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The 27th meeting of the CITES Animals Committee (AC27) started 28 April – 3 May 2014 in Veracruz, Mexico. Among the topics to be discussed/debated will be the Periodic Review of the Felidae (African lion) the findings of which will be presented by co-authors Namibia and Kenya. Additionally, African lion will be discussed under the topic of Significant Trade Review. USF&W has decided to wait until this has been presented. Their projected new decision date, FWIW, is May 18th...we'll see. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ J. Lane Easter, DVM A born Texan has instilled in his system a mind-set of no retreat or no surrender. I wish everyone the world over had the dominating spirit that motivates Texans.– Billy Clayton, Speaker of the Texas House No state commands such fierce pride and loyalty. Lesser mortals are pitied for their misfortune in not being born in Texas.— Queen Elizabeth II on her visit to Texas in May, 1991. | |||
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I hope they delay again. My hunt starts on the 20th! | |||
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Lane- Thanks much for the latest info from USF&W. This needs to be resolved as soon as possible for 2014. If they pull the same as they did with the Elephant, they are simply asking for additional lawsuits. More importantly, further delay is only causing more anxiety amongst those of us who have Lion on quota later in 2014. Please keep your eye on this for us, as you seem to be one of the few who are on top of it. Mike ______________ DSC DRSS (again) SCI Life NRA Life Sables Life Mzuri IPHA "To be a Marine is enough." | |||
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So after CITIES put off a decision for yet another year, is USF&W going to follow suit? I also heard that Dr. Craig Packer got in essence declared persona non grata in Tanzania now... Hope that doesn't cause any more issues since he's one of the folks that is considered more than a little influential with USF&W. | |||
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Dr. Butler, Lets put your statement into context here and clarify a thing or two. Tanzania is a country that has virtually ALLOWED its ele population to be wiped off of the face of the earth. They could put a stop to the poaching tomorrow if they WANTED to. So when you speak about Tanzania being at odds with Dr. Packer...what are you saying??? Are you taking sides with a governmet who allows mass production commercial poaching to go on at will over someone who wants lion hunting to continue...albeit on a SUSTAINABLE level??? Secondly...what exact issues has Dr. Packer created already since you are worried he might cause "more" issues??? Please be specific in listing these issues for us to discuss. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ J. Lane Easter, DVM A born Texan has instilled in his system a mind-set of no retreat or no surrender. I wish everyone the world over had the dominating spirit that motivates Texans.– Billy Clayton, Speaker of the Texas House No state commands such fierce pride and loyalty. Lesser mortals are pitied for their misfortune in not being born in Texas.— Queen Elizabeth II on her visit to Texas in May, 1991. | |||
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I think you overstate the ability of the government of Tanzania to be able to stop poaching altogether. Could they do more? I am sure. Stop it? Have we in the US stopped killings of any of our protected animals? We sure have a lot more resources than Tanzania has, and I have heard lots of stories about US bears and elk products being illegally diverted to China. As to issues with Dr. Packer. I was told that his repeatedly saying things caused the Tanzanian government to revoke his work permit and so forth. I find it unfortunate that you are equating the lion and elephant issue with each other here. Dr. Packer, to the best of my knowledge has nothing to do with the elephant issue going on. You were the one who stated that Dr. Packer was the person who was going to make or break the lion uplisting. You have also implied that the whole issue of uplisting was because hunting companies and outfitters were not doing enough in the eyes of the scientific community. While I do not personally know Dr. Packer, I would think he's a pretty rare bird if he does not get mad about his work permit being revoked for what I am sure he believes were sound reasoning to make the statements and threats he did. My concern is will this action cause him to disregard the scientific evidence which your group marshaled on the benefits of hunting to extract a normal human reaction of revenge, especially if he has as much influence as you have implied on USF&W's decision. So, to specifically answer your points: As to what Dr. Packer has already started- Dr. Packer and several others started the ball rolling on uplisting the lion to try and force changes in the hunting industry, which resulted in the unfortunate mess we all are in now, even though he admits that hunting offtake is not a major source of lion kill (just the only one that is amenable to law passage and the threat of USG action). Now, do I disagree that some action was needed? No. I do think the age laws and their modifications or a drastic cut in quota were needed. Do I agree about how he went about it? No. In any case, its water over the dam. What am I worried about him creating? An environment where the politics in DC can be justified as being scientific because a highly regarded scientist or someone around him makes some statements influenced by the belief that he is being wronged by one of the players. I would think you would agree that any stance that hunting is not useful by Dr. Packer will be used by the antis to push for ES status for all lion? Maybe I am reading too much in to your previous statements that he made about being the one who would decide, I don't know. I am taking you at your word here. I am not a player in DC, nor am I in the confidence of one. | |||
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SO what happened (or didn't) at the CITES meeting in Mexico? Good Hunting, Tim Herald Worldwide Trophy Adventures tim@trophyadventures.com | |||
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What I heard was basically that the findings did not support moving the lion to CITIES I but that the parties want to have a complete review as the feeling is that lion are critically endangered in part of their range. They want to have a complete review done for COP 15 next year. | |||
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Lane in red. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ J. Lane Easter, DVM A born Texan has instilled in his system a mind-set of no retreat or no surrender. I wish everyone the world over had the dominating spirit that motivates Texans.– Billy Clayton, Speaker of the Texas House No state commands such fierce pride and loyalty. Lesser mortals are pitied for their misfortune in not being born in Texas.— Queen Elizabeth II on her visit to Texas in May, 1991. | |||
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Basically, that is correct...they tabled it for the time being. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ J. Lane Easter, DVM A born Texan has instilled in his system a mind-set of no retreat or no surrender. I wish everyone the world over had the dominating spirit that motivates Texans.– Billy Clayton, Speaker of the Texas House No state commands such fierce pride and loyalty. Lesser mortals are pitied for their misfortune in not being born in Texas.— Queen Elizabeth II on her visit to Texas in May, 1991. | |||
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Dr. Easter, Its certainly possible that I have details mixed up. I don't have any inside sources. However, didn't HSUS use Dr. Packer's research in their letter and didn't they quote communications with him? Now, I am sure they cherry picked citations, as it seems is common in academia, but their underlying basis for contention was from him. I guess that part of my concern about the man is caused by his unwillingness to quash this right at the beginning when he was stating that he had control of the situation, and the fact that he has been quoted as saying things that are rather anti hunting at times. You know him, and you probably have a much better read on him than I do. I still am concerned about what you just confessed up here- that Dr. Packer is upset about Tanzania's actions and that his supporters are upset. To some extent, I am too, as scientific thought requires freedom to explore things without censorship, something that US medical research needs to recall, but nevertheless, as several people have found, you say something unpopular with your boss, you get fired, being right does not necessarily matter. Been there, had it happen before. Being right just allows you to live with yourself. As to where I got the connection between elephant and lion, read back a few messages. Who brought up elephant in this thread? You seem to be correlating Tanzania's issues with elephant poaching to their behavior with Dr. Packer. I really hope that Tanzania and Dr. Packer can come to an understanding again. The scientific world is not so populated that we can lose talent for internal squabbles, but I also think that the proper way to deal with Lion or Elephant from our (US) standpoint is to work through CITIES, not play our own game here- all that does is offend folks, and as near as I can tell by their actions they blame Dr. Packer for a lot of this, rightly or wrongly. Also, how can young lion hunting offtake be a major issue? There are what 2-300 Lions (of all ages, predominantly older males) taken by sport hunters in Tanzania a year, versus how many thousand killed by poaching or "animal-human conflict"? I am not disagreeing that we should work to 0 but still, statistically its not significant in comparison. | |||
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Lane in Red. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ J. Lane Easter, DVM A born Texan has instilled in his system a mind-set of no retreat or no surrender. I wish everyone the world over had the dominating spirit that motivates Texans.– Billy Clayton, Speaker of the Texas House No state commands such fierce pride and loyalty. Lesser mortals are pitied for their misfortune in not being born in Texas.— Queen Elizabeth II on her visit to Texas in May, 1991. | |||
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Addition to above: The "gut feeling" of a group of conservationists I polled for this answer say between 100-200 (closer to 100 than 200) lions are killed each year in TZ OUTSIDE of hunting...no where near a 1000 much less 1000's. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ J. Lane Easter, DVM A born Texan has instilled in his system a mind-set of no retreat or no surrender. I wish everyone the world over had the dominating spirit that motivates Texans.– Billy Clayton, Speaker of the Texas House No state commands such fierce pride and loyalty. Lesser mortals are pitied for their misfortune in not being born in Texas.— Queen Elizabeth II on her visit to Texas in May, 1991. | |||
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I thought it was quite a bit higher. I have been told by multiple trackers and game scouts that 5-10 lion are poisoned for every one that is hunted (after all, the whole pride is poisoned when they do that), and that the local farmers shoot a fair number that are killing livestock. Of course, these are never found by the folks counting the lion kills. I have personally seen a whole pride that was poisoned. I think my anecdotal evidence is not too out of the ordinary experience. You don't need to talk to too many folks to hear stories about Masai poisoning Lion. If there is wholescale poaching going on, then where is that? Somehow I think the lion population of Tanzania would be fine if they were only losing 400 or less a year. Logically, legal hunting offtake has to be a drop in the bucket. I also have read in several places that the biggest issue is loss of habitat- this is where hunting is the most helpful, yet that is never stated by the scientists as a primary target of big cat protection, reduction of legal hunting pressure is the only thing that seems to be on the table. Again, as I have said before, I am not against a scientifically derived rationale as to which animals to take; but the scientists need to wise up that even if they turn hunting offtake to 0 their current plans don't save the species. Kind of analogous to all the US plans with greenhouse gases. We can cut the US emissions to nothing, but since China, India, and the rest of the third world are dramatically increasing theirs, we really are doing nothing except damaging us without addressing even their perceived problem. | |||
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Large scale commercial poaching of ele is real. Actual intentional poaching of lion for resale is probably quite low. As you say...retaliatory poisoning of lion is a big problem. Still not 1000's per year and I think we can probably safely say less than 1000/year. I have listened to Dr. Packer speak twice now publicly. Each time he led off with loss of habitat being the #1 cause of lion population decline. He has even proposed mechanisms to stop human encroachment into hunting and park land. As #2...he always says retaliatory killing. While he is not a hunter hisself...Dr. Packer recognizes that hunting blocks are needed habitat for lion and only WITH lion hunting money can they be maintained. The man only asked for "real" conservation tactics with transparent accountability...something you and I could agree that was needed...but he was crucified for it...damn shame. The same people that crucified Craig are also turning a blind eye to large scale commercial ele poaching...that is the correlation between the 2. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ J. Lane Easter, DVM A born Texan has instilled in his system a mind-set of no retreat or no surrender. I wish everyone the world over had the dominating spirit that motivates Texans.– Billy Clayton, Speaker of the Texas House No state commands such fierce pride and loyalty. Lesser mortals are pitied for their misfortune in not being born in Texas.— Queen Elizabeth II on her visit to Texas in May, 1991. | |||
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