of discussion a jong pale white lady got up she represented the greenies and said "why dont you catch them and kastrate them"
an old man with a big red beard got up and said "young lady you dont understand the jackal doesnt SCREW the sheep they kill and eat them"

He has a good point! Do I want to know what a "jong pale white lady" is? Not really...

Yukon i think they look like this only a bit more fustrated and stiff(imagine a carrot in their backsides)

Thanks a lot...my wife happened to be looking over my shoulder when this photo loaded. That's nasty...uh, the photo that is. I think she thought it was real.

quote:

Originally posted by 375 fanatic:
Yukon i think they look like this only a bit more fustrated and stiff(imagine a carrot in their backsides)

Tell her that they make nice handbags, Yukon

quote:

Originally posted by 375 fanatic:

quote:

Originally posted by yukon delta:
I quote..."She argued that when elephants are killed, the herd automatically breeds more, and other elephants move into the space of the slain elephants, resulting in a larger population than before the killing." That's magical.

She should move to the States and run for presidency on a ticket of "hope".

This qoute makes me think of a story i heard. the farmers in the Karoo called a meeting to discuss the pac jackals that kills thousands of sheep every year. Everybody was there nature conservation, ph ,outfitter, the minister and every Johnnie and his dog .

after hours of discussion a jong pale white lady got up she represented the greenies and said "why dont you catch them and kastrate them"
an old man with a big red beard got up and said "young lady you dont understand the jackal doesnt SCREW the sheep they kill and eat them"

Seems logical to me that they could cull them at much less cost, and a much greater gain to the economy by lowering the trophy fees and letting carefully vetted PHs take clients into where they needed to be, including the parks. It might take a year or three but the results would be the same. Which is better, getting thousands of dollars into the economy allowing someone to hunt elephants, or paying someone to fly around in a helicopter and shoot them?

Although the thought of using hunters to do this sounds like a good idea, there are many problems with this approach. From my understanding, the goal is to reduce the populations as quickly as possible (whole family groups in a matter of minutes)and then process them as quickly as possible. This is a hell of a lot of work. It requires very experienced people working in well organized teams. It does not resemble recreation in any way. There are some situations where hunting can be used as a tool with good results and great benefits -there are other situations where it is not the best choice. The logistics, liabilty, image, and efficiency would all be compromised if foreign hunters were brought in to do this IMO.

Those interested might like to read Ron Thomson's books such as Mahohoba, The Wildlife Game, A Game Rangers Report and Managing our Wildlife Heritage, where Ron discusses Elephant control principles and methods at length and explains why sport hunting of bulls and culling by professional culling teams is to be encouraged. All ofthe books are great reads and well worth the money.

Incidentally, I note that the press release I saw last night said they were going to cull from Monday, by this morning the news said they start in May......... I'd bet the cull will be postponed yet again.

Adding to my previous post, I looked at the e Times newspaper this morning and at the end of the article about the possible cull, there were about 15 or 20 comments posted by readers. All but 2 of them supported the cull or at least said leave it to the experts on the ground to make the decision........