Recent content by AFRICAN INDABA

The Wyss Foundation is partnering with African Parks [currently managing ten parks in seven countries, totaling approximately six million hectares of protected areas] to safeguard more large wild landscapes in Africa from poaching and destruction,” said Hansjörg Wyss, Founder and Chairman of The...

African Leopard & US Fish & Wildlife Service The deadline for comments to assist the US Fish & Wildlife Service with its decision on whether to up-list leopard to ‘Endangered’ was January 31st. It will take another year or more before a decision is rendered and action taken. Hunters taking...

Editor’s Note: When you come across vegetarians/vegans again – here are some good arguments for a civilized dialogue When it comes to food, few things are more universal than a loaf of bread. Wholemeal, white, or seeded, we consume billions of loaves annually, all over the world. But despite...

When Richard Ruggiero first saw the gold mine from the air, he was reminded of one of Dante’s circles of hell. It In the midst of Gabon’s Minkebe National Park—a huge protected area the size of Belgium—there was “a gaping hole in the forest more than half a mile wide and long.” On the ground...

Although widespread across the savannah, woodland and desert regions of 21 countries in sub-Saharan Africa, giraffe populations are increasingly fragmented and shrinking in size, and have already been lost from 7 countries. There are now estimated to be less than 100,000 individuals left – less...

The Boone and Crockett Club, the oldest hunter-conservationist organization in North America, has released a position statement and video on big-game trophies and hunting on 18 January 2017. There are several aspects to public hunting and its connection to wildlife and habitat conservation that...

Editor’s Note: I recently discovered Dougherty’s 2011 article when searching the internet. Although written in a North American context, it strikes me as being applicable to Southern Africa, if one exchanges deer with buffalo, antelopes, etc. and readjusts the property sizes. We have written...

The breeding of wildlife to produce unusually colored animals, in the hope that hunters would pay a lot more to shoot them, has fallen flat in a spectacular manner — with the practice being widely condemned If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. The old adage has become a painful...

Africa’s protected parks and reserves are capable of supporting 83,000 wild lions if well funded and managed, according to a new report led by Panthera. Published in Biological Conservation [1], the study shows that populations of the African lion and its prey species are drastically below their...

Editor’s Note: Carl D. Mitchell sent me this article. Considering the main topic in this issue of African Indaba it seems appropriate to include this opinion piece of Darimont et al. in full length. 1. Introduction The killing of Cecil the lion (Panthera leo) ignited enduring and...

People that don’t live in Africa tend to learn about wildlife conservation in easy-to-understand terminology. But safeguarding animal species like lions is often more complex than mainstream media sound bites would have their audiences believe. The National Post recently reported that...

A new paper by IUCN experts presents substantial evidence that the controversial practice of trophy hunting can produce positive outcomes for wildlife conservation and local people. Download the PDF at Unasylva 249, Vol. 68, 2017/1 Trophy hunting is the subject of intense debate and polarized...

President Teddy Roosevelt said more than 100 years ago “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care”. This statement aptly describes the present status of the relationship between hunters and non-hunters. Anti-hunting activism un-fettered by scientific facts and logic...