http://www.news24.com/Columnis...the-killing-20160627

Andreas Wilson-Späth

I’ve never understood the appeal of trophy hunting. You love wild animals so much that you want to kill them, stuff them, pop glass marbles into their eye sockets and display them above the lounge mantelpiece? You’re trying to impress others with your sharp-shooting prowess by installing a macabre menagerie of the fearsome beasts you’ve “bagged” in your pool house? I don’t get it.

I guess I could come up with a plausible pop-psychology explanation. Something to do with a primordial killer instinct dating back to our hunter-gatherer ancestors, our innate pseudo-religious or pseudo-Darwinian need to dominate nature, or just the satisfaction that comes from collecting lots of pretty things. Perhaps some people derive a certain dark satisfaction from being able to legally put a bullet through another living creature’s heart and seeing the life seep out of it in a trickle of blood.

Alternatively, I guess, we could simply dismiss this bloody pastime as a distraction for the seriously rich who lack the imagination to find other things to do with their time and money. But how big a hobby is trophy hunting actually? How many animals get shot for the express purpose of being turned into supposedly decorative display pieces? And what role does South Africa play in this business?

The answers may shock you even if you’re not particularly squeamish about the idea of killing animals for sport.

Earlier this month, the International Fund for Animal Welfare published a report, titled ‘Killing for Trophies’, in which the global wild animal trophy trade between 2004 and 2014 is analysed on the basis of data collected by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

During that decade around 1.7 million hunting trophies were traded between over 100 different countries. Of these, at least 200 000 came from threatened animal species. All of this, by the way, is perfectly legal and in line with CITES regulations. The size of the black market in animal trophies is unknown.

US citizens are the keenest trophy hunters on the planet. Twenty countries account for 97% of all trophy imports, with a massive 71% (over 150,000 trophies) going to the USA. Germany and Spain occupy a distant second/third position at 5% each, while South Africa is fourth with 6460 imported trophies.

The highest ranking trophy exporting country is Canada, with a 35% share of the global trade (68,899 trophies, most of them American black bears going to the USA). South Africa comes in second (23% or 44 700 trophies) and Namibia third (11% or 22 394 trophies).

Of the top 20 trophy exporting nations, half are in Africa.

African elephants and leopards are among the top six most traded trophies from threatened animal species (more than 10 000 trophies each), but the greatest increase has occurred in the trading of African lion trophies (at least 11 000 between 2004 and 2013). No doubt this is chiefly the result of South Africa’s large industry of breeding lions in captivity specifically for the trophy hunting market.

The report confirms South Africa as by far and away the biggest exporter of trophies ‘harvested’ from captive-bred animals – a total of 7663, which is a huge number when compared to the next highest, that for the USA at only 327. The South African figure includes predominantly lions (5 253), but also other rare species, such as Lechwe (1 099).

There can be little doubt that trophy hunting is almost exclusively a pursuit of the super-rich. The report notes that in South Africa, hunters pay between US$15,000 and 35,000 for shooting a leopard, $8,500 – 50 000 for a lion and $25 000 – 60 000 for an elephant. Walter Palmer, the American dentist who infamously killed Cecil the lion in Zimbabwe last year reportedly paid $54,000 for the privilege.

Trophy hunters will claim that there is absolutely nothing wrong with any of this, that it’s simple market economics and that their activities provide much needed money for wildlife conservation. In essence, they argue that you need to sacrifice a few prime animals to the bullets of the wealthy in order to save the rest from extinction.

That’s some pretty warped logic as far as I’m concerned. If we truly value indigenous animals and want to make sure that they’ll be around for our grandchildren’s grandchildren to see in the wild, we’ll find funding that doesn’t require us to turn them into ghoulish stuffed displays for the creepy pleasure of a tiny minority.

- Andreas is a freelance writer with a PhD in geochemistry. Follow him on Twitter: @Andreas_Spath

Disclaimer: News24 encourages freedom of speech and the expression of diverse views. The views of columnists published on News24 are therefore their own and do not necessarily represent the views of News24.

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If we truly value indigenous animals and want to make sure that they’ll be around for our grandchildren’s grandchildren to see in the wild, we’ll find funding that doesn’t require us to turn them into ghoulish stuffed displays for the creepy pleasure of a tiny minority.

Perhaps he will share with us where the conservation dollars are going to come from "to make sure that [indigenous animals] will be around for our grandchildren's grandchildren to see in the wild" and how to address the rapidly dwindling habitat for wild animals due to a burgeoning human population. I will not hold my breath. He does not "get it" simply because he has decided not to try and "get it".

Still waiting

Pajama Boy

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There can be little doubt that trophy hunting is almost exclusively a pursuit of the super-rich

Bollocks. Typical know-it-all (over educated with little practical experience).

I once had a PHD subbornly insist that free roaming "brown bears" live in upstate New York. I tried to explain that they were not "brown bears" as in grizzly bears, but rather brown color phases of black bears. Unfortunately his "education" trumped any logic I could provide.

I've been to Africa twice on trophy hunts. Two cape buffalo and one elephant. I guess I need to inform my wife that we are "super rich".

For people who hunt, taking trophy animals, especially Dangerous Game, is the pinnacle of big-game hunting. More to do, with testing oneself and re-living the romance of an earlier era, than anything else IMO.

But I am not a PHD, I only have a BS in Computer Science.

BH63

Just another Pillow Biter with a Blog....
Long on verbal diarrhea... Short on substance or solutions to their own self created problems
Liberals can't come to grip with their own paradox of demanding rights...unless they don't agree with you're rights...then F U ....your rights must be taken away because they don't agree

Citing IFAW to imply credibility is like quoting Charles Ponzi on finance or Hillary Clinton on ethics. But, good to post and discuss.

These are the same clowns that will sit down to a dinner of veal roberto, drinking fine wine from a vineyard that displaces thousands of acres of wildlife habitat, drives an SUV that gets 11 mpg, and get all snooty when they see a person who hunts, while remaining myopically silent when they pass a bulldozer clearing land for more McMansions that house at the most, 2 or 3 people. The hypocrisy of these people stuns me. The enemy of wildlife is not the hunter, it is the know nothing blowhards like this who pass judgment on hunting while knowing nothing about it.

With the answers posted above I can think of nothing to add above saying animal rights folks are simply brain dead as far as conservation is concerned!

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Buffhunter63,
In reference to the PHD you refered to, that is called the Peter Principal. That is when a person is educated beyond their intelligence level. Very common at this point in time.

Hi website contact email is dead. Cannot send him my response.

Anyone know how to communicate with this guy?

Waste of breath and ink
They don't listen they don't care

I always ask these sorts just how much money they have contributed to conservation..I also assume the people he associates with do not eat trophy animals...I believe in trophy hunting as a method of conservation, making room for the up and coming animals and using the older ones, same as I have done of years in the ranching business and so do the folks that put food on this persons table..Its the same old story, uninformed ignorant people that don't even bother to seek the truth, just operate on misplaced emotions. Its silly and been around for ever..Best ignored.

"Tiny minority." Funny, we're ALL supposed to not only accept, but celebrate (constantly, ad nauseum) another, tiny minority.

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macabre menagerie of the fearsome beasts you’ve “bagged” in your pool house? I don’t get it.

Obviously afflicted by a gross imbalance of estrogen...