British hunters, including a prominent Harley Street surgeon, have been paying the Zimbabwean authorities thousands of pounds each to take part in a mass elephant cull.

 

They are among groups of hunters who have been permitted to track and kill whole herds, including their calves, before taking photographs of themselves with the carcasses.

 

Rumours that Zimbabwe was culling its population of 80,000-100,000 elephants have been circulating for some time, but definitive proof that foreigners have been paying to be involved has emerged only now.

 

Elephant culls are highly controversial. They typically involve killing every animal in a herd, usually about a dozen strong, and they are condemned as brutal and unnecessary by many conservationists.

 

Supporters argue that the animals are destroying ecosystems by stripping whole areas of edible foliage and monopolising water sources, and that killing is the only effective method of population control.

 

Alternatives, such as habitat expansion, relocation and even the use of contraception, are proposed by wildlife campaign groups, but the hunters reject them as unworkable.

 

Peter Carr, a professional hunting outfitter from Yorkshire, took a party to the Hwange national park last year to cull a herd of 11 elephants, including some “adolescent” calves.

 

The game reserve, which is Zimbabwe’s largest at more than 5,600 square miles, is said to be home to about 50,000 elephants, more than double its capacity.

 

One of Carr’s party was Benjamin Chang, a British orthopaedic surgeon who is based in London’s Harley Street. He paid £5,600 to take part, most of which was passed on to the Zimbabwean park authorities.

 

Chang and Carr shot three elephants each. Unlike conventional trophy-hunters, clients taking part in culls are not permitted to keep any part of the elephant; but they are allowed to take photographs.

 

Ivory from slaughtered elephants has been legally sold by the Zimbabwean authorities to China and Japan. Last November, Zimbabwe sold nearly four tons of ivory in a one-off sale permitted under international law, for £330,000.

 

The British hunters, who used specialist rifles to kill the elephants, said shooting was the most humane method of killing, although sometimes more than one shot was necessary to dispatch an animal.

 

Elephant welfare campaigners were horrified. Will Travers of the Born Free Foundation said: “These days it takes something pretty extraordinary to shock and distress as far as Zimbabwe is concerned. But news of the slaughter of elephants inside national parks still has the power to make you sick to your stomach.”

 

Michael Wamithi, the elephant programme manager for the International Fund for Animal Welfare said British hunters paying to kill elephants were unlikely to help Zimbabwean conservation efforts. “Because of the corruption and financial situation I would be surprised if anything at all reached conservation or communities,” he said.

 

However, Carr said he believed that the money would be used to help maintain the stability of the wildlife in the park.

 

Carr, author of a forthcoming book, Death in the Bush Veldt, which includes chapters on hunting elephants and other big game, said: “The elephants are slowly turning the land there into a desert. I consider myself a champion for elephants but they must be culled, although it’s such an awful word it makes the bunnyhuggers spit their dummies out.

 

“No one feels great after culling a herd: it is quite a sombre mood. You have to kill all of them - if any escape they can spread panic in other herds.”

 

Carr said the cull has been kept low-key. “I was asked last year if I could find clients to go over and shoot 100 elephants as part of the cull,” he said.

 

“I took one party over [including Chang] and had another 18 clients lined up, half of whom were British, but after that the reports of violence and unrest caused them to back out.”

 

The overall African elephant population has dropped from 1.3m in 1979 to about 500,000 today, but in some areas they are considered too numerous. South Africa is proposing a cull of elephants in Kruger national park for the first time since 1995.

In Zimbabwe starving people have resorted to killing elephants for food, and recent reports have suggested Mu-gabe’s soldiers are being given meat from carcasses.

 

Chang, 49, said it was right to use the elephants to feed the Zimbabwean people. “The meat goes to the village. They are queuing at the camp saying, ‘Please give us the meat.’ I was told one elephant will feed one village for 3½ months,” he said.

 

The hunter, who struck a thumbs-up pose for a picture of him astride an elephant he had shot, went on to shoot a lioness in South Africa. He defended the practice of foreigners paying to kill elephants. “The army could have done the cull themselves but they don’t have the right guns. You can’t use an automatic rifle, that would just be cruel,” he said.

 

Rich game

Big game hunting is a rich man’s pastime. Hunters must pay a fee to kill each animal, and are usually allowed to keep the skins as a “trophy”.

The so-called big five are the most popular prey. A bull elephant costs upwards of £6,500 and can be as expensive as £37,000. Lions cost between £8,000 and £15,000, buffalos from £6,000 and leopards between £8,000 and £15,000. White rhinos, which are often tranquillised with a dart rather than killed, start at about £5,000.

 

Source: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article5537002.ece

 

Is it right for elephants to be hunted and killed in the name of sport?

 

Even if they have to be culled, surely there are more humane ways of doing it?

 

Had to laugh at this comment though.....even the use of contraception, just imagined massive condoms :o

 

Disgusting.... <_<

 

A bunch of bloodthirsty, rich scum getting their rocks off by killing wild animals for "sport", not sustenance, they gonna eat the elephants are they....? Fukkin' b'astards..... Not only that, but they're actually contributing to propping up the vile Mugabe regime..... So, that makes them double morons in my book....

 

I feel the same way about this as I did about fox hunting.... Frankly, I'd lock these people up if I had my way....

i dont agree with the short term solution, but elephants are increasing towards an unsustainable population level and something does have to be done about it. contraception has to be the civilised way foreward.

i dont agree with the short term solution, but elephants are increasing towards an unsustainable population level and something does have to be done about it. contraception has to be the civilised way foreward.

 

I love this part....."Alternatives, such as habitat expansion, relocation and even the use of contraception, are proposed by wildlife campaign groups, but the hunters reject them as unworkable". Well, they would say that, wouldn't they....? More civilised methods of population control spoil their "sport" dont they....? <_<

 

Absouletly disgusting behaviour from these sick people. Several countries have human population which has reached full capasity yet i dont see anyone suggesting we cull them instead.

The African Elephant is an endangered species aswell, this should not be bloody legal at all!!!

Several countries have human population which has reached full capasity yet i dont see anyone suggesting we cull them instead.

 

Exactly... For example, Mexico is grossly overpopulated, as is India... So, we should organise a mass cull of Mexicans and Indians should we.....? -_-

 

 

Exactly... For example, Mexico is grossly overpopulated, as is India... So, we should organise a mass cull of Mexicans and Indians should we.....? -_-

 

:)

Exactly... For example, Mexico is grossly overpopulated, as is India... So, we should organise a mass cull of Mexicans and Indians should we.....? -_-

 

No, but amongst the population there would be many people like me who are independent and given adequate funding, would willingly relocate to another country.

 

In practice it isn't all that easy because of immigration restrictions. Same with relocating animals - they need a habitat which will sustain them and the animals whose territory it is. You can't just move them in somewhere if they're going to kill the resident population or vice versa or detroy other animals' habitat.

 

Now that there are contraceptive implants etc., other than the massive chore of capturing all the animals every few months, I'd plump for that control option.

 

The very word cull send shivers down my spine. I think I was traumatised by TV pictures of seal culls when I was a kid.

 

If there is no alternative to a cull then I'd rather the animals were dispatched quickly and cleanly by skilled hunters.

Edited January 19, 200916 yr by Baytree

Elephant culling wouldn't even have needed to happen if people just had an organised and realistic breeding-in-the-wild plan to bring their numbers up from when they were endangered years ago.. Endangered because of money hungry people and their ivory obsessions. What were the conservationists thinking when they crowded SO many elephants in such small borders. As far as I know elephants have massive territories and duh with 20000+ elephants being in the Kruger National Park alone, they are bound to get violent and kill people. And their breeding has always been immensely successful in the wild, they're huge and aggressive animals obviously their young are 90% unlikely to fall prey to anything. With the breeding plan they had, it basically shot them and the elephants in the foot, right from the start. That breeding plan should be used for CRITICALLY endangered animals such as the Wild Dog or Ethiopian Wolf, whose numbers are below 500 and 50 respectively. You can't really blame these sick people, this hunting game is a huge tradition in Africa and they are only partly to blame for tragedies like these. If there were qualified conservationists who have an actual brain all this could've been stopped. But them putting so much focus on saving an animal that was barely endangered and putting barely any focus on animals that might become extinct in the next few months, completely blows my mind.

Absouletly disgusting behaviour from these sick people. Several countries have human population which has reached full capasity yet i dont see anyone suggesting we cull them instead.

The African Elephant is an endangered species aswell, this should not be bloody legal at all!!!

They aren't endangered btw. Their numbers were brought up to probably half or a quater of a million over the years..

They aren't endangered btw. Their numbers were brought up to probably half or a quater of a million over the years..

 

Sorry my mistake.

 

I agree with pretty much everything you say there Katherine by the way.

If there is no alternative to a cull then I'd rather the animals were dispatched quickly and cleanly by skilled hunters.

 

Okay.... Then why make a "sport" of it.....? This is the problem I have... The "great white hunters" going from their air-conditioned offices and banks into someone else's territory, showing complete ignorance and a lack of respect for the people and the wildlife.... Are any of these "weekend warriors" skilled hunters.....? I rather think not.... If it is deemed necessary to "cull" them, then the only people who should be doing it are the game wardens, who should be employed to carry out that specific task... I mean, we operate a similar culling of deer in Scotland, and it IS the game wardens that tend to do it, we dont just allow any Johnny Pillock with a wad of cash there for the weekend with a rifle onto national parks.....

Sorry my mistake.

 

I agree with pretty much everything you say there Katherine by the way.

 

It's hard to know what's considered "endangered" these days. :) The term now is completely different from what it was fifty years ago.

 

I agree with the human analogy. Some countries are overpopulated. And I think some people are forgetting one. England. Should you all be shot in the head to free up space? As far as I can tell, humans take up more of this earth than Elephants. It's the humans who need contraception.

 

It's hard to know what's considered "endangered" these days. :) The term now is completely different from what it was fifty years ago.

 

I agree with the human analogy. Some countries are overpopulated. And I think some people are forgetting one. England. Should you all be shot in the head to free up space? As far as I can tell, humans take up more of this earth than Elephants. It's the humans who need contraception.

 

you dont read these pages much do you...:lol: england = overpopulated= send home immigrants and stop chavettes breeding. problem solved.

you dont read these pages much do you...:lol: england = overpopulated= send home immigrants and stop chavettes breeding. problem solved.

 

That's exactly the point I'm making. You wouldn't kill humans to free up space.

I mean I understand that they may need to do such things to stop it becoming overpopulated, but the way it is done "sport" is disgusting. I don't really agree with it full stop, just picturing it upsets me.

 

The thing is they can get away with this because they're animals it's almost seem as acceptable but like some of you are saying, many countries are overpopulated with people, but we don't go killing them.

It's Africa! People kill each other for witchcraft, elephants being hunted as a sport is nothing.. In Mozambique the locals capture baby elephants tie them up and use them as their dartboard for practising their spear-throwing. As harsh as it sounds, this 'sport' puts food on the table for these people who pretty much can't do anything else.

i dont agree with the short term solution, but elephants are increasing towards an unsustainable population level and something does have to be done about it. contraception has to be the civilised way foreward.

 

Just because a species is becoming heavily populated doesn't give us a right to shoot or kill them.

 

Just because we are the most succesful species doesn't mean we need to worry about unsustainable populations. Mother nature has been taking care of it's own problems for centuries, and doesn't need a bunch of rich pricks to help out.

It's Africa! People kill each other for witchcraft, elephants being hunted as a sport is nothing.. In Mozambique the locals capture baby elephants tie them up and use them as their dartboard for practising their spear-throwing. As harsh as it sounds, this 'sport' puts food on the table for these people who pretty much can't do anything else.

 

i wish you had read the thread then you wouldnt post this nonsense.

 

to clarify..... since when have rich british men killed elephants for food? <_<

 

Just because a species is becoming heavily populated doesn't give us a right to shoot or kill them.

 

Just because we are the most succesful species doesn't mean we need to worry about unsustainable populations. Mother nature has been taking care of it's own problems for centuries, and doesn't need a bunch of rich pricks to help out.

 

you show a startling lack of knowlege for environmental issues.... true mother nature will balance itself out.... after the ever expanding elephant population has eaten itself to starvation... the ultimate result of unfettered population control, you will be left with hundereds of starving, suffering, malnourished elephants in a dessert where smaller spieciese have been pushed to extinction through habitat loss.

 

not our problem?.... well it IS, after all if 'we' had never brought africa into the modern age and left it in the stoneage, there would be no tea, coffee, citrus fruits, soya, tobacco, exotic crops as the african countryside would be wild, full of predators, and the elephant population would be controled by natural means. we upset the balance through agriculture for the 'tea and fags' you consume so its our resposibility to manage the unbalance we caused.

 

It's Africa! People kill each other for witchcraft, elephants being hunted as a sport is nothing.. In Mozambique the locals capture baby elephants tie them up and use them as their dartboard for practising their spear-throwing. As harsh as it sounds, this 'sport' puts food on the table for these people who pretty much can't do anything else.

 

Sorry, but I have to agree with Rob.... What the locals do to manage wildlife and elephant populations is neither here nor there, it's their land after all.... I dont agree with the cruelty factor, but, for poor, starving Africans there is perhaps no choice, food has to be put on the table, rural African peasants cant exactly nip out to Tesco or Sainsbury can they, therefore it is more necessity for them, even the "target practice" serves a function, they're learning to be more proficient hunters, again, this is necessity... This does NOT mean, however, that a bunch of rich tourists can just blithely go in there and do their own thing, surely this is historically part of Africa's problem, rich outsiders thinking they can do what they like and to hell with the feelings of the indigenous population. It certainly is not a case of necessity for these classes to do what they do, it's more a case of "I say Carruthers, I'm rather bored, let's bally well go out to the dark continent and kill something, not because we have to, but because we're rich, upper class twits and that's what rich, upper class twits do, shoot things.....". It is exactly the same thing as fox hunting, which was hardly about "necessity" either, I mean, yeah, right a bunch of dressed-up, upper-crust clowns were really effective in managing fox populations down I dont think.... :lol: The amount of fox sets in urban areas such as London is quite staggering (I hear their night calls all the time where I live in Highgate), but do you see any of these fukkin' toffs on horseback riding through the suburbs of London....? Like hell..... :rolleyes:

 

If the elephants have to be culled, then it should only be done by those who know the land, as deer populations are managed in Scotland.... We used to have wolves to keep the deer population in check, but, hey, we exterminated all those beautiful, majestic, intelligent creatures to suit our own selfish purposes and then, oh golly gosh, suddenly LOTS OF FUKKIN' DEER around..... :rolleyes: Humans.... We're bloody idiots sometimes......