Hunting: In Namibia, The Trophies That Create Discord

Trying to help people understand.

As I discussed in my hunt report, Le Figaro magazine was with us as part of a larger story in Namibia. Attached is the link to a piece of that story. Perhaps @AfricaHunting.com could translate the first half if he has time. The article hits the stands in the morning, May 28, 2021, in the Figaro Magazine and the entire interview will be used for various things as well as in Le Figaro live.

The English interview starts at one minute into the video.

French:
Chasse: en Namibie, les trophées de la discorde
Barbarie pour les uns, tradition pour les autres : la chasse aux trophées déchaîne les passions et embrase les réseaux sociaux. Nous avons pu suivre un chasseur américain lors d’un safari en Namibie. Pour comprendre ses motivations et savoir si cette pratique pouvait jouer un rôle dans la conservation en Afrique.

Translation into English:
Hunting: In Namibia, The Trophies That Create Discord
Barbarism for some, tradition for others: trophy hunting unleashes passions and sets social networks ablaze. We were able to follow an American hunter on a safari in Namibia. To understand his motivations and find out if this practice could play a role in conservation in Africa.

@gizmo when you have the link to the Figaro Magazine article, please send it to me or just post it here and I will translate it.

AfricaHunting.com said:

@gizmo when you have the link to the Figaro Magazine article, please send it to me or just post it here and I will translate it.

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Thank you Jerome. I will do so as soon as it’s posted.

For some reason the video does not want to play for me, saying I need to have a look at my cookies...
I'v tried another browser, used VPN to go to France, but to no avail..
Maybe they'll post the video on their Youtube channel as well (its not there yet)

but thanks a lot for sharing Gizmo!

How did this happen that a French newspaper is interviewing an American on his hunt in Namibia?

Well that is quite a story in itself but I’ll give the Cliff notes version and sum it up with, the photographer that took all the pics and I have been working together for a little over 5 years now. She’s a free lance photographer who is French and stationed in Belgium. We have done several projects together over the years and she has become like family. About 3 years ago Le Figaro approached her about the work she was doing on my ranch and asked if one of their journalists could do an article on it. I agreed to it and they sent one of their high speed big wigs. @BWH helped me with that one. When I told Mel I was going to Namibia I asked her if she wanted to come and asked if she knew anyone that would want to pick up the story. Le Figaro had pretty good success with the last one so they sent Vincent Jolly down with Mel to do this one as it tied in with some things he was already working on. The whole thing was wonderful and I’m very glad it all worked out.

This article is reserved for subscribers. 93% of the article is not showing.

Here is the English translation using the international page translation tool.

I'm in France, so I'll try to find the newspaper tomorrow and I'll post it here as soon as possible.

The following of the paper...


Slowly we follow in Hendrick's footsteps. Hands clasped behind his back and head lowered to the ground, he sinks deeper into the bush. The large stains of coagulated blood on the rocky ground succeed more and more scattered droplets, soiling a vegetation whitened by the first rays of dawn.

The anguish of the stalking.
All are haunted by the same thought, but no one dares to say it: What if they do not find it? "There is nothing worse for a hunter to know that an injured animal wanders in the wild," says Erik. We progress under the branches of trees between which the spiders have woven thick webs tossed by the wind. You have to face this wind in order not to scare away the animals.Five miles and a thousand and one thorns away, Hendrick lifts his hand over his shoulder. He crouched down suddenly. We imitate him. At three hundred meters from us, a small black spot appears on the horizon. The binoculars allow us to see the wildebeest and its black coat flushed with the wound on its side. . With a stern gaze, shortness of breath, Erik grabs his Remington 700 again and adjusts his scope. Everything comes to a stop for a short, seemingly endless moment. The explosion tears the silence; the smell of gunpowder stings our noses. nostrils The sound of the galloping hooves of the rest of the herd follows the reverberation of the shot.The wildebeest collapses for the last time.Reassured, moved, Erik approaches the corpse, "No one should touch the animal before the hunter", he specifies before kneeling near his prey. "It's pretty amazing to know that no human being has approached him before me." Hendrick shakes his hand, Phillip, the PH and owner of the reserve we are in, congratulates his client. Erik takes off his cap, runs his hand through his sweat-soaked hair and exclaims: "My friend, that's a full size taxidermy”. A trophy intended to join the many other empaikké animals owned by Erik Grimland.
... To be contined ...

Solitaire said:

The following of the paper...


Slowly we follow in Hendrick's footsteps. Hands clasped behind his back and head lowered to the ground, he sinks deeper into the bush. The large stains of coagulated blood on the rocky ground succeed more and more scattered droplets, soiling a vegetation whitened by the first rays of dawn.

The anguish of the stalking.
All are haunted by the same thought, but no one dares to say it: What if they do not find it? "There is nothing worse for a hunter to know that an injured animal wanders in the wild," says Erik. We progress under the branches of trees between which the spiders have woven thick webs tossed by the wind. You have to face this wind in order not to scare away the animals.Five miles and a thousand and one thorns away, Hendrick lifts his hand over his shoulder. He crouched down suddenly. We imitate him. At three hundred meters from us, a small black spot appears on the horizon. The binoculars allow us to see the wildebeest and its black coat flushed with the wound on its side. . With a stern gaze, shortness of breath, Erik grabs his Remington 700 again and adjusts his scope. Everything comes to a stop for a short, seemingly endless moment. The explosion tears the silence; the smell of gunpowder stings our noses. nostrils The sound of the galloping hooves of the rest of the herd follows the reverberation of the shot.The wildebeest collapses for the last time.Reassured, moved, Erik approaches the corpse, "No one should touch the animal before the hunter", he specifies before kneeling near his prey. "It's pretty amazing to know that no human being has approached him before me." Hendrick shakes his hand, Phillip, the PH and owner of the reserve we are in, congratulates his client. Erik takes off his cap, runs his hand through his sweat-soaked hair and exclaims: "My friend, that's a full size taxidermy”. A trophy intended to join the many other empaikké animals owned by Erik Grimland.
... To be contined ...

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Thank you very much for doing this.

gizmo said:

Thank you very much for doing this.

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You continue to amaze, as does this site and members. Well done for the joy you bring to all who read.

Bravo Zulu to all.

MB

Even translated that was very well written and sermd to capture the emotion of the moment.

Thanks for Google tanslator .....

Thanks for Google tanslator ..... but I'm writing in french before, I'm not so good in english ....

A $ 12,000 trip
Like thousands of other hunters every year, Erik traveled to Namibia last April to exercise his passion. A trip he organized with two of his friends and for which he saved for a long time. "I only travel to hunt, the rest, that bothers me" he proclaims!
Exceptionally, he accepted our presence during this adventure for which he is spending more than $ 12,000.The media repercussions, insults and threats he risks by exposing himself in this way? He does not care: "Fate wanted me to kill my lion on the same day as W.J. Palmer, the famous dentist who chased Cécil in Zimbabwe."But I'm my own boss, Twitter and company can go there, they can't change me. And if they want to find me, they'll come see me on my ranch in Texas." Erik readily agrees, he is teasing. But from the top of his 41 years and behind a big mouth capable of declining the insults and the most deliciously vulgar jokes and leds that the language of Shakespeare can understand, he reveals himself to be a generous individual, endowed with a natural bonhomie and sharp humor."Have you read Capstick? It's like Hemmingway but without the depression" he tells us with this disarming aplomb. From Peter Hathaway Capstick, one of the greatest writers on the hunt that he has read and re-read tirelessly, Erik drew his passion for this universe under the fire of the critics. So he has this phrase from the prologue to "Death in the Long Grass" perfectly in mind. "My father always told me that it was useless to change people's minds about four things: politics, religion, hunting and redheads." And Erik added "post whatever you want, those who don't like hunting won't change their minds, and neither will those who support it!" in spite of the blindness which he can show on certain aspects of the subject, Erik is right on this point.Despite the blindness and stubbornness he can sometimes show on certain aspects of the subject, Erik is right on this point. For more than fifteen years, the debate on hunting ... and moreover trophy hunting ... has often boiled down to a discussion in which the right questions are rarely asked. And where no one wants to know the answers! ......

To ban or not to ban?
“Whether to ban hunting is a stupid question,” resumed Erik. “What must be determined is what forms of hunting ... of which animals and under what conditions ... they should be fought or regulated ". Because anyone who works in the conservation of wildlife in Africa knows that banning hunting stricto sensu is a fad - a sweet dream fueled by an emotional reaction to a coldly logical problem. And then, as Morel says in "The Roots of Heaven" by Romain Gary: "There are people who are always willing to pay the price it takes to satisfy the intimate needs of their souls". Or their stomachs. If the hunting ban meant de facto the creation of an inviolable sanctuary for wildlife, all conservatives on the African continent would have long supported it. This is not the case !
In Kenya, a country where hunting has been banned since 1977, poaching, the reduction of natural habitats and the tourist overexploitation of the reservoirs are eroding the populations of elephants, leopards and zebras with much more efficiency than a gun. On the other hand, Tanzania, where most of the game reserves belong to the state, experienced, in the early 2010s, the collapse of its lion population due to an overly lax policy that resulted in over hunting .... However, independent studies indicate that stopping hunting would have had much more dramatic effects.

And then there is the "canned hunt". Sinister process where animals are raised in captivity, stripped of their wild nature, and released into enclosures to be slaughtered by lazy hunters wishing to free themselves from the investment, time, and especially the risk of hunting a real lion in full bush. This practice, for the king of the savannah, has just been banned in South Africa. But the government has already specified that "the real authentic hunting of wild animals would continue to be supported". For hunting to play a real role in environmental conservation, a balance must therefore be found between the extremes; a balance that Namibia is trying to achieve.

3 pages to come ... have a good night ... it's 11pm here in France

gizmo said:

Thank you very much for doing this.

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Thanks a lot for the job you've done !

Now if only real American journalists could write as well about hunters, hunting and the conservation and habit of wildlife hunters provide vs the anti's that do nothing, provide nothing for wildlife habitat and conservation.