Peter
Thanks for the info on SA.

Steve
I understand the permits take quite a while to be issued in SA, I wonder if the process would be faster(instant) if the PH walked in and picked them up. This seem to be the case in Namibia. In Namibia the only reason for the vet permit is to show the animals were taken from a disease free area. The purpose of the export permit is to show the trophies were taken in a legal(not poached) manner.

The skulls do need three days to be boiled, dipped and dried. Accordind to NPHA rules the skins must dry for 14 days. I only brought back one skin, it was taken early in the hunt. I had to leave my hartebeest there for later shipment, because of their nonremovable horns hartebeest take over a month to dry. I also had to leave the skull of a baboon that I killed one hour before heading for the airport. I had planed to have the hartebeest and baboon skulls shipped back with a zebra rug that was being perpared in Namibia, I decided to hunt with the same outfit this year so they are holding these three trophies until I come back.

There is no rule about "chemical dipping" the only rules are that the trophies must be dry and free of blood, flesh and all bugs and they must have the proper permits from the country they are hunted in. Also they MUST be your own trophies. My trophies were dipped to kill anything that might be on them.

As I stated the permits were easy to get. It took less than one hour to get both permits. My PH had taken me into Windhoek to do a bit of "tourist" type shopping.

As far as the PH not having time, he is being paid to take you for a bit of sight-seeing in the city do you think he minds taking one hour out of his day(he is being paid) to grab two permits?

The USDA may inspect shipments but they did not inspect any of my trophies. A USF&W agent did inspect my trophies and permits as did a customs agent.

I did not mean to imply you don't have personal experience with clearing shipments, I was only asking if you have tried to bring trophies back yourself. I am confident if you had you would agree it is really very simple if you have the correct paperwork.

Having done this one time I am no expert but I feel I have a good grasp in part because a new customs agent was being trained as I brought my trophies through. I was allowed to listen in on the explanation of the rules as the head customs guy trained the newbie. The head agent thanked me for being patient and urged me to voice any questions I might have. One question I asked was if it is "better" if I have my trophies shipped back next time. The answer from Mrs Bossie was that it made no difference but it would save me the cost of shipping and the trouble of going to the coustoms office in San Francisco to clear my trophies if I brought them back as checked baggage again.

If you would like to contact me via email I would be happy to give you Debbie Bossie's contact info. She is the USF&W agent who cleared my trophies.

Jason

[This message has been edited by J Brown (edited 01-28-2002).]

Thanks JB, this is very interesting and informative! All good information here by everyone posting.

------------------
~Ann
Orion Trophy Expeditions

Jason,

I vaguely remember some Outfitter/ or hunter in the western cape of SA I think !! doing a service similar to what you did with your PH in Namibia, he is the only one in SA that I have personally heard of whom might offer the "suitcase safari" as I term it

... I will try to locate the details in my mountains of old emails, and see if I can locate it again for you ..

take care, happy hunting

Peter

Ann

Sorry for highjacking your thread. I am very interested to hear the outcome of your dealings with F&F.

Please keep us posted.

Jason

Perter

I think the outfit you are thinking of is Frontier Safaris.

Jason

Jason,

You got it in ( One ) that is correct, run by MR. Burchall ... the reason they do it ( as on option ) is becuse he does his own taxidermy work and is registered and all the other BS paper work ect ... very few Outfitter Co's do their own taxi work in RSA, as I mentioned in a previous post in this thread, MOST are more interested in guiding and do the actual hunt than that work which they contract out to a registered taxi ... but just shows there are always exceptions to the rule ...

Peter

Jason,
Barry Burchell is one of the very few, like Peter said. I just received a shipment from a client that hunted with him and as always (from Bruchell's) it was in top notch form. Each skin tightly packed, wrapped in plastic with the hunter's name and species on the plastic as well as on permanant tags on the skins.

Better check about those laws again, read the Cities treaty in detail about the international transport of trophy hunted skins. In RSA skins must be dipped, it's the law and no way around it.

Now you tell me that you only brought back one skins and that it was from early in the hunt, hehe. That made all the diference in the world for your PH to get things handled and the skin dry in time. I'd wager he dipped it also, read the Vet clearing documents closely. Horns like Hartebeest, Buff. and Wildebeest may take months to dry, depends on the process used to clean the skull.

Before you fly, please talk to the USDA, US FWS,Customs and the dept. of public health to see what they say. I'd hate to see Anybody get in trouble!

Now when it comes to clearing shipments, The paperwork is a piece of cake. I see no sense in hiring people like F&F whatsoever. All you need to do is fill out a US FWS form 3-177 . As I said before certain species are USDA controlled and must go to a USDA approved faclity for treatment.

This thread was about Brokers that put the screws to us anyway. We should get back to that topic again.

I heard mention of Hecny Transport a few times. I've had customers use them on numerous occasions and not once have had any kind of problems.

Good Luck Annie, we're rooting for ya!

Thanks,
Steve

Just a quick note to end this thread. After receiving Ann's shipment in I have finally been able to read through all of the documents to see what exactly happened and why. Rieser's had done exactly as asked and all documents (including Cities permits)were shown to have the shipment sent as per Ann's instructions to our studio. Ya'll know from Ann's posts what F&F had done, no need to go over that again.

It came to my attention that at one time I had posted about waiting for client's trophies that were in Namibia with Rieser taxidermy. I am happy to say they too arrived safely. I was under the assumption that the dip/pack and airfreight had been paid but turns out it had not, no wonder they had not been shipped.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, I have always been pleased with the way trophies arrive from Rieser's. They do an outstanding job making sure nothing gets dameged on that long trip over. Next time I'm in Namimbia, ya'll know who will be handling my personall stuff.

Good Hunting!
Steve M.

Ann,

Go for it and let us know the outcome. By the way have you received your trophies from Rico Bower.

Rob

Yes Rob, after Nico finished with my trophy prep he sent everything on to Steve via Tracks Freight out of Johanessburg. Nico took payment for his services and made sure the money I sent for the shipper was also delivered. This is the email (very professional) I received once my cargo was shipped. I was able to track its entire journey all the way to that little airport in Minnesota.....
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
DATE: 14 JANUARY 2002

TO: ANN HORSMAN

FROM: MARINDA VAN ROOYEN

RE: SHIPPING DETAILS

1. DEPARTURED JOHANNESBURG INTER-AIRPORT ON AF995 (AIR-FRANCE)

2. AIRWAYBILL NO. 057-2226 3172
.............................................

3. DATE OF DEPARTUR: 13 JANUARY 2002
.....................................

4. PLEASE BE SO KIND AS TO CONFIRM BY FAX
OR TELEPHONE WHETHER THE TROPHIES
ARRIVED SAFELY AND IN GOOD CONDITION,
MUCH APPRECIATED AND THANKING YOU IN
ANTICIPATION.

KIND REGARDS


MARINDA VAN ROOYEN
ASSISTANT TO BOET VAN STADEN
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It just goes to show there are honest people making an honest living out there in the world. I hope everyone has made sure their shipping details are taken care of for this season!

Good hunting.

------------------
~Ann
Orion Trophy Expeditions

I forgot to add that word has it that my shipping ordeal made the NAPHA general meeting. I will try to confirm this and post those findings.

------------------
~Ann
Orion Trophy Expeditions

In light of all these posts about F&F, I was wondering if anyone has any suggestions. I've used F&F a few times in the past, and have thought that their prices were pretty darn high. I'm leaving for RSA on the 29th of this month, and will be having my taxidermy done by Life-Form Taxidermy in South Africa. Any ideas on who, and how I should have my mounts brought into the U.S.?

[This message has been edited by mikeh375 (edited 05-23-2002).]