Poachers decimate Zimbabwe's wildlife
Sunday Tribune (SA)
Date posted:Mon 17-Dec-2007
Date published:Sun 16-Dec-2007



Many former wildlife protectors are now their trigger-happy assailants

Myrtle Ryan and Eleanor Momberg

A radical increase in poaching of Zimbabwe's beleaguered wildlife recently has seen a new twist: many former wildlife protectors are now their trigger-happy assailants. Rhino numbers, in particular, are plummeting. Johnny Rodrigues, Chairman of the Zimbabwe Conservation Task Force, said 12 rhino had been killed in the past three months. They included three black rhino (one due to give birth within a week) gunned down by men in military uniform at Imire Safari Ranch at Wedza; a mother and her calf shot in the Hwange National Park; three white rhino shot in the Mazoe area; and two black rhino shot by poachers in Chiredzi. In a follow-up operation at Chiredzi, parks staff recovered camping equipment, a rifle and a rhino horn. "It has been reported that a rhino in a pen at Shearwater Adventures, in Victoria Falls, has also died, but we don't have the details," said Rodrigues.

About years ago, there were more than 40 rhino in Matusadonna Game Reserve. "Last week, it was reported that there are only six left," Rodriguez said. "Midlands Conservancy had 56 rhino. The last we heard about a year ago is that they are left with only 21. The others were shot. Bullets from AK-47s were found in their bodies." Rodrigues said that the organisation had recently received a report of canned hunting 15km from Kwe Kwe. It appears three lion hunts were sold for $25 000 (R172 000) each. In addition, it had received numerous reports of elephants being shot - so many that there was a "silent cull" taking place. "We believe the hunting quota of 500 elephants a year has now been increased to 1 000. We recently received a report from an investigator who saw about 900 elephant carcasses from the air in Chisarira National Park. He said there were more carcasses than live animals," said Rodrigues.

A tourist visiting Hwange National Park in November reported seeing three elephant carcasses and a foetus in the Robins Camp area. The foetus was untouched, but the adult carcasses had been cut up and the meat stripped from the bones. He said chronic food shortages in Zimbabwe were driving people to behave like barbarians. He told of the death at Kariba of one of the residents' favourite elephants, "Short Trunk" - so named because the tip of his trunk was missing because of a snare. Rodrigues said Short Trunk had been walking along the main road when a group of 30 local residents started stoning him. The elephant panicked and ran down the embankment, off the tar road, stumbled and fell into a shallow gully. He was unable to get up. The locals continued to stone him until a woman arrived on the scene and called for help. A group of rescuers arrived and tried to push Short Trunk up, but their efforts were in vain.

"By this time, he was extremely stressed and traumatised. The helpers tried to keep him cool by pouring buckets of water over him. All the while, his tormentors were squatting on their haunches nearby, waiting for him to die so they could take the meat," said Rodrigues. As it was too late to do anything further, they left the elephant there for the night with National Parks guards watching over him. "The helpers returned early the following morning and tried to pull him up with a Land Rover, using a rope tied to his tusk and foot, but that didn't work, so they called for a front-end loader.Two younger elephants stood nearby, as if to keep him company and give him moral support. While waiting for the front end loader to arrive, Short Trunk gradually grew weaker and then died just as it (the loader) arrived," said Rodrigues.

Meanwhile, a poacher was shot dead by Kruger National Park rangers on Friday morning, less than a month after two others were arrested as they had tried to flee across the border to Mozambique. Raymond Travers, a park spokesman, said the poacher had been killed in a shootout in the Stolsnek section, between Pretoriuskop and Berg-endal in the south-west of the park. The poachers had walked into a ranger patrol shortly after midnight. Rangers had increased their patrols after two rhino carcasses were found in the area two weeks ago. "In the fire-fight, one poacher was killed. Follow-up operations are being conducted in the area in concert with police to find the rest of the group," Travers said. Various weapons, including a modified hunting rifle, a home-made shotgun, spotlights and camouflage uniforms were confiscated by police after the shooting.

This Rodrigues guy is an alarmist tree-hugger. Yes, there is poaching in Zim, and yes in areas it is very serious. Most of the private ranches that were taken have been poached badly or overhunted by their new landlords out to make a quick buck. But as anyone who has been to Save or Bubiana (Lemco) will tell you, there is tons of PG in Zim if you know where to go. For the record, there are about 400 farms that are still in original hands and the game on these is reasonably well protected.

In the government concession areas, nothing has changed. There are plenty of buffalo, if anything too many elephant, lion are coming back, leopard are always there, and the usual complement of PG can be found.

Rhino have unfortunately taken it very hard in Zim...but this is nothing new. Frankly, I didn't know there were any left in Zim...I was led to believe the last Zambezi Valley Rhino were exported to Australia by the Parks Dept.

Guys, Rodrigues has an agenda. He has to raise money and he wants to stop all hunting. (That would be a really dumb move from a conservation standpoint).