I have noticed on hunts advertised on outfitters websites, magazines and on here that outfitters say that their animals are free-range or free-roaming, however, this hunting takes place on a fenced property?
Interesting topic with lots of varied opinions. I would say there are several definitions and you must ask lots of questions ot really get a clear answer. If you don't want to see any fences at all, that will be tought in RSA... Those South Africans are the best fence builders in the World! LOL.
For example, one of my concessions is in a Big5 Private Reserve of 5000ha (12500 acres) - is this free range or not? I would most definitely say it is.
Adriaan, not wishing to be argumentative but I would not call that free range... Fair Chase.. Absolutely! I would say that going further, it depends upon the species. Duiker and steenbuck, probably the various pigs, most or all smaller predators, heck likely big predators especially leopard are pretty much free range and fair chase. I've seen leopard duck under a fence without missing a stride.. And jackal baboon, and wart hog go through most fences at full clip! But a cattle fence seems to keep most wildebeest in check and will certainly turn them if they have the option.
I think what people mean by "free-roaming" in South Africa is that the animals are born, breed, live and die on the property in the natural course. Said another way, the animals are not "put" on the property for the purposes of hunting them (some might call this "put and take").
If you assume that this is what "free ranging" means in South Africa, we all still have to make our own decisions about what constitutes "fair chase" - which is a different term - in this context. Personally, I want to hunt free ranging animals which can get away from me. For my purposes, my cut-off is about 20,000 acres, although I recognize this is a big number.
Hank sums it up well.
My first hunt in Africa was with Crusader Safaris owned and managed by Andrew Pringle in the East Cape and he prides himself so on being all free range that he we could not hunt blue wildebeest because he had non available in his definition of "free range". The PH told me he could take me to a place if I insisted but it would not be free range and he preferred to not do that hunt. So I passed and took one this year hunting with
@Spear Safaris on their roughly 20,000 acres where we were mainly hunting buffalo.... That was high fenced and my first fenced hunt... The buffalo hunting was phenomenal and he did have I think 3 bulls that had been brought in to improve genetics.. Those were off limits for a few years at least. We saw fences every day and drove the roads along them... But the internal fences had been taken out and the buffalo hunting was challenging and exciting. Not free range but certainly free chase. I would not repeat the lion hunt though.
To hunt Eland with Crusader, we had to hunt next to a fenced area and actually went in there for lunch. And the whole concession was high fenced and we needed to call to get the gate open to enter. Then we drove some 40 kilometers to the area the eland were hanging out. That night we actually saw a young eland bull trying to get into the fenced enclosure (within the concession) where we had our mid day break... When we shined the headlights at him, he looked at the high fence and then hopped over it!
The RSA huge concessions are a bit different to understand but in the right areas it works well and creates some great hunting experiences in large open areas. But they do have cattle fences.
Then the forth outfit I hunted with was
@Tootabi Hunting Safaris and for my hunting was all fenced. I think he had unfenced areas but even the fenced places were mostly fair chase... I hunted a bontebuck and lechwe which were not overly challenging hunts and the bontebuck were probably in as large an area as you will find for them, but definitely a controlled area. The lechwe were free to roam a large area but were just not hard to find nor difficult to stalk... Maybe I should have held out to hunt one in Zambia or the likes... but the opportunity was there and I took it. I could have had a deal on a sable in similar conditions but drew the line and thought I would rather hunt one in a place like Zambia or Moz. where they really are free roaming. (but it was thrilling to see them!)
We also hunted a very large fenced area where we drove in through one gate and after 121 kilometers and a wrong turn which lead to a decision to not eat the last jerky or candy and to conserve the water.... We found our way out another gate well after dark and made it back to the lodge. That was so huge, I would have to think of it as being as close to free range as you can get on a fenced property... However the comments about the necessity of managing the animal populations rang true and they were doing massive culling... Which lead to skittish animals and challenging hunting conditions. We had herds of hundreds of animals running around in front of us. So it was a sight to behold and a very cool experience.
Out-of-control populations of animals can cause damage to the plant community that can take decades to repair.
Sounds like what I saw in much of Kruger! Especially as it relates to elephant... One old gentleman explained it to me that it is to the point that it would not make a difference to go in and cull 1000 elephants... The population is increasing by that much per year so all it would accomplish would be to gain a year of status quo. He commented that to improve the situation they need to go in cull 7000 elephants. (sorry for the diversion from the topic)
In Zimbabwe we hunted very large communal land areas. That has it's own challenges, mainly a lot of people and livestock around.. But not much in the way of fences.... We drove past some large fenced areas... But we drove for hours without seeing fence while hunting and walked 10+ miles without seeing fences.
If you don't want to even see a cattle fence or drive through a livestock type gate, as a minimum... I would suggest you might look elsewhere other than RSA. Save up for a Tanzanian hunt or go to the right areas in Zimbabwe or Mozambique. I'm sure there are others such as Zambia as well. I assume Namibia has open areas but no experience.
Personally having been there and done all of the above.. No big problem with the very large fenced areas that are truly fair chase... I want nothing to do with the put and take stuff but understand it is fine for others and if done well I cannot condemn the practice. But it will really piss me off if I'm mislead into something that it is not.....