Kenya Hunting Brochure 1976!

[deewayne2003]

And the kids of today that have zero interest in hunting Africa

There are some interested in it, I deal with a lot of youth and they constantly ask me about it; several have asked to see my “elephant gun” and one 5th grader asked me what powder I was using when he didn’t recognize Jamison brass while looking at my .470 brass.

Sadly enough, I fear that only the ones born into wealth will ever have the opportunity to do it as I have; if prices/purchasing power continues to widen.

 

[wesheltonj]

Our friend Jimmy Y used to hunt with Bert in Pearsall. Said a lot of ‘09ers booked with him.

I don’t think this crowd knows what 09ers are.

 

[dchum]

I don’t think this crowd knows what 09ers are.

Haha, he was speaking in code directly to me

 

[Shakka]

There are some interested in it, I deal with a lot of youth and they constantly ask me about it; several have asked to see my “elephant gun” and one 5th grader asked me what powder I was using when he didn’t recognize Jamison brass while looking at my .470 brass.

Sadly enough, I fear that only the ones born into wealth will ever have the opportunity to do it as I have; if prices/purchasing power continues to widen.

You are absolutely right! Prices are so out of control now, it will soon become a thing only the wealthy can afford. It already is in places like Tanzania, Cameroon, Ethiopia, etc

 

[Shakka]

Maybe because they didn’t have trail cameras and it took more effort to get one?…. Or they still considered Lions a pest?

What ever the reason it caught my eye too and wish we could know.

@Wheels - Am I mistaken or doesn’t your family have connections/History in Kenya?

Can you shed a light on game densities or other details that may give context to the prices?

I bet that you are right. I would assume too that this is before PHs became specialized in leopard hunting, and it was more of a stroke of luck to see one when our hunting someone else

 

[wesheltonj]

You are absolutely right! Prices are so out of control now, it will soon become a thing only the wealthy can afford. It already is in places like Tanzania, Cameroon, Ethiopia, etc

I heard at SCI that South Sudan was going to open. I was told those places will look like a bargain priced hunts.

 

[Mtn_Infantry]

You are absolutely right! Prices are so out of control now, it will soon become a thing only the wealthy can afford. It already is in places like Tanzania, Cameroon, Ethiopia, etc

Those places have always been places only the wealthy can afford when looking at the endemic species or Big 5. There are definitely ways a more middle class person can experience them it’ll have to be Plains Game, and they’ll likely be saving and avoiding South African Safaris.

 

[Charlie64]

.

Only seeing this now .....

I was born in Nairobi & my uncle was a warden with Parks. I have a number of old books - East African Game Animals - with Kenya shilling prices for game written in them (by him by hand). Love to get it out & read it from time to time. Sable, roan & dassie (!!) were off limits - classed as "Royal Game". I still today have a Grevy's zebra flat skin that my father took in Kenya in the early 1970s along with a kongoni flat skin both on the floor in my study.

Can still remember weekends spent in the bush - three white canvas tents, a campfire, laundry drying on thorn bushes & the back of a Landy as my bedroom along with my two cousins with the spare tire for a pillow & smelly grey army blankets!

Memories!

.

 

[Foxi]

By that time 1976, there were concessions or blocks in Kenya, but still a new concept to the business. They would be held by safari companies not much different than some systems today.

I am No expert obviously! But I did just finish Brian Herne’s “white hunters”.
And it is littered with amazing first hand information you can’t read anywhere else.
Super book for the African nerd.

Wolfgang Schenck, the former chief taxidermist at Zimmermann (the largest taxidermy firm in East Africa ) wrote in his book that, as a resident, he could hunt without any problems in the blocks designated by the government where a professional hunter (PH) was staying with their clients. The blocks were also accessible to other safari companies. Under certain circumstances, they stepped on each other’s toes. The safari companies did not have leased hunting grounds.
But this was never widely publicized. The country was vast, and the guests were still successful and brought a lot of money into the country.
At that time, Kenya had 7 million inhabitants; today, 59 million, plus millions more who are unregistered.
As a resident, one could bag 10 elephants a year back then—6 throughout Kenya and an additional four in the Abadares (until the end in 1977). What times those were. Not so long ago.
Sigh.

 

[DLSJR]

I had a friend, Dr. William Pritchard of the University of California at Davis, who hunted Africa very extensively after World War Two ended. Bill was the Dean of UC Davis’s veterinary medicine school, widely regarded as the top veterinary medicine school in the USA, and that afforded him some unique opportunities across Africa.

Bill would travel to Africa when college was out for the summer and work with the Kenya Wildlife Service and other game departments on veterinary medicine and when he was finished he would stay for up to 35 days to go on safari. I remember Bill telling me how a Kenya license included everything endemic to Kenya, including 2 elephants and black rhino. Bill told me that when they’d hunt in SE Kenya in the Tana River & Tsavo region that Black Rhinos were so common that they were a nuisance that would often interfere with stalks on other game. He was fortunate to hunt across much of Africa during the golden age when very few ventured there and safaris were very long by modern standards.

Bill was like many from his generation, modest despite being very accomplished. I remember sitting in his study one time, talking about Africa after a wonderful lunch his wife had prepared for us. I asked Bill how many times he’d hunted Africa and he simply said “more than 60”. Imagine living a life that enabled one to do that.