Hello everyone,

First off, I wanted to thank you all for your assistance and guidance in helping me book my first safari. The responses and subsequent PM's from this thread were invaluable! Looking to book my first safari - feedback needed

My wife and I decided on what we hope will be a great outfitter, and booked a plains game hunt in South Africa for 8 days, 7 nights. We decided to pursue Kudu, Gemsbok, Impala and Zebra.

One area where I have tried to research and came up a little vague is the whole dip, pack, and transport process of my trophies. I plan on having shoulder mounts completed in the US once funds permit, and a rug made from the Zebra, so I believe I would like to have the hides dipped, packed, and the skulls bleached for temporary European mounting until I can afford full taxidermy work...At least that is what I think I want... Does this sound like what you all would suggest?

I am still learning a lot about the preparation, handling and shipping of my trophies, and I want to make sure I have all loose ends tied up before heading over to hunt. From what I understand, there is a dip/pack fee charged by either the outfitter, or whichever local taxidermist they use and then I coordinate to have the trophies shipped back to the US- is that correct? Any idea of how much typical dip and pack charges will be?

I have been approached by a company in the US who specializes in shipping trophies back. They seem to be reasonable in price, although I really don't quite know what to go off of. I am thinking that rather than attempt to go this alone, I will hire a shipping agent. Is that what you all would recommend? If any of you happen to specialize in the business of coordinating shipments of tropies back to the US, please send me a PM as I'm definitely in the market. Thanks very much in advance for your help!

John

Your PH should handle everything as to shipping the trophies and your taxidermist should be able to handle everything state side. Be sure you use a taxidermist that understands African animals unless you want everything to look like a whitetail. The best taxidermist I know is Mike Dingas in Omaha, NE. There are others, he is the closest good one to me. Don't get talked into having them done in Africa. It sounds like you will save money, but the shipping makes up the difference and the taxidermy is quite often not up to par. It will take at least a year for the trophies to be shipped. By that time you will know what you want to do with them. As far as the Zebra rug goes, have it tanned in Africa. They can do chrome tanning over there and it comes out much better than over here and is cheaper....Tom

I share your frustration of trying to find out what to budget for taxidermy and dip and ship costs! Many times I have tried to find out on behalf of a client [or potential client] what the costs are likely to be. Often failed to get even an order of magnitude quote! Many of these outfits seems to work on the rule of seeing how much of a ride they can take each individual for!

First, some agreement with Trapper2: Have the zebra hide tanned in South Africa! Now a warning about trusting the PH about advice about which taxidermist to use: Do make sure that your PH is an integral part of the hunting outfitter's firm that you have chosen to arrange your trip. Some "Freelance" PH's will, with very convincing arguments and examples, steer you to entrust the taxidermy to the firm from which they get the highest % of commission. If the PH has no real interest in your becoming a return client, as he would have if he was also the hunting outfitter or a full-time employee of the HO firm, this referral to where he gets the best deal often has disastrous consequences!

Mostly you will simply have to trust the taxidermists and dip and ship agents in South Africa, as no one will do anything unless you pay in advance! There are a few parties involved in the whole chain of custody of your trophies, and a basic understanding of how this chain works is required to understand the choices. Your Hunting Outfitter arranges and presents the hunt and he is the man where any complaint must be dealt with. The PH is responsible for field judgement, shooting, treatment and overseeing skinning and salting of the trophy. You, and no one other than you, are responsible to choose the taxidermist [for simplicity I'll just refer to the taxidermist - which includes some people who does only dipping and pre treatment for shipping raw material to other countries] to entrust the trophies to. The Hunting Outfitter - and not the PH - is responsible to get your trophies delivered in good shape and together with the required documentation to the taxidermist of your choice. The taxidermist will then make a quote to you and demand some payment in advance before he does any work. Once the taxidermist work is completed he will demand the final payment before he releases the packed and completed trophies to the shipping agent. The choice of shipping agent is also your and yours alone! In actual practice every taxidermist has a [usually only one] shipping agent through which they prefer to work. Note that a few taxidermists are also shipping agents. Once the shipping agent has your trophies and the paperwork he will apply for the export licenses and arrange for the crating and proper documentation to accompany the shipment. He will however do nothing before sending you a quote and you have made the full payment. By this stage of the process you have very little control over it. They literally charge you what the wish, and if you refuse to accept their quote, then you find out how extremely expensive it is to get your shipment removed from his premises and transported to an alternative shipping agents' warehouse. You will invariably get screwed! The shipping agent contacts his preferred carrier - sea freight or airfreight - you have no choice on which to use - that is the shipping agent's choice. You just pay him! The next stage is the clearing agent in your country. I will rather not attempt to say anything about hem - here are simply to many countries for a small HO like myself to know enough about to make any statements about them!

In general I would advise that you trust the recommendation made by the Hunting Outfitter - at least you have researched him well and he has a lot of interest in getting you back as a return client! However, I have one question for you: Why has your chosen Hunting Outfitter not bothered to explain the full sequence of events to you? I make very sure that each one of my clients, or prospective clients, fully understand the whole process and I make sure that he/she understand the implication(s) of each decision. What is perhaps the most important of all is; I tell the client that I do not get any % commission on any taxidermy work that I refer to anyone. I simply refuse to become some sort of taxidermists pimp!

Wish I could give you more specific costs and better advice about the choices, but ask you HO. Good luck for your safari!

Congratulations on booking your first Safari and I hope it is a safari of a lifetime.
Andrew gives some great advise above, I would happily forward you my preferred dip and ship guys here in Limpopo and Mpumalanga if that would help.
John

On my first safari to RSA I trusted the outfitter as to what company to use for the dip and pack and everything worked out great. The company used only does dip and pack and no taxidermy work, I believe their name is Dip & Pack Limpopo or something like that. My first trip was back in 2003 so I believe they have been in business for over 10 years. The company is actually run by a wife of a PH and is a small company and does not do a lot of stuff. The last trip I went on back in 2009 I believe the dip costs were around $90 a head and then pack fees were 25% of the dip costs. I pay the bill once I am back when they send me an email saying the stuff is ready and I wire the money to RSA or a US account that they have. Then they send the box to an RSA shipping agent, which I believe is Safari Cargo, and Safari Cargo sends me an email saying the stuff is ready and asking if I want to prepay. Thats when I put them in contact with teh brokers I use here in the states, Coppersmith, and they handle everything from there and I pay Coppersmith for all the shipping costs and clearing fees.

Solid advice from Andrew. I’ll state the obvious… your shipping costs are variable based on weight. So, tan “large” hides in Africa as one element to assists in reducing the weight of your shipment. Additionally, if you are mounting the heads why ship the skulls? Take baseline measurements of the horns (width at base and tips) and only ship the horns unless the skull is mandatory for whatever reason.

Hi John,

I only see one glitch in your plan, and your plan is a nice one and makes sense. It is regarding the taxidermy work. Your capes and horns will need to be shipped to a taxidermist here in the states, and he will be the "accepting agent" so to speak. You will probably want him to go ahead and tan the capes, rather than having the raw untanned capes sit around until you decide to have the taxidermy work done. Most taxidermists will agree to do this, but will insist that if they tan the capes (or even send them out to be tanned) they also want to be THE taxidermist who mounts them. Therefore, to insure this, they may want to keep your capes and horns in their shop until you give the go ahead to mount them. (This is what my taxidermist did, and I was OK with it.) This means that you would probably not be able to take the European skulls/horns to display in your home until you get the full taxidermy done. In other words, many taxidermists will want to hold your capes and horns (hostage) in their shop to insure that they will be the taxidermist who does the final mounting. If you have a particular taxidermist in mind that you want to mount your animals, you will want to talk to him before your safari to see if he'll let you take the skulls/horns home before the taxidermy is done.

Regarding the dip/pack and shipping, the guys who posted above gave you some good information.

I used Hunter's International to coordinate the shipping and clearing of my trophies. I found Maria there to be extremely helpful and patient with the first timer. I'd recommend you give her a call.

http://www.hunter-international.net/

Rex Freight out of Port Elizabeth took care of the shipment from RSA to New York then Fauna and Flora took care of it from there to the taxidermist and it all went well with zero issues. Good luck and enjoy.

Who is John Galt?

John,
My first African hunt was eight years ago
for plains game in the East Cape of SA. I used
Derick Robinson ( DR) Taxidermist and they did a great job. Later, they did a Cape Buffalo for me and it was great too. I always use Fauna & Flora for shipping & import. They are FIRST CLASS and really on it. Hope this helps.

I'm surprised nobody has answered your cost questions, so I'll give you some rough numbers...of course these vary depending on many things, but these give a basic idea.

$500 for dip/pack
$1000-1500 for shipping
$500 for clearing agent (unless your taxidermist will do this if they are near the port of entry)...you can also do this yourself if you're nearby and are able to spend a little time.

If the port of entry is not nearby, then there will also be some shipping costs to your home or taxidermist.

John, the costs above should be in the ballpark. Check out huntingtrophy.com this is a division of Coppersmith Logistics. I have used them on several African safaris with great results each time. You simply fill out a power of attorney form and provide them with a credit card number and they handle all the import paperwork, inspections, etc and arrange shipping to your door or taxidermist if you prefer. One thing to watch for is the port of entry; some are more affordable than others. They should be able to help you pick an affordable port. It is a lot simpler than it seems and I think the service they provide is worth the money given all that can go wrong. They can also check the paperwork from your Dip/Pack provider and safari operator to make sure you don't have any USFWS problems.

For a basic plains game safari I would budget $100-$150 per animal for dip and pack. $1500-$2000 for shipping of trophies to the US. $800-$1000 for customs brokerage fees and freight to US taxidermist. Budget on the high side, not the low side.

Keep in mind that if you have any skins tanned in Africa you are holding up the rest of the shipment for many, many months. The longer skins sit the more chance for problems. I had a zebra rug tanned in Namibia once and it came out great. I would not do it again simply because it held up the shipment for so long. If you are having the work done here, I recommend getting all of the stuff over here as soon as possible.

Thanks everyone- I really appreicate your feedback!

-John

I use floraandfauna.com I have had good experience with them