Global outcry over killing of desert elephant

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The controversy about the hunting of the so-called desert-adapted elephants is continuing, with local and international outrage growing against Namibia following its decision to issue hunting permits for these animals.

Since reports first surfaced about a month ago accusing the Namibian government of issuing hunting permits to gain political support, a global campaign against the government has gained momentum and has now been fuelled by the recent shooting of the first desert elephant.

While the allegations of buying votes have been dismissed by the Ministry of Environment and Tourism, the controversy about the hunting of these elephant has grown in the past few weeks.

A campaign on social media was launched, with over 10 000 tweets being sent in a short period of time, and a rapidly growing petition to stop the hunting of desert elephants has gathered more than 12 000 signatures.

The issue has also sparked debate on whether Namibia’s desert-adapted elephant is in fact a subspecies and whether the population is at risk.

The killing of the young elephant bull in the Sorris-Sorris conservancy, north-west of Uis, on June 14 has resulted in a renewed outcry from the international community.

The young bull, nicknamed ‘Delta’, from the Ugab family herd was apparently shot near a local school with 200 children. He was one of only three young bulls in the Ugab family.

Environmentalists have criticised the killing of Delta as unnecessary and bad conservation practice when taking into consideration the various other options submitted to both the government and the hunting outfitter.

The government has apparently proceeded with the sale of these hunting permits against the advice of highly qualified scientists and conservationists working tirelessly towards the protection and understanding of these elephants in the desert.

Other options made available to the government included replacing elephant meat with beef for the villagers.

According to the ministry only four elephants have been included on this year’s game utilisation quota for conservancies. Two elephants are shared by conservancies in the Khorixas district of the Kunene Region and the Omatjete area in the Erongo Region, while the Torra and Doro !Nawas conservancies share another elephant and the Otjimboyo, Tsiseb, Sorri-Sorris and Ohungu conservancies also share an elephant. The elephant are for own use by the conservancies and therefore not limited to bulls. The quota is for a period of three years.

However there have been claims that seven permits have been issued, which included a trophy-hunting permit.



Source: Namibian Sun
 
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Hi Jerome

Thanks for the update. From reading there is a disagreement on the number of desert elephants in Namibia.

From a high of 160+ to a low of 60 big spread in the elephant herd count.

The herd is growing at 3 to 4% at year. or the government leaders are saying 5 to 8 elephants.

conservation groups are saying a growth rate of 2 to 3 % or 1 to 3 elephants a year.

It has been difficult to determine which numbers are correct.

However brighter minds than mine indicated that the harvest of 6 old bulls this year is not in the best interest of the herd and it is not sustainable. They were asking for a more modest plan of 2 to 3 old bulls from the desert herd.

However, election year brings some promises that need to be kept.
 
I am afraid that I am the culprit behind the global social media flurry. I am a booking agent and a few months ago, I sold a desert elephant hunt for a Namibia Outfitter to take place in Namibia later this year. As my desert elephant listing position on the internet using Google was high on page 1, I made the marketing decision to leave the listing on line after it was sold and mark it as sold. The anti-hunters stumbled upon it and it immediately went viral. I started receiving 150 E-mails a day with the worst language you can imagine. I also received several death threats. Once I got my e-mail filters set to remove terms such as scumbag, murderer, the F words, etc., they shifted to my business Facebook Page and began leaving negative comments and 1 star ratings. Once I figured out how to stop those, they shifted to Twitter. I actually received Tweets from Oprah, Hillary Clinton and Leonardo Di Caprio pleading with me to stop killing elephants. I finally took down my Twitter page, as it was becoming a distraction.

(I must admit, from an anti-hunter perspective, the picture of the deceased trophy is a little bit in-your-face. I will most likely use a picture of a live elephant in the future)

They then started an online petition aimed towards a Minister in Namibia imploring him to stop the hunts. The prime movers behind all of this activity is a UK based organization whose main purpose is to halt all elephant hunting. I believe they are called Save The Elephants .Org / UK. They will never rest until all hunting is stopped.

This was a legally sanctioned hunt and the permit was lawfully issued by the Namibian government. The issuance of this permit falls within the realm of sustainable usage, which is sanctioned under CITES. The meat is distributed to the local village and concession fees are paid that benefit the local population.

I will not be deterred from selling legal hunts and have since listed white rhino hunts, elephant hunts within the Associated Parks Nature Reserves (APNR) that feature unfenced borders with Kruger Park, and lion hunts immediately adjacent to Kruger Park. I have toyed with the idea of listing a black rhino that has become available, but have no wish to experience all of the noise that the DSC auction of the black rhino cause earlier this year. And to add to the irony, I recently was offered another one of the rare Desert Elephant tags that is available for a hunt this year.

I write this to reinforce to you that we, as hunters, are under attack by the uninformed anti-hunting organizations that sit at their homes in urban areas and spew out hate mail directed at hunters and organizations associated with the hunting business. Most of them have never spent a dime on conservation and most have never been to Africa to witness the poverty and other issues that Africa faces.

The real problem for wildlife in Africa is not the legal and closely regulated hunting of animals. It is the rampant illegal poaching and the rapidly expanding human population that is pressuring both the animals and the habitat that sustains them.

I regret that my leaving the desert elephant hunt on the web after it had sold started this social media flare-up, but just as the antis have adopted the web, so have those of us that offer hunts for sale. The collision was inevitable!

John Martins
 
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The internet is your friend and enemy.
 
John, after seeing the effects of "the love" first hand, I understand what you have had to endure. Give Oprah our love when you chat.

I will not be deterred from selling legal hunts and ……………. I have toyed with the idea of listing a black rhino that has become available, but have no wish to experience all of the noise that the DSC auction of the black rhino cause earlier this year.
…….

From that response it appears you have already been deterred.

The collision was inevitable!
…….

Perhaps we all need to learn to drive defensively to avoid accidents.


This was a legally sanctioned hunt and the permit was lawfully issued by the Namibian government. …..

Namibia has some of the best working models for community use and conservation in Africa. They are not perfect though.

I recently followed a story in Namibia of a Bull Elephant that wandered into an area that Elephant are not typically found. Over several weeks the Bull was hazed by locals, all the while causing some damage to property. On the big scale, it was nothing. To the locals that were effected it was a significant cost. Complaints were voiced and the people were told the Elephant would move on.
Shortly, I read about the result. The Elephant finally got tired of the hazing and did some real damage. Which resulted in it being destroyed. Read: Shot as a problem causing animal.
This did not happen in a typical conservancy, so there was no apparatus in place to facilitate a hunt. The price of which might have benefited the community directly. I never found out if the meat was even used. I hope so.

Developed areas and Elephants equal conflict.

Localized populations of Elephants may be under threat (Tanzania/Kenya/Congo/ Vietnam), while other local populations are certainly not (Addo, Hwange, Chobe, etc). In my view, global generalizations that suggest banning all Elephant hunting will not work and we have direct evidence that banning hunting does not work (Kenya). Conversely, a general argument about "legal" hunting Elephant under CITES authorizations for a country as a whole, does not mean every Elephant population is sustainably huntable.

Perhaps, this smaller "distinct" population of Elephants is some of the issue for the Antis. This group has certainly been covered widely in the media and gained significant notoriety and thus huge emotional attachment has been created. I am not sure that there is a more well known group of Elephants anywhere.

Personally, it makes sense for me to determine if the qualified science is present to support a sustainable hunt of a local population. Since I am not planning to head out on a Desert Elephant hunt tomorrow I have no idea of the science in this case. It sounds like there are some conflicting ideas and conclusions.

Typically, Namibia follows the science and manages its wildlife reasonably well. Taking the heat on the Black Rhino has cost them and they have been standing behind that conservation decision and taking the heat.

As hunters I hope we all make informed decisions about our hunts and ensure we are part of the solution and an integral member of the conservation team.
 
Detered was probably the wrong term to use. The black rhino would have had to be marketed at a price of $260,000. That is a lot of coin and the pool of buyers for this type of hunt is small. The grief vs reward ratio mulltiplied by the probability of finding a buyer on the internet did not equal a worthwhile experience. Plus, I am not sure that USF&W would issue an import permit, as the funds would mostly go to the concession owner.
So I decided to market the white rhino instead!
 
Hi John

Thank you for the response.

The only reason i was looking at this was the possibility of a potential elephant hunt for myself in the future.

I always like to look ahead and see what is available that i would like to do and what i can or could afford. I do not not like borrowing money to go on a safari.

While looking at places to hunt Elephant, Tanzania, Mozambique and Zimbabwe are off of me.

Therefore, I was doing some reading on hunting Elephants in Namibia, when I came across the hunting of desert elephants information on the internet. I have seen pictures and read some stories on the tracking, camp-lodging facilities that went with a desert elephant hunt.

The Namibian parks can only support a limited elephant herd with out damage to the ecosystem.

Then i was trying to find out the number of elephants in the desert elephant herd, and that when the conflicting numbers starting showing up. I try to use government game department numbers, however they were dated information. However there were other reports and they had a wide spread in number count (newer number information).

By any count this was not going to be a walk in the park guarantee elephant hunt. The ones (2) that i looked at usually found tracks on roads near the park boundary and then tracked elephants that left the park and this could be a all day event. Day after day until a shooter would be found.
 
James.

If you want to PM me I will give you the lowdown on Desert Elephant hunts. There are only a handfull available at any one time. I am only aware of 1 exportable tag currently available and the asking price is $37,000. The actual count is estimated between 300-400, but some debate exists, as some of Namibia's elephants are highly migratory and show up in areas that what many consider to be the "true desert elephants" inhabit. So the question becomes "Do they count as desert elephants?" It depends on who you talk to.

Mt hunter asked me to go and film him. He is also actually hunting a leopard and lion as part of a classic safari package that I got for him at an incredible price. It will be VERY HOT (120 degrees F ), and this will be an incredibly difficult hunt. 21 days of roasting! My hunter is 41 and in great shape. I am 59 and in not great shape, although I managed to get a Tahr in NZ last year on foot! I would love to accompany him, but am not in good enough shape to do it. I know it, and I don't want to slow them down. My brother put it in perspective for me when he told me "I wouldn't put myself through that for my own elephant, much less someone elses! Instead, I will be sitting in a tree stand in Iowa during the rut trying to top the 216" monster that I shot last year with a rifle, but this time with a bow! But my heart will be in Namibia with my hunter!
 

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