Please can someone from Zim explain how the ration hunts work (Elephant & Buffalo), what areas they are allowed in, how they are supposed to be conducted and who may or may not offer them

Thanks

I don't know how ration hunts work for elephant and buffalo, but last time I was in the Save Conservancy, I was asked if I wanted to shoot cull impala for the game scout camp between Hammond and Senuko. Since I was going to shoot leopard bait anyway, I, of course, jumped at the opportunity to do some "practice" shooting at game. I ended up killing 12 young male impala for a very appreciative group of families.

The only problem was I didn't bring much ammo for my plains game rifle (.300 Winnie) and I had to conserve what I had left after the cull to make sure I had enough for leopard and plains game targets of opportunity. I ended the hunt with eight extra rounds, which I gave to my PH.

Safari areas for the last 3 years have been issued with a ration quota that Parks has asked the operators to sell. If they did not then Parks would offer those to other individuals. Needless to say the Operators in their areas sold the ration quota as they did not want any "Tom Dick or Harry" hunting in their areas. Most times there is NO profit in these hunts but it is necessary for operators to take it "on the chin" so as to maintain control of their areas.

The ration quota is non trophy eles and non trophy buff and a few plains game and odd hippo where there are hippos. We at CMS decided that NON trophy eles should be ele cows as we feel that the bulls have been subjected to hard hunting for many years and feel that the trophy bull quota is too high anyway.

After having aged all our ele bulls for the last 5 odd years and having found that the oldest bull is 40 years old we felt that there are no "old non trophy bulls' and shooting young bulls would affect our future trophies. That was the main reason behind deciding to shoot cows instead of bulls and we feel that this policy should be through out the country with the exception of possibly areas adjacent to Wankie National Parks.

On the Buff side we sold only 2 of our 5 non ration buff just to keep Parks happy- we feel that buff numbers in the whole Valley need to build up and if we had our way we would not shoot any.

Despite been told to sell our Ration quota at the begging of the year the quota has not been signed off by the Director general so as we talk there are no ration quotas BUT we think that will change any moment now and be signed in. Hope that helps! Cheers Buzz

Good explanation Buzz. The ration Ele I took with Alan in 2012 was a Chewore South tusked cow with Chifuti Safaris. I agree with your evaluation that ration Ele need to be cows, with the possible exception of a bull with broken tusks near the lip line.

quote:

Originally posted by LionHunter:
I agree with your evaluation that ration Ele need to be cows, with the possible exception of a bull with broken tusks near the lip line.

I'm not trying to start anything, but don't you run the risk that bull may have genes for 60+ pounds? It's not like a whitetail or other antlered animal that will likely regrow any broken tines. This is more for educational purposes, as I have not seen an elephant in the wild.

I understand your question.

Consider why he would have tusks broken high near the base where it enters the Elephants head? There are all sorts of possibilities and at least one is that he had very brittle or thin ivory with large nerves, which will break much more easily than thick ivory with small nerves. Is this a genetic issue? I think it is but I'm not an Elephant biologist. I have, however, been watching them in 8 sub-Saharan African countries on an annual basis for the past 20 years. I've taken many photos and killed my first bull in 1998 and this September I will be hunting the fourth in the past 4 years. Elephants are about all that I hunt in Africa anymore and if I couldn't hunt one I probably wouldn't go over, as I have taken almost everything else that interests me.

BTW, if your theory was followed, nobody would ever shoot an Elephant bull under 60 pounds for fear of removing a potential benefit to the gene pool. Nature and hunting just don't work that way. I'd wager that most one time Elephant hunters take an Ele between 35-55 pounds.