I'm going to address this before anything else.

quote:

Then please tell me now honestly that you are not Liz mentioned in this blog piece from Lion Aid.

"Do take the time to read the Accuratereloading entries while sitting at your next airport. And do consider the wonderful world of conservation hunting as is revealed. Thanks to a wonderful LionAid supporter who digs in muck on our behalf, if I was Liz you would have an OBE.

Lion Aid Blog

The LIZ mentioned in that piece would be our queen elizabeth who gives out OBE's (a medal), so in answer no i am definately not LIZ.

Lion Aid were aware of AR way before i came here and had a blog about something here on their facebook profile. One of the AR members started a thread about it.

http://forums.accuratereloadin...1002751/m/2471066361

Now after conversing a little with the AR member in question on that facebook page i decided to come here and learn a little more about the other side of the fence so to speak.

As for the blog in question you have mentioned, well Lion Aid were aware of you before i came along, your forums are public, anyone can participate and read the threads here.

I have read the thread in question and of course the blog but i did not write it nor did i have anything to do with it.

Let's be honest here, if i was here to cause trouble for the hunting community there are far better and easier ways i could have done it.
We all know that the average joe public are outraged by pics of hunters with their kill, would be outraged by pics as they would see it bragging about their trophy rooms and the occasional tale of unethical kills. The ingredients for articles on all of those are here. And before you jump down my throat and say there are no tales of unethical anything, there are if you put a slight spin on things which you (generic) claim happens quite often. I have also seen proof of this recently with a story about a wolf/bear hunting judge, i know it happens.

Now yes i am a writer but i have not written anything on my discussions with people here, in fact i have written nothing about wildlife conservation yet other than a piece about a wildlife park here in the UK that rescued some lions from a romanian zoo which was not published.
If i was to write something it would be a debate piece, putting forth both sides of the article, but i have no foreseeable plans to do so.
See ultimately the problem for me is that the average joe public is not aware of your side of the conservation debate. There are plenty of articles out there supporting the antis and these are the pieces that make it into the papers but the hunting community remains quiet.
As a community you will not garner support by staying quiet, the public deserves to have both sides of the story. I know others have said in a different thread that it leads to abuse by antis but are you really that thin skinned? Surely the most important thing is to get your message out there and be heard. Believe you me the antis get abuse too and have even been attacked over here when the fox hunting debate was at its ugliest.
I think we can all agree that the conservation of species is the most important thing here, we believe it or not share a common goal. I want what is best and i will support what is best with all my heart.
This site has been extremely useful to me and has helped changed my attitude towards hunting immensely. If you dont believe me read my other thread.

http://forums.accuratereloadin...1002751/m/8981092461

There really is very little more i can say on this off topic discussion. If you continue to converse with me i thank you but if you dont wish to then i thank you for your discussion before but ask if you will bow out and not throw accusations at me that you cannot possibly know are truth.

The problem I have with your thread is that you list up some very doubtful claims that you demand the AR members to prove that they are wrong. And if we can't bring proves of them being wrong, it must be the truth.

That is not trying to get knowledge at all, that is just trying to win a discussion by bringing fiction to the table.

I can claim that aliens are visiting our planet all the time(some people really believe that) and since you can't prove that aliens are not visiting us, then I must be telling the truth.

How can any of us prove that Kenya is or is not earning that much money on photo tourists?
I am sure that minimum 99% of the government in Kenya have no idea about how much money photo tourists leave behind in Kenya. Most likely no one has any idea at all of how much is left behind because of the immense corruption in Kenya.

The really interesting question when you make Kenya a part of the question if big game hunting in Africa is economically useless or useful is how much money could Kenya make if they opened up for trophy hunting.
How much money could they make out of that and how many jobs could that make compared to the photo tourism in Kenya today?
Would that make an impact on the wild animal population in Kenya?
Increase or a decrease?
What would that do to poaching in Kenya?
How much very much needed protein would the Kenyan population get by having trophy hunting in their country?

Without considering that, then Kenya is totally uninteresting in the discussion if big game hunting in Africa is economically useless or useful.

Norwegianwoods

A very sensible and logic way of thinking you have. Even if I wanted to, I could not say it better!

quote:

I know many people who go on safari and not one of them would go for under 14 days. They are all brits, i didn't claim to know what americans or any other nationality does.

Once again, applying your very narrow sample of experience from friends etc to all the British travelers. While you are at it why not just sum up the world?

You have shown beyond doubt that you are quite simply irresponsible in the way you sprout forth supposed facts based on what you want to think, not even remotely related to any truth.

Jolougueburn, you are not here to learn, you are here to argue. Which as it turns out you are not very good at either.

Even if she were here to learn, what does she plan on doing with the knowledge?

No Jo, I am not implying you are a mole for Lion's Aid or some other group. What I am saying is you came here as an "anti-hunting" person, self proclaimed.

Supposing you learn we are not the dark force what are you going to do with the information?

1) There is a great article demonstrating the negative impact of tourists on the environment per dollar spent. So it is LESS SUSTAINABLE to bring 10 people with cameras than on hunter.

2) The article does not grasp the fact that photo tourists go to Kenya, best areas of Tanzania and Botswana and that the Zambezi Valley and many other areas of monotonous bush would be completely. So the 200 million come where the 840 million WOULD NEVER COME.

3) The article forgets to say that each hunting party is an "armed wildlife protection patrol", curbing poaching. The economic impact of hunting in this fashion is just phenomenal. Just use the amount of money asked by the "protectionists in kenya" (my quote) to understand this economic effect. But these hunters "work" and pay at the same time.

4) There is a spiritual and ethical concept that is also not appreciated. Money is not all!!!!! When bushmeat from organized hunting is shared according to the culture and rituals of the native Africans, this is ethically correct. People embrace the laws. You can find enough money to pay a rancher in Montana if one of his colts is eaten by a wolf, but he will shoot that wolf every time he comes in to eat one of his horses, the reimbursement is not all.

5) Please read:
SELOUS GAME RESERVE
DEVELOPMENT OF CBC IN THE BUFFER ZONE
FACTS AND FIGURES
By Rudolf Hahn and David Kaggi

6) Buffer zones are places where tourism is just about impossible to be implemented. But hunting can be of enormous value. Adding money to what is made in the core areas.

Dante

Here's a twist.

Let's presume:

a) Kenya does have 1M tourists a year.

b) Everyone of those 1M tourists are ALL doing photo safaris and NONE of them are just visiting family/friends, religious sites, beaches etc.

c) All of those photo safari tourists generate a total of $1B USD (I know they only claim $850M, just being generous)

d) Photo safari tourists all take commercially organized tours and those are generally restricted to National Parks and Reserves - according to the Kenya Tourism web site there are currently 30 total Parks, Reserves and Sanctuaries.

e) All of these Parks require tourists to use vehicles to "tour" the park, plus they have to use vehicles to get from Nairobi to all of these parks and all of these vehicles consume OIL/FUEL!

If all of those presumptions are taken as FACT then I am willing to bet that $1000 per photo safari tourist doesn't cover the carbon offset/foot print nor the environmental impact they are causing to the park. Not to mention all the nasty carbon those nasty airplanes are generating hauling their butts.

Conclusion - Hunters should band together and advocate a "green tax" on all photo safari tourists of say $5000 USD per person to offset the environmental impact they are causing and to repair the tree/grass loss due to the certainty of acid rain caused buy all the pollution and greenhouse gases from the vehicles and that is falling in Kenya and depleting the food supply for the animals. All this pollution caused by all these photo safaris is therefore what is causing the falling animal populations in Kenya.

After all, it is impossible to be caused by "hunters" because "hunting" has been outlawed in Kenya for 30+ years.



Just trying to be helpful.

Actually, there ARE groups within Kenya, some of them representing regions there, that are very much interested in the economic contributions that restoration of hunting would afford. They believe that those benefits would be huge and are important means of utilizing marginal land. See the study I cited above.

The media does cover these studies, but political forces have stakes in not responding.

quote:

Originally posted by Norwegianwoods:
...
How can any of us prove that Kenya is or is not earning that much money on photo tourists?
I am sure that minimum 99% of the government in Kenya have no idea about how much money photo tourists leave behind in Kenya. Most likely no one has any idea at all of how much is left behind because of the immense corruption in Kenya.

The really interesting question when you make Kenya a part of the question if big game hunting in Africa is economically useless or useful is how much money could Kenya make if they opened up for trophy hunting.
How much money could they make out of that and how many jobs could that make compared to the photo tourism in Kenya today?
Would that make an impact on the wild animal population in Kenya?
Increase or a decrease?
What would that do to poaching in Kenya?
How much very much needed protein would the Kenyan population get by having trophy hunting in their country?

Without considering that, then Kenya is totally uninteresting in the discussion if big game hunting in Africa is economically useless or useful.

I get the feeling we are actually dealing with a fifteen year old female troll who has watched too many Disney episodes on TV...

Honest to God Rich, after reading this regarding circumcision:

quote:

Originally posted by Idaho Sharpshooter:
I would bet you a Yankee Doolar it would be even more effective on women...

For my "Yankee Doolar" Jolouburn is more mature, inquisitive and discerning than you.

I would rather have people like her on our side than people who feel the need to show their stupidity every chance they get.

David Hulme,

quote:

Fantastic responses, well done hunters! Thank you Jolo, you have done me a service here - this thread provides more than enough hard fact for a critical response to this ridiculous IUCN report which certain people in other groups have asked me to put together. I don't expect any major headway to be made by doing so - some positive comment from those who are not blindfolded, and nothing at all from those who contribute nothing at all to conservation with their uncompromising stance, as usual... But I believe it is important to get the REAL TRUTH out there anyway...

Good luck with the article. Perhaps we could read it at some point.

Saeed,

quote:

I can tell you with absolute certainty, that no matter how many immature animals are killed accidentaly by hunters, they come nowhere near as many as killed by poachers.

I would hazzard a guess that hunters kill less than 1% compared to what the poachers kill.

And the sad part is the governments in some countries are not doing enough about.

And they add insult to injury, by not allowing non-government entities to do it either.

If all the anti-hunting orgenizations really want to see the conservation of wildlife, they would put their efforts into persuading governments to do something about the poaching. Which is getting out of control in several countries. Instead of being so blind to the real danger and keep screaming their heads off to ban hunting.

And now the Chinese have a foothold in East Africa, one can only guess what is goling to happen.

I completely agree with all your words here. I personally believe that poaching along side human encroachment, disease, lack of government protection etc are a far bigger problem for the conservation of wildlife than hunting could probably ever be.
I would assume that anti's pick their battles well in as much that they have chosen to pit themselves against the hunting community which is probably the easiest battle to win. The war on disease, the spreading of communities and govenments lack of concern for their own wildlife are all bigger battles where making a change will quite possibly not happen.
People who will take on the bigger problems in life are very far and few between. Easier to fight the battles you can win as this quote from the musical Evita shows.

'Che - How can you be so short-sighted
To look never further than this week or next week
To have no impossible dream?

Eva - tell me who'd be delighted
If I said I'd take on the world's greatest problems
From war to pollution, no hope of solution
Even if I lived for one hundred years'

Ms Peron knew she had no chance of making a real difference in her own lifetime and oh people want to make the difference in their own lives, this is why we pick the easy fight more often than not.

Idaho Sharpshooter,

quote:

to digress just a minute or three; what would be your response if I ask you if you have stopped abusing children under the age of ten? This is a variation on the universal theme of accusing your opposite view point supporters of something that cannot be responded to.

The first part is not worthy of a reply, the second well many people have been able to respond and very well at that.

quote:

You bring questionable data to the forum and then say "if you do not prove me wrong, I am right..." In America we call that the "If, then..." fallacy of assumption.

I have never once claimed to be right. I suggest you read a little more carefully my words before commenting.

Zig Mackintosh,

Thank you for that info and when i have time i will wade through all 110 pages.

African hunters quest,

Thanks for your opinion, you'll forgive me if i take it with the pinch of salt it merits.

quote:

Even if she were here to learn, what does she plan on doing with the knowledge?

No Jo, I am not implying you are a mole for Lion's Aid or some other group. What I am saying is you came here as an "anti-hunting" person, self proclaimed.

Supposing you learn we are not the dark force what are you going to do with the information?

I can only give my reasons for being here so many times. Yes i came here as a self proclaimed anti and i have been honest and upfront about that all the way through the discussions i have had here. Anyone who took part in the discussion i had elsewhere can see that my attitudes have changed dramatically and i do not have the same thoughts about hunting as i did.
At this moment i have no intention of doing anything with the info i have or what i have learnt but i can say if i was to it would not be detrimental to hunting in any shape. As i said previously i worry that joe public only has one side of the story and that side isn't yours (generic). The public deserve all info before making decisions as important as anything to do with conservation of species.

m3taco,

quote:

Conclusion - Hunters should band together and advocate a "green tax" on all photo safari tourists of say $5000 USD per person to offset the environmental impact they are causing and to repair the tree/grass loss due to the certainty of acid rain caused buy all the pollution and greenhouse gases from the vehicles and that is falling in Kenya and depleting the food supply for the animals. All this pollution caused by all these photo safaris is therefore what is causing the falling animal populations in Kenya.

A green tax would be a good idea in my opinion. However $5000 or £3178 is a lot of money and would financially prevent some people from being able to go on a photo safari. Perhaps a smaller amount percentage proportionate to how much of a carbon footprint you will leave. After all though not as much hunters use vehicles too.

quote:

I get the feeling we are actually dealing with a fifteen year old female troll who has watched too many Disney episodes on TV...

Idaho Sharpshooter,

Your sixth sense has deserted you partially in this instance. I am a 38 year old woman who actually has watched many disney films. Some of them hold some good morals and the lion king even has a touch of conservation in it. Well worth a watch by anyones standards.

And on a different note i have had chance to read some of the info you have all kindly given me and it has been very interesting and eye opening.
Thank you

quote:

Originally posted by jolouburn:
David Hulme,

quote:

Fantastic responses, well done hunters! Thank you Jolo, you have done me a service here - this thread provides more than enough hard fact for a critical response to this ridiculous IUCN report which certain people in other groups have asked me to put together. I don't expect any major headway to be made by doing so - some positive comment from those who are not blindfolded, and nothing at all from those who contribute nothing at all to conservation with their uncompromising stance, as usual... But I believe it is important to get the REAL TRUTH out there anyway...

Good luck with the article. Perhaps we could read it at some point.

I'm sure you have already read the gist of my critical response to this tripe, but if you haven't, go back to Zig Mackintosh's post:


"The opinions expressed in this publication are not necessarily those of the IUCN."

David,

You sent the email to Zig Macintosh?
As all i see in Zig's post is the response to an email he had sent them. You however stated you were going to write a critical response, was that response an email? I thought you were going to try and make a difference by writing a piece on it and getting it published!!

Listen Jolo, if you scroll down the African hunting forum page or visit my facebook Borderline walk page, you will see that I am engaged in more important issues right now, like trying to save wildlife. I kind of lost interest in the critical response when I became aware that this article is not the official stance of anyone, just another underhand attempt by a ridiculous bunch of keyboard crusaders to tarnish hunting. I have more than enough interaction with sensible non hunters going on right now and am sticking with them for the moment. I may write a response and I may not, depending on how I feel in the next few days. I think I will just post the email response below the 'economically useless' post which I first came across on facebook, with a bit about how anti hunters are trying to deceive people into believing it is an official stance. I like writing articles but I mostly like writing them about hunting and shooting buffalo bulls.

David

David,

I've already visited your facebook page and i have read some stuff in other forumss here. It wasn't a dig at you in any way, i misread what your intentions were is all. I understand you are upset about this article but please do not take it out on me.
As far as i am aware wildlifeextra is not an anti hunting site to be fair to them.
I like writing articles too and would love to write about what i enjoy all the time such as speedway, embroidery, wildlife but its more important to get important issues out to me than me enjoying my writing.
As an aside the work being done as described on your facebook page and the jimmy calendar are fab. Might well order one of thos for the hubby myself.

Okay apologies, I still do intend to write the article and I agree with you, some things do have to be done. Just running around a bit now, online and in real life, you know? I will be sure to send it to you once I have it in order. Please do buy a Jimmy calendar because the money will go to people who are battling against serious odds to preserve an awesome piece of wildlife country. I will be promoting this Jimmy campaign on as many groups/sites as I can the next while, maybe you could help me by sharing it with your friends? Thanks, sorry I came across as if I was taking my frustration with this article out on you.

David

Joloburn,
Interesting article but I would not consider it totally unbiased. Might I present this article for your review which encompasses several of the key points that support hunting fairgame has mentioned.

http://greenresistance.files.w...0/trophy-hunting.pdf

While we can all agree that there are pros and cons to the hunting industry and argue dollars/pounds/euros spent and by whom, I believe that the utilization, preservation and rehabilitation of the marginal communal and tribal lands alone make hunting a viable economic enterprise for the African countries that allow sport hunting.

Also interesting to me was the fact pointed out by Baker in 1997 that trophy hunting generated more income per client with less damage to the environment than ecotourism. Hard for a preservationist who is truly interested in the wild places to overlook.

It is true that it can be hard to be a hunter and unemotionally defend your sport. Hunting is and has always been controversial and misunderstood. No doubt there are bad apples in our sport (like any other) who give us a bad name or sully our reputation with unethical behaviors, but most of us are ardent conservationists who happen to like "extreme" sport and traveling to far-away places to be a part of a culture and ritual thousands of years old.

So I guess one can throw any study out to defend his/her position and call it gospel and tell the other side to refute it... it just keeps the chasm between us wider.

In many ways I admire you for getting on these boards and challenging one to think about why we do what we do. It makes us understand ourselves better. And I would wager we both would share many of the same beliefs in trying to preserve many of the same places and maybe the same rituals... but maybe not. We will never know unless we have rational conversations and put emotions aside.

quote:

Originally posted by jolouburn:
I can only give my reasons for being here so many times. Yes i came here as a self proclaimed anti and i have been honest and upfront about that all the way through the discussions i have had here. Anyone who took part in the discussion i had elsewhere can see that my attitudes have changed dramatically and i do not have the same thoughts about hunting as i did.At this moment i have no intention of doing anything with the info i have or what i have learnt but i can say if i was to it would not be detrimental to hunting in any shape. As i said previously i worry that joe public only has one side of the story and that side isn't yours (generic). The public deserve all info before making decisions as important as anything to do with conservation of species.

Jo,

If both of the bolded parts above are true, and I believe they are, then perhaps you should consider writing about your experiences on this board.

When hunters write about their passion, wish for conservation, and perpetual wellness of an animal population we are viewed as self-serving.

Perhaps your voice as, if you pardon my description, a "reformed anti" would carry some weight and show that being pro wildlife does not equate to being anti-hunter.

Feel free to title your report, "In the Lion's Den".

Cheers
Jim

[QUOTE] Conclusion - Hunters should band together and advocate a "green tax" on all photo safari tourists of say $5000 USD per person to offset the environmental impact they are causing and to repair the tree/grass loss due to the certainty of acid rain caused buy all the pollution and greenhouse gases from the vehicles and that is falling in Kenya and depleting the food supply for the animals. All this pollution caused by all these photo safaris is therefore what is causing the falling animal populations in Kenya.

[QUOTE]

From Jolouburn:

A green tax would be a good idea in my opinion. However $5000 or £3178 is a lot of money and would financially prevent some people from being able to go on a photo safari. Perhaps a smaller amount percentage proportionate to how much of a carbon footprint you will leave. After all though not as much hunters use vehicles too.

[QUOTE]

A tax placed on photo safaris should be far higher than one placed on hunters for the following reasons:

a) Obviously if you believe the 1M photo tourist and $840M nonsense, it is pretty clear that photo tourists are NOT paying their "far share" to begin with. They are only spending between $840 and $1K for an ENTIRE trip and hunters are spending $5000K or more on just the daily fees alone. So, hunters are already spending much more per trip than photo tourist are. Maybe Kenya needs to change its no hunting policy. If just 10K hunters spent an average of $8500 per trip, those 10K hunters would DOUBLE the tourism revenue and only increase the total tourist traffic by .01%.

b) As was just previously pointed out by Bawanamrm and his his ref to Baker in 1997, "that trophy hunting generated more income per client with less damage to the environment than ecotourism". I presume it is because in part due to the fact that most of us eat at least part of what we shoot. Also, unlike photo tourists we don't ride around in vehicles all day. They are used to get to and from the day's hunting area and then we WALK most of the day. We also tend to stay in one area for the entire hunt and don't run all over the country to get to the next park and ride around all day.

c) Since the anti's believe "hunters" are a minority, then as such we deserve "special protection" status. This is further reinforced every time an anti calls us (hunters) animals. Therefore, if we are a "minority" as well as "animals" and our numbers are supposedly dwindling (willing to bet those numbers are compiled by the same clowns doing the game animal counts), we therefore need to be classified as an endangered and specially protected sub-species and be provided "hunting subsidies" for us to pursue and maintain our "culture" and sub-species.

d) We as hunters are actually already doing something, and have been for millions of years, to combat "climate change" by reducing greenhouse gases - primarily methane and carbon dioxide - one of the primary sources of them...animals. The antis want to eliminate hunting and increase the animal populations and therefore are promoting increasing greenhouse gases and further contributing to "climate change" and therefore need to pay higher taxes.

Unrelated Side Note: They, the greenies, had to change from global warming to the generic "climate change" once it was pointed out that back in the 70's "all the science" claimed/showed the earth was heading into the next ice age and there hasn't been a proven increase in temps for the past 15 years nor have the sea levels increased as was predicted and they have yet to explain how man made pollution from 100K years ago ended the last global ice age.....but the climate is changing and it is all mans fault.....just like it has been continually doing long before man arrived and will continue to do long after we are gone.

It is strange that plants require carbon dioxide for photosynthesis and in lab studies higher concentrations of CO2 enhanced plant growth - makes you want to go hummmmm??

David,

Oh yeah i know what you mean, life gets in the way of life !!
I will most certainly share the Jimmy campaign with my friends and i will be ordering one myself :-)
No apologies needed, i can understand your frustration.

Thank you for the understanding Jolo, and thank you for backing Zim's wildlife. I apologize for reacting instinctively to your question of genuine interest. I hope to achieve a semblance of order in my house one day.

David

bwanamrm,

Thank you for the article. I will read and digest it and get back to you on it.

It has surprised me and probably will continue to surprise me how many different angles need to be looked at when discussing hunting. The majority of main stream information readily available to those who do not look any deeper is clear cut, 'hunting is bad'. Nobody talks about the financial benefits, local community benefits or effects on the environment.

Yes anyone can throw a study out there and claim it is fact, the truth. Finding info to support a theory especially on the anti side is not difficult. This is partly why i question what i find so stubbornly and vigorously, i want all sides of the argument.

Emotion will always creep in when people feel passionately about something, its unavoidable.

Frostbit,

quote:

Jo,

If both of the bolded parts above are true, and I believe they are, then perhaps you should consider writing about your experiences on this board.

When hunters write about their passion, wish for conservation, and perpetual wellness of an animal population we are viewed as self-serving.

Perhaps your voice as, if you pardon my description, a "reformed anti" would carry some weight and show that being pro wildlife does not equate to being anti-hunter.

Feel free to title your report, "In the Lion's Den".

Cheers
Jim

Unfortunately opinion pieces are very hard to sell when you are not a big name writer and believe me i'm not lol.
However a factual piece presenting the arguments would perhaps fair better. I could still bring in the 'ex anti' angle with a factual piece but it wouldn't be so prevalent.
Before i can do anything i need to understand certain aspects better anyway.

m3taco,

quote:

A tax placed on photo safaris should be far higher than one placed on hunters

I did say :-

quote:

Perhaps a smaller amount percentage proportionate to how much of a carbon footprint you will leave.

I never said hunters should pay as much as photo tourists or even anywhere near as much.

quote:

it is pretty clear that photo tourists are NOT paying their "far share" to begin with. They are only spending between $840 and $1K for an ENTIRE trip and hunters are spending $5000K or more on just the daily fees alone. So, hunters are already spending much more per trip than photo tourist are.

Their fair share of what? A hunting safari and a photo safari are of course going to cost different amounts of money, they are totally different trips. It is not the average photo tourists fault your fees are so high is it?

quote:

trophy hunting generated more income per client with less damage to the environment than ecotourism". I presume it is because in part due to the fact that most of us eat at least part of what we shoot. Also, unlike photo tourists we don't ride around in vehicles all day. They are used to get to and from the day's hunting area and then we WALK most of the day. We also tend to stay in one area for the entire hunt and don't run all over the country to get to the next park and ride around all day.

I'm a little baffled here, i've thought on this a while but still cannot fathom why you cause less damage to the environment by partly eating what you shoot. Can you explain this to me? Perhaps i'm being thick but i genuinely don't get that comment.

Photo tourists don't ride around in vehicles all day, most of their day is spent sitting in the vehicle watching wildlife.
As i understand it vehicles are used in hunting for taking you to 'drop off spots' and presumably picking you up. They must be used to pick up your kills and they must be used when baiting for predators. Now considering photo tourists often sit in one spot for hours on end is their vehicle really causing far more damage than that of the hunters?

Most safaris i have seen advertised are in one destination in a country. I don't know of any that dash around going one park to the next, but hey i might be wrong.

Now just as an example here i did a little research on cars eco friendlyness and journeys made. My husband and i went to Kruger national park for five days. We started off at Malelane and ended up at Punda Maria so thats pretty much bottom to top of the KP. That entire journey was 405km and a time of 8hr 18mins according to google maps. Not really that much time spent driving but a lot of time spent parking with engine off watching wildlife. We booked directly with the Kruger Park, there were no agents collecting fees, the total cost went to the KP. We also paid conservation fees every day we were in the KP. We spent money in the gift shops, restaurants etc and we did all this in a little Ford Ka. The Ford Ka interestingly has a green car rating of 40, 0 being the most green, 100 the least. Its co2 emissions are 147 g/km. Now compare that to something like a landrover, four wheel drive type affair now that has a green rating of 94 and a co2 emission of 354 g/km. Now i know most organised safaris will use jeep type vehicles too but we didn't. We used a little eco friendly car and i don't see why we should have paid $5000 in taxes for doing that when hunters and other photo tourists are using twice as less friendly vehicles and probably doing more driving. This is why i suggested a percentage proportionate to the footstep you leave!!

quote:

Since the anti's believe "hunters" are a minority, then as such we deserve "special protection" status. This is further reinforced every time an anti calls us (hunters) animals. Therefore, if we are a "minority" as well as "animals" and our numbers are supposedly dwindling (willing to bet those numbers are compiled by the same clowns doing the game animal counts), we therefore need to be classified as an endangered and specially protected sub-species and be provided "hunting subsidies" for us to pursue and maintain our "culture" and sub-species.

Seriously?
Then perhaps i deserve special protection status too either as a bear, fox or troll?

Everyone is probably a minority in something. I am in a minority of people who support speedway (bikes not cars) and because i like to embroider. Should i too be subsidised and classed as an endangered species.
Please right now noone is stopping hunters from hunting, trying to stop is an entirely different thing. The whole of your argument in the above quote is just a little childish don't ya think?

quote:

We as hunters are actually already doing something, and have been for millions of years, to combat "climate change" by reducing greenhouse gases - primarily methane and carbon dioxide - one of the primary sources of them...animals. The antis want to eliminate hunting and increase the animal populations and therefore are promoting increasing greenhouse gases and further contributing to "climate change" and therefore need to pay higher taxes.

And i'm sure millions of years ago hunters knew they were doing what they could to combat greenhouse gases!! 'rolls eyes'

Do you have a pet? If you do perhaps you should pay higher taxes, after all you're creating more greenhouses gases than someone who doesn't.

Also with the greatest will in the world do you really think money raised from a greenhouse gases tax will go back into conserving the planet. Most governments are far to corrupt and greedy for that. Again your above quote is just a little childish.

quote:

Originally posted by jolouburn:
Frostbit,

quote:

Jo,

If both of the bolded parts above are true, and I believe they are, then perhaps you should consider writing about your experiences on this board.

When hunters write about their passion, wish for conservation, and perpetual wellness of an animal population we are viewed as self-serving.

Perhaps your voice as, if you pardon my description, a "reformed anti" would carry some weight and show that being pro wildlife does not equate to being anti-hunter.

Feel free to title your report, "In the Lion's Den".

Cheers
Jim

Unfortunately opinion pieces are very hard to sell when you are not a big name writer and believe me i'm not lol.
However a factual piece presenting the arguments would perhaps fair better. I could still bring in the 'ex anti' angle with a factual piece but it wouldn't be so prevalent.
Before i can do anything i need to understand certain aspects better anyway.

Thanks for thinking about it at least.

Frostbit,

I will do it. I just don't feel confident enough of the facts etc yet. With a little more help from people like yourself here i'm sure we can all together put something good down and get the message out there.
When i've put something together i'll run it past here and see what you all think :-)