Hunting Lion

Danilo,

If entering a 15000 acre area to pursue a lion that you already know is out there and unable escape beyond the fenced boundaries is what you wish to do, so be it. I just said it's not my thing. So what?

And, if you are under the belief that all 'hunting' is conducted behind fences, well, I can only suppose that you must be kidding. You are kidding, right?

Like I said, to each his own.

Hi,

All animals in Namibia or South Africa belongs to the owner of the land. They have fences because they to protect his property. The animals are breed or bought for someone's hunt. I'm kidding if you have never seen reality.
Other countries use another sistem. The land belongs to the farmer or the government, but all animals belong to the government. Then they make money with the safari ($1.000,00 or 1.500,00 per day). Do you think that they don't know where the animals are? The ph lives with that. Today, with GPS, they go with you where they want, spend all 10 to 14 days in non-fenced areas for you to kill one and they receive for daily rates.

That's real. What do you think about shooting a lion in a small fenced area but very dirty, with possilibity of charge all the time? Would it be better a large place, with no fences, a lion under one tree resting and you spot him and shoot at 200~300 yards? Which is the better choice?Which is the real hunt?

Lions make small territories and live there if they have enough food. Non- fenced areas for a lion is not a big land. Do the lions escape from the humans? Do they run like plains game? NO, they stop and get furious.
Danilo
 
Lions that live in the east African Miombo woodland often maintain quite big territories.
I spent four months in Northern Mozambique this season and I can tell you that the Ph's of that area know a great deal of their areas but they might not even hunt half of the area due to the size and time required.
 
Danilo . . . much of your most recent post is a collection of misinformation which I can only suppose is a contrived justification in support of the high fenced lion hunting which you so obviously support. There is no real reason for you to do so. Like I've said multiple times; so be it, it's your choice, and to each his own.

But with regard to your attempt to diminish free range lion hunting where do you come up with nonsense such as locating a lion "under one tree resting and you spot him and shoot at 200~300 yards? Which is the better choice? (free range or high fenced enclosure) Which is the real hunt?"

First, I don't know of any reputable PH who would condone such a shot on a lion in the first place and, secondly, I don't know any true sport hunter who would consider taking such a shot. Most ethical hunters I know consider long shots on dangerous game animals to be unsporting.


classicsafari . . . Sounds like a great area where a true hunt will take place. It's too bad more people haven't had the opportunity and/or desire to experience a true free range hunt for game in such an area. . . and four months, you lucky devil!
 
Impacts of Trophy Hunting on Lions in East and Southern Africa

Impacts of Trophy Hunting on Lions in East and Southern Africa: Recent offtake and future recommendations

View the entire article at impacts-of-trophy-hunting-on-lions.pdf.

watermark.php

Known-aged Lion males from the Serengeti

View the entire article at impacts-of-trophy-hunting-on-lions.
 
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I've been following a debate on AR about the "canned lion hunts" in South Africa. Yes, there is a high fence...it keep the plains game in as well. It's a huge concession....I don't know how may acres but it's 10's of thousands. The lions are not drugged, the are not socialized to humans...what's the rub? How is shooting a deer in Texas on a fenced concession, over a water hole, near a feeder, from a fixed & elevated blind more sporting that shooting a captive bred lion that has a higher chance of a charge than a wild lion so horrible?

High fence is less sporting in any capacity I think thats the point. however 10s of thousands of acres does open up the can to debate...
 
Hi Big Five,

Where do you hunt? If "That's just not hunting" like you said, show me one place without fences in USA, South Africa, Canada, Mexico, Spain, Russia or Namibia? Botswana and Zimbabwe, may be...

Danilo

You need to get out more apparently. If you hunted behind high fence in Canada then you deliberately chose to do so and missed out on hunting some of the last true wilderness on the planet. There are very few fenced hunting operations in Canada as most provinces in Canada have banned it. Resident Canadian hunters generally despise high fenced hunting and most provincial fish and game associations have lobbied long and hard to stop it from starting in their provinces and successfully had it banned in several others after it started.

If you even suggested hunting deer or moose behind a fence to a resident hunter in British Columbia, the Yukon, the Northwest Territories, or in Manitoba where I live, they would probably fall off their chair laughing. Different place, different mindset. I have been hunting and guiding in Canada for close to 4 decades and I have NEVER hunted behind high fence, nor had any desire to do so.

Certainly there are high fenced operations in most countries and they are far more prevalent in some than others. Bottom line though is if you hunted behind fence in a number of countries you listed, it was by choice and nothing else.

Maybe you should try booking with an outfitter in Canada's north and go on a pack trip into real wilderness for a couple of weeks for moose, elk, sheep and grizzly. See what it is like to hunt in an area where the only people you see for two weeks are your guide and a cook/wrangler............and perhaps the outfitter if he drops in with his Supercub to see how you are doing and drop off some supplies. Listen to the wolves at night and know that they and the grizzlies are your only hunting competition. Then perhaps you will know what Big 5 is talking about.
 
Some people live from hunting and for others it's a sport. With the technology today, if you think that a lot of days are needed to encounter a lion it's because you are the guide, making money with the client. I'm a hunter and bought it, but I know that the PH can spend a lot of days walking behind a lion and you don't really know what's happening.
Just one question... Would it be better to spend a lot of money with a daily rate or to pay for an animal?
 
Would it be better to spend a lot of money with a daily rate or to pay for an animal?

danilocf

I would book 21 days in non-fenced safari area, hunt hard, hang baits, sit in blinds, track lion, shoot bait and work my butt off for the full 21 days and not kill a lion before shooting one behind a fence.

"paying" for an animal is not sport hunting.
 
Wait a lion with a bait? Sorry, but it's really not a hunt.
The problem is if to you know if you are tracking an animal or walking behind the guide.
Why the PH don't sell animals with high prices in non-fenced areas? Why do you have to pay $1.000,00 or more for a day? Why do you receive only $3000,00 or $ 4.000,00 if you don't kill it and pay $20.000,00 or more for daily rates? They sell the lodge, not an animal. It's a big business.
 
Maybe you should try booking with an outfitter in Canada's north and go on a pack trip into real wilderness for a couple of weeks for moose, elk, sheep and grizzly. See what it is like to hunt in an area where the only people you see for two weeks are your guide and a cook/wrangler............and perhaps the outfitter if he drops in with his Supercub to see how you are doing and drop off some supplies. Listen to the wolves at night and know that they and the grizzlies are your only hunting competition. Then perhaps you will know what Big 5 is talking about.

Skyline, well said!



danilocf

I would book 21 days in non-fenced safari area, hunt hard, hang baits, sit in blinds, track lion, shoot bait and work my butt off for the full 21 days and not kill a lion before shooting one behind a fence.

"paying" for an animal is not sport hunting.


Mike70560, my sentiments exactly!



. . . if you think that a lot of days are needed to encounter a lion it's because you are the guide, making money with the client. I'm a hunter and bought it, but I know that the PH can spend a lot of days walking behind a lion and you don't really know what's happening.
Just one question... Would it be better to spend a lot of money with a daily rate or to pay for an animal?

danilocf, again and again I'll say that if you wish to hunt within an enclosure for lion, or any other game for that matter, it's your choice to do so. No one is holding you back and no one is telling you not to do so. But the more you unnecessarily defend your position to hunt in that manner your series of posts seem to suggest that your hunting experiences are either quite limited, or they have all been conducted within high fenced enclosures.

In one post you seemed to suggest that all hunting in all places is done behind fences. That, of course, is purely uninformed nonsense. In another post you attempt to simplify and reduce free range lion hunting to nothing more than walking up and lobbing a shot in at a lion resting under a tree at safe distance of 200-300 yards. Again, absolute nonsense. And, most recently you suggest that proper lion hunting can successfully be conducted in a matter of just a very few days. You're kidding, right?

Have you ever been on a free range fair chase hunt, or have you always entered the 'hunting field' through a locked gate?
 
Nobody talk about my questions. I'm learning. I know about the big business and war behind that. But I don't want to pay a lodge.
 
Nobody talk about my questions. I'm learning. I know about the big business and war behind that. But I don't want to pay a lodge.


I am not sure what you mean about big business and war, it may be something lost in translation.

We have a difference of opinion on how lion (or any dangerous game) should be hunted.

I read that you do not want to book very many days, buy a lion, and shoot it.

I prefer to book as many days as possible and stay in camp the entire time. Last year I stayed in Martin Pieters camp on Lake Kariba for a week after my hunt was over and enjoyed that time as much as my hunt.

If you think $1000.00 per day is too much for a dangerous game hunt you probably have never been to a remote camp. Between vehicles, generators, food, diesel, PHs, trackers, etc and the logistics to bring it all together it is it is tough to make money at $1000.00 per day. Throw in an anti-poaching team of 20 to 40 men year round and hopefully you get the picture.

The are not selling a lodge (as you put it), they are selling an experience that for me is worth every penny I have spent on three dangerous game hunts.

As Big5 said hunt where you like it matters not to me, but to make uninformed statements and comparisons about hunting unfenced areas is completely incorrect.
 
Like I said: I'm learning. How much do you think that one of the black men are payed for a day? Try to find it and you will know what I am talking about.
I would like to spend a lot of days hunting a lion and I will pay it well: $15.000,00 for lion and $300,00/400,00 for a day . Not $15.000,00/20.000,00 for the lodge and $4.000,00 or $5.000,00 for a lion. Something is wrong when the principal activities is not to kill the animal, but to sell the place. Well, it is possible to hunt with few persons and sleep in a tent. I don't need luxury. I only want to hunt.
Danilo
 
Hmmmm...............read the last couple of pages on this and view it as being very similar to beating your head against the wall. It feels good when you stop.
 
Like I said: I'm learning. How much do you think that one of the black men are payed for a day? Try to find it and you will know what I am talking about.
I would like to spend a lot of days hunting a lion and I will pay it well: $15.000,00 for lion and $300,00/400,00 for a day . Not $15.000,00/20.000,00 for the lodge and $4.000,00 or $5.000,00 for a lion. Something is wrong when the principal activities is not to kill the animal, but to sell the place. Well, it is possible to hunt with few persons and sleep in a tent. I don't need luxury. I only want to hunt.
Danilo

Danilo, I can assure you that what the outfit pay staff has very little to do with the price of such a high demand and little available Safari .
You say you are learning yet you make statements about lodges and how much you pay to stay there? From where do you get such information. Hunting and killing a Lion is great, but the whole safari is what its about and I can happily say, I find the experience of a Safari into wild places like Selous, Niassa, Zambezi est worth far more than shooting a farmed cat in SA.
But again, the saying "what ever floats your boat" has merit here.
 
Hi Classicsafari

Thanks for replying with respect. I don't like trying to kill someone with my arguments like other people. I have a doubt about what they call "real Hunt with no fences". If you know about tracking an animal you should know when you are going behind it or the guide . If he is a serious PH, I would like someone showing me why you have to spend 15 or 20 days behind a lion? I would understand it if it was last century, but today, with GPS and other modern equipments, that's unbeliavable.
 
Hi Classicsafari

I have a doubt about what they call "real Hunt with no fences". If you know about tracking an animal you should know when you are going behind it or the guide . If he is a serious PH, I would like someone showing me why you have to spend 15 or 20 days behind a lion? I would understand it if it was last century, but today, with GPS and other modern equipments, that's unbeliavable.

As I have probably stated before, both my lion where taken in wilderness areas (Zimbabwe's lower Zambezi Valley and northern Mozambique. Both these areas are in the millions of acres in size and hold a high natural lion populations).
I was lucky enough to have taken both of them within eight days of starting the Safaris (one by tracking and one of bait). This however in not going to happen all the time (unless they live in a enclosed area).
During my three months last season and five months this season in Moz, I watched successfully and unsuccessful Lion Safaris unfold. This is all apart of a proper Safari.
My next cat Safari will be Leopard and although most outfits will sell ten to twelve day hunts, I will book fourteen as I know this will assist in success in a quality cat during daylight hours.


not me.
 
My next cat Safari will be Leopard and although most outfits will sell ten to twelve day hunts, I will book fourteen as I know this will assist in success in a quality cat during daylight hours.

I agree. I think you are wise in your decision to book fourteen days for a proper daylight hunt for leopard. As you know those stealthy big toms just love to vanish at the crack of dawn and await the end of dusk to reappear.

My best wishes for your success. I truly hope you get a great tom!
 
A Tool For Lion Hunters: The Pocket Guide To Aging Lions

A Tool For Lion Hunters: The Pocket Guide To Aging Lions

In November, Conservation Force began widely distributing a condensed version of its Guide to Aging Lion in East and Southern Africa. The free guide occupies the last two pages of this Bulletin. It has been circulated to professional hunters associations, is available on Conservation Force’s website, is being published in African Indaba and freely handed out at meetings and conventions around the world.

Of course, it is not a substitute for the more complete guide of 46 pages published by Safari Press. The guide was the work of 12 of the leading lion specialists in the world, while this free guide has been wholly prepared by the leading author of the original, Karyl Whitman, Ph.D., and has been previewed by Craig Packer, Ph.D.

Hunters are the primary stakeholders in the survival of the African lion, which is seen as intolerable by pastoralists. We are also its stewards.

It is necessary and important that we search for and apply suitable practices for this dwindling species. The limiting of harvest to lion five years of age or older is the new ethic, new definition of a trophy lion, and has the very least biological impact on the respective population. If we are to be good stewards, we must adopt reasonable practices ourselves. The age ethic is fortified by contemporary lion science. Conservation Force is deeply engaged with the scientific community in the advancement of that science in addition to our leadership in evolving national lion action plans across Africa.

I am getting a little leery of “best practices” as being unnecessarily limiting. Nevertheless, this is a better practice, particularly while we endeavor to secure robust lion populations, of which there are too few, and rebuild and restore others. It is probably a necessary, good faith practice if we are to keep lion from being uplisted and continue to play our important role in its conservation. It is still a difficult judgment call in the field, but that is what makes it a true trophy.

View or print The Pocket Guide To Aging Lions at pocket-guide-to-aging-lion.

watermark.php

The Pocket Guide To Aging Lions

View or print The Pocket Guide To Aging Lions at pocket-guide-to-aging-lion.

Conservation Force Directors serve on the African Lion Working Group (ALWG) and the Cat Specialist Group of IUCN. Conservation Force has lion research, management and recovery projects from Danakil, Ethiopia, west to Burkina Faso and throughout all of Africa. Unfortunately, it is not yet enough, but we are in for the long haul to ensure that lions forever roar.
 
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Hi Big Five,

Where do you hunt? If "That's just not hunting" like you said, show me one place without fences in USA, South Africa, Canada, Mexico, Spain, Russia or Namibia? Botswana and Zimbabwe, may be...

Danilo

Gentlemen you are waging a loosing battle here. There’s one thing sure, you will never get through to anyone with facts whose mind is already made up! The boy says he is LEARNING, but his reluctance to see facts here doesn’t bear that idea out to me.

It is my opinion that Danilocf is not only misinformed but is a child as well, and getting through to him is like, as someone said earlier, banging you head against a brick wall. This young man has some citified ideas as to what hunting is all about, and equates hunting with money and shooting. What he is leaving out is the HUNTING part! The concept of HUNTING is as foreign to him as if he were from MARS.

In the first place I have never seen a LODGE in anything but a high fenced game farm hunting area, or a national park, and it is quite evident he has never been in a wild hunting area without a high fence. Has never actually tracked a lion, or he would know that they are not that easy to approach, and can lead you on a merry chase for days, and still out distance you, never giving you a glimpse much less a shot.

There are some things mentioned about high fenced operations that are true and that experienced hunter say is not true! One is the fact that those who choose to TAKE/BUY a lion ( I don’t call it hunting) in a fenced in enclosure are at least not taking wild lions from the bush where proper lion hunting takes place. That much is a plus! Another fact is, because these lions in enclosures have little fear of people, once wounded have no hesitation in charging you because they know that can’t escape. So this lion shooting can be dangerous, and not only because the lion is not afraid of people, but because the people who engage in that type of lion shooting, are generally very inexperienced, and not only the paying client, but the so-called PHs as well.

Some animals are OK in high fenced areas that are larger than their natural range, like Impala or many of the antelope that don’t migrate but live their whole lives in a HOME RANGE. Whitetail deer are an example, of a non-migrating animal. The whitetail deer lives and dies within one mile of his birth place in low land habitat, and only move up and down in altitude in country where the mountains get deep under snow in winter, so they have to go to winter pasture, and back up the mountain in summer!

Animals like lion Cape buffalo, elephant, and the migrating things like zebra, wildebeest, who follow the rains, Or Elk and Moose in North America should never be shot behind fence. Of course there is a case where the fence doesn’t matter as long as it doesn’t hinder the animal’s natural habits at all. A good example of this is hunting on islands where the fence is the shoreline, and is as effective as any man made fence ever built.
Nobody I know thinks coastal Brown bears on off shore islands are not fair chase, while they are as effectively fenced in as if in a very large cage. Everyone always brings up SA and Texas when these things are posted, and as others have said here, if you ain’t hunted the whole place you simply don’t know what you are talking about. The general idea is that TEXAS is nothing but HIGH FENCE HUNTING, and that is certainly not the case. There are a few high fence ranches in Texas, but I would say there is less that 200,000 acres under high fence in Texas out of a state that is larger that than the whole country of Zambia, or Zimbabwe, 252 counties, some of which are bigger than some countries, and a piece of land that is 1000 miles across in any direction you want to cross it, and 92 % of the state is privately owned. I’ve hunted all my life in Texas and I’ve never hunted but one time in a high fenced property, and that was simply a cull meat hunt to fill the freezer not a sport hunt. Almost all private property in Texas and most western states is fenced, but 99% of it is low cattle fencing that doesn’t hinder game animals at all.

So as others have already said if the Money, high fence and guarantees, are what you are about have at it, but if you want to HUNT, especially dangerous game in Africa get the hell out of most of RSA, and get into the large hunting areas where you will get a safari, rather than a drive in a park, and a so-called trophy for your money.
 

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