I had the opportunity to visit with a South African hunter at DSC about lion hunting with a focus on lion hunting in RSA.

Here is what was said (in brief).

He hunted 2 wild lions in Zim and 2 released lions in RSA in 2009. He was the shooter on three of the four lions.

The lions in Zim were baited and the lions in RSA were pen raised and released three days prior to the hunt in a 5000 acre enclosure.

He described the Zim hunt as relatively boring with the driving, checking tracks, killing and setting baits, checking baits. Each bait had trail cameras installed. When the lion showed up, they set up and promptly shot the lion. Cost was about $50,000 USD per lion.

He described the RSA hunt thusly. He went into the paddock with a PH/tracker. After several hours, they located the lion, stalked it and shot it. One lion took two days to locate. He said both lions were unafraid of people and did not run at the sight of man. He said his shots were killers and did not deal with a wounded lion, but both lions came toward them when spotted.

He quoted these statistics to me - In 2009, about 1000 lions were shot in RSA - all pen raised other than a few that came off Krueger (supposedly). In the rest of Africa, less than 100 lions were taken. He felt, based on his contacts in Zim and RSA, that lion hunting will stay closed in Bots and be closed in Tanz and Namibia. He said that quotas will be reduced in Zambia soon. He said success rates on lions outside of RSA was about 30%. Namibia was higher because of the "problem" animal rules there which boosted success rates there very high. He said Tanz had the next highest at 30 to 40%. He said Zim and Moz were the lowest.

He said that the law will change in RSA to where a lion will be considered free range if released into a 10,000 acres enclosure and self sustaining for two years. No longer will the three day release be practised.

He said that lion and elephant are the "big money" animals where the operators actual make a nice profit on the hunt. Plains game hunts were very low margin and that 2009 and 2010 will cripple many "plains game only" outfits.

Leopard hunting in Namibia will resume in 2011 at lower quotas (down from 250 to 100). Dog hunting there is finished.

Elephant hunting was best in Zim due to quotas and numbers of elephants.

Zim is recovering after the switch to the USD as currency. He said gasoline and food is readily available if you have USD.

He is a dedicated hunter who knows the business aspect of the safari industry. He said that lion hunting in RSA will continue to rise due to the cost and availability of lions. The new rules will impact the unscrupulous guys that drug and plant the lions. He felt that a foot stalk on a lion that is unafraid of people was a bit scary. He said that he has talked to various PH types in RSA that do these hunts and that if the lion is not killed cleanly, most of the time a charge occurs because the lion knows the shot/problem came from "man" and he is headed toward the perceived problem.

It takes 6 years to raise a "shootable" lion. The cost to raise the lion is significant, however, the price that people will pay makes this profitable. The new "2 year release" rule will impact the cost.

OK - for those that are in the business or to those who have hunted both ways - what do you think? For those that want to rant on pen raised lions - rant elsewhere please - I would like to hear opinions from those with actual first hand knowledge. THanks

BulldogMaster, That is spot on. They are even smuggling lions for clients to shoot also. I have made 2 attempts on lions in Tanzania and came close this past year seeing 5 cats and one shooter male who was moving into the long grass. Finger was saying shoot, my brain said hold off. 2012 I will attempt to get simba back into the Selous.

Mike

quote:

Originally posted by BulldogMaster:
He went into the paddock with a PH/tracker. After several hours, they located the lion, stalked it and shot it. One lion took two days to locate. He said both lions were unafraid of people and did not run at the sight of man. He said his shots were killers and did not deal with a wounded lion, but both lions came toward them when spotted.

They were on the prowl for range cubes.

i dunno but i shot a problem lion in zim. had to do it at night, & if chasing a lion into the tall grass at 11 PM doesn't get your pants damp I guess nothing will

Mike:

Your quote is hysterical!

Who is going to monitor that the lion was released 2 years before the hunt? And prove it to the hunter.
The PH or Outfitter?
This is nothing other than smoke and mirrors.

You can fabricate all the rules and regulations you want....they are still canned hunts.


dale

Dale,
I asked that very question and the response was that the lions would be "monitored" and the government folks would be a part of the process. He likened it to the rhino darting. In rhino darting, the rhino is only darted once a year. When darted, he is marked with an electronic chip, blood drawn and health is checked. A state veterinarian is present to help and witness.

He then asked what I knew about "canned" deer/elk/stag hunts in the US, Canada, Mexico, Argentina and New Zealand. I told him that I had been on one high fenced hunt. He asked then, why not the legislation by the various states/countries on this as it is a lot more common than lions. Shooting deer at a feeder is "worse" than shooting a free ranging deer. He pointed out a couple of booths at DSC where feeders were sold or big deer were taken that were obviously breed for horn size in an enclosure.

I had to admit that I could see his point. What is the difference between the 500" red stag in NZ that is pen raised and let loose vs. the lion situation in RSA?

quote:

OK - for those that are in the business or to those who have hunted both ways - what do you think? For those that want to rant on pen raised lions - rant elsewhere please - I would like to hear opinions from those with actual first hand knowledge. THanks

As I have stated and taken the heat for several times in the past...I have no problem with someone taking a pen raised lion as long as everyone is up front and knows they are taking a pen raised lion.

On a side-note however, your friend's statement does highlight the peril in which "wild lion hunting" is in and reiterates how important it is for the safari industry to embrace quality science based conservation practices...

...for the good of the lion and for the good of the sport!

Dale,

"CANNED" seems so harsh and condescending. I prefer "PRESERVE".

Oh wait preserves are really just canned fruit...

Oh nevermind

Jeff

I would respectfully disagree with the success rates stated....most specifically in Zambia. John DuPlooy was, thru 2009, at about a 95-98% success rate on lion in his Luangwa Valley concessions. As far as quota going down...that seems inevitible. Pen raising is for quail, not for Lions....this as far as hunting is concerned. I would feel different if the lion were "released" and not hunted for 3-4 years...but there's no business sense in that scenario.
Regardless, if one wants a lion, I suggest booking quickly, as I feel lion hunting of "wild" cats is coming to a rapid close.

Gary
DRSS
NRA Lifer
SCI
DSC

quote:

Originally posted by GarBy:
I would respectfully disagree with the success rates stated....most specifically in Zambia. John DuPlooy was, thru 2009, at about a 95-98% success rate on lion in his Luangwa Valley concessions. As far as quota going down...that seems inevitible. Pen raising is for quail, not for Lions....this as far as hunting is concerned. I would feel different if the lion were "released" and not hunted for 3-4 years...but there's no business sense in that scenario.
Regardless, if one wants a lion, I suggest booking quickly, as I feel lion hunting of "wild" cats is coming to a rapid close.

Gary
DRSS
NRA Lifer
SCI
DSC

Gary,
I asked about Zambia and my friend did not have any first hand data. He mentioned that lion hunting there has leveled off since hunting re-opened.

I've spoken my peace multiple times on this issues, check my posts with Shakari.

BULLDOGMASTER- I'm completely with you,

THERE IS NOT A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ANY ANIMAL. THEY ARE ALL JUST MAMMALS WALKING AROUND, and WE ENJOY HARVESTING THEM.

Whether it is a deer, lion, bear, quail stag, kudus, black/white springbuck, rhinos, whatever!

Everyone seems to put LIONS in a special category...I assure you, if a whitetail is range, he doesn't have a chance if I have my merkel and swarov scope...so this whole, lions don't have a chance...sh*t nothing does, we shoot bullets at like 2500fps, no animal moves that fast! HEll, what if years ago, we decided to raise lions for steak meat, would angus cattle not be allowed to hunt in fenced areas?

People need to get off their high horse and realize, if RSA closes lions, lion hunting in Southern Africa will be closely behind it.

Free-range is a grand idea, but it's a thing of the past...fences are everywhere, so GET OVER IT...all you I'd rather stop hunting than hunt behind a fence will be very limited to what you can hunt in the future.

To be clear, I am not opposed to lion hunting in RSA. I think pen-raised lion hunting in RSA is fine for those that desire that sort of thing. I do oppose, turning a pen-raised lion loose and shooting it 48 hours later. Why not just hunt at the zoo? If there were truly a way to ensure that lions were released and allowed to be self-sufficient for a meaningful period of time, that is fine. I do wonder when I hear that the requirement will be that they are released for two years. That is a lot of plains game (i.e., $$) to feed a lion before the hunter shows up . . . not to mention the difficulty of really policing the practice.

I think pen-raised lion hunting in RSA does the same for lion hunting that the teste fly does for buffalo hunting . . . it keeps areas open to those that want to hunt free ranging animals. God bless the mighty teste fly. And long live pen-raised lion hunting and the SCI-trophy book fanatics that pursue them.

Bulldog....I saw A LOT of lion when I was there in 2008. Of course, we are only talking about one area...but there were lion to be had. Of course the lion had a couple of villagers too while I was there....but that's another story.

I disagree about the whole high-fenced scenario AS IT APPLIES TO LIONS....and here's why. According to some well known PH's I have spoken to and/or hunted with, lion are raised in the "captive pens" and then released. As I've been told, subsequent generations are raised the same...in other words, the lion are not breeding in the wild after being released....but being released and then hunted...and a 2 year time frame is not going to allow a cub to grow up to be a mature trophy. IF the lion were released in a high-fenced area and allowed to breed in the wild w/o human interaction, then I would view lion hunting in large fenced concessions differently. But, that isn't going to happen as the "return on investment" is substantially further out than it is currently.
As a point of fact, 100,000 or so acres of high-fenced area for plains game or other type of game is no different that free ranging, IMO....as long as the area contains enough indeginous terrain so as to be substantially similar to free-ranging.

Gary
DRSS
NRA Lifer
SCI
DSC

Interesting perspective.

In particular, note his comparison of put and take lion hunting to a sort of "cage match" where the shooter is exposed to real danger.

I suppose that may be true in some cases - but certainly not in all or even most cases where canned lion are shot. Still, with no drugs, with an animal that is truly and fully acclimated to the wild and self-sustaining, and with a big enough area . . . food for thought.

But even under those circumstances, it's the "manufactured" nature of the whole enterprise that I find troubling.

And yes, IMHO, a lion is quite literally a much different animal than a deer - not the least because of his innate dangerousness, and his status as an apex predator fully capable of killing and devouring us humans.

I often wonder when these Lion hunting threads get started:

Does ANYONE know if there REALLY are enough Lion in the wild, free range countries to support the existing Lion quota [I guess that means outside RSA]?

I have seen the total Lion population in Africa quoted between 5,000 and 28,000, as it would seem to me that a vast majority of those numbers must be females. Are these numbers enough to sustain them?

Does anyone have any reliable population statistics?

Les

quote:

Originally posted by Oryxhunter1983:
People need to get off their high horse and realize, if RSA closes lions, lion hunting in Southern Africa will be closely behind it.

Free-range is a grand idea, but it's a thing of the past...fences are everywhere, so GET OVER IT...all you I'd rather stop hunting than hunt behind a fence will be very limited to what you can hunt in the future.

That sounds too pessimistic. The glass is half full remember. We need to fight against all this from happening. Tz does not have a single fence in the entire country that was put up to keep wildlife in or out! More than a quarter of its land mass is under wildlife protection - more than any single country in the world! we are fighting to keep it that way.

quote:

Originally posted by LHowell:
I often wonder when these Lion hunting threads get started:

Does ANYONE know if there REALLY are enough Lion in the wild, free range countries to support the existing Lion quota [I guess that means outside RSA]?

I have seen the total Lion population in Africa quoted between 5,000 and 28,000, as it would seem to me that a vast majority of those numbers must be females. Are these numbers enough to sustain them?

Does anyone have any reliable population statistics?

Les

There is an attempt at getting a more comprehensive "estimate" of wild lion populations in Africa by Chardonnet from the IGF. So far, Benin, CAR, Mozambique have been completed. Tz is next. Hopefully with funds the rest of Eastern and Southern Africa will be done in coming years. They are difficult to count.

Bwanamich,
I'm an optimist, and a REALIST! The world is being developed TZ might not be, but just about everywhere else is... Fences will be a huge part of the future...just look at land here in the states. The only land that isn't being fenced is public lands.

I will reiterate my sentiments, that I enjoy hunting, love it, love the animals, the time with friends, but this whole "it's unethical shit" is really annoying. Because that is a personal issue that has to be decided for each person. B/c I've heard certain bowhunters (I am a bowhunter, so I can make comments about it) say its too easy with a rifle, got to give them an animal a chance!

Who are we kidding, whats next, if you don't stone the animals to death, it's not sporting?

quote:

That sounds too pessimistic. The glass is half full remember. We need to fight against all this from happening. Tz does not have a single fence in the entire country that was put up to keep wildlife in or out! More than a quarter of its land mass is under wildlife protection - more than any single country in the world! we are fighting to keep it that way.

Absolutely!!!