Botswana Elephant Hunting

[Carl 9.3x62]

Looks like Botswana is going to resume recreational elephant hunting, after being closed for the last five years. Not that I will ever have a chance to go, but man I would love to hunt an elephant some day. Maybe I have read too much of Bell and the like. Anyone on here ever hunted elephant?

 

[Kiwi]

I haven't hunted elephant but am going to Botswana in July. Would consider elephant hunting if it wasn't so expensive.

 

[BearFoot]

Ah! The smell of elephant poop.



I never considered it. To many elephants in an area, do tear up the place, and should be managed.
A few pic's I took.

 

[SFC B]

Latest estimate I saw was at least 135K elephants.....that is a LOT

 

[LopeHunter]

Texas needs a few elephants mixed in with aoudad and axis deer. Not sure they make a fence that can hold one, though.

 

[375H&H]

An elephant hunt would be an amazing adventure. Close range, dangerous hunting if done right.

It puzzles me why Rinella and others are so offended by African trophy hunting and allude they will never take part in it?

 

[TerraPrey]

Botswana is thought to be home to some 130,000 elephants — about a third of all the elephants in Africa. The country has long been a safe haven for the animals and has been largely unaffected by the ivory poaching that has wiped out a third of the continent's elephants in the past decade.
Feels kinda bad, actually.

 

[Carl 9.3x62]

An elephant hunt would be an amazing adventure. Close range, dangerous hunting if done right.

It puzzles me why Rinella and others are so offended by African trophy hunting and allude they will never take part in it?

I have no idea. Possibly because of all the negative publicity they'd receive?

 

[fishing4sanity]

I love seeing them in the wild, but I haven't been too interested in hunting them. I've been in the thick nasty brush very early in the morning (pretty much dark) and when you get too close without even knowing it, then one trumpets LOUDLY to tell you to leave - it'll get your attention!

 

[Aussie_hunter_JD]

A tuskless hunt isn't too expensive in the grand scheme of things $10-15k.

My wife told me I can hunt anything in the world but an elephant. I genuinely would love to as it's meant to be one of the most challenging tracking hunts you can do in the world. Tracking/stalking is my favourite style of hunting.

African guys I have spoken with say that eland would be second in terms of challenging tracking hunts. More difficult (though less dangerous) than buffalo.

Anyway great to see science winning over disney emotion. My sister inlaw is travelling to africa later this year. She's one of the people that thinks hunting is cruel but animal violence is ok because she doesn't have to see it. I told her that her eyes may soon be opened wide!

 

[Straight Arrow]

I have no idea. Possibly because of all the negative publicity they'd receive?

I think so. To many hunters the African trophy hunt is the dream hunt. But some realize the connotation of opulence and self-indulgence, as opposed to wildlife management, conservation, and beneficial use of resource. Not intending to start a debate about it, but just pointing to reality of wide public perception which we in the hunting community often tend to ignore.

 

[AvidIndoorsman]

I genuinely would love to as it's meant to be one of the most challenging tracking hunts you can do in the world.

Flase, green hunt a thylacine.

 

[Irrelevant]

I don't know, maybe I've been Disney-fied, but I have zero interest in hunting Africa at all. Maybe a couple of larger eland type critters, but even then I don't know, I would want a couple of just lookin' trips first.

 

[Jape]

I think so. To many hunters the African trophy hunt is the dream hunt. But some realize the connotation of opulence and self-indulgence, as opposed to wildlife management, conservation, and beneficial use of resource. Not intending to start a debate about it, but just pointing to reality of wide public perception which we in the hunting community often tend to ignore.

That's a good point, and for some it just doesn't pass the "gut test." I fall into that category. I have no desire to hunt elephants. I don't know if its their intelligence/self awareness that bothers me, their majesty, or something else but I just don't want to do it, even if it was free. I have no problem at all if others want to hunt them, but it's just not for me. Oryx on the other hand....

 

[Tiredofthebickering]

I don't know, maybe I've been Disney-fied, but I have zero interest in hunting Africa at all. Maybe a couple of larger eland type critters, but even then I don't know, I would want a couple of just lookin' trips first.

That's where I am with it too. But I know that a large part of it for me is that fact that it would be so gosh darn expensive, if even possible, to bring any meat home and the meat is a huge part of the hunt for me. To me, Africa is the true trophy hunting experience. That's not to knock others that do it because I understand the value to conservation, etc. that it brings, but it's not for me.

 

[Bambistew]

Its amazing that so many people poo-poo hunting in Africa and consider it a "trophy" hunt, yet will shoot and donate a bunch of meat every year to the needy, or go to Alaska and bring back horns/antlers and leave all the meat because its too expensive to get home. Giving meat to "needy" people in the US = clean conscience... distributing meat to the "locals" in Africa = guilt, yet giving the meat to the natives in Alaska boarders on the level of heroism to some I've met. Meat can't be imported into the US from those type hunts, so there is little you can do about eating what you shoot, other than while in camp. I get the don't shoot it if you won't eat it. I'm mostly there as well.

I'd love to hunt elephant, as a matter of fact I would put it up there near the top of the hunts I want to do in my life. Its amazing how people anthropomorphize some animals (mostly all African animals and predators) but not others. Its ok to blast a fawn/calf deer/antelope/elk in October, but shooting an old bull giraffe is taboo.. I think tracking the right one down for a week or two would be quite an adventure even if you didn't kill one. Those types of adventures are becoming harder and harder to come by.

 

[MTGomer]

I don’t want to hunt elephant but I think it’s great others do. Nobody else (per usual) other than hunters do much outside of National Prks for conservation in Africa.

I have no desire to kill a black bear either, for example. But it’s great that others want to and I’m sure not against it.

 

[AvidIndoorsman]

I think tracking the right one down for a week or two would be quite an adventure even if you didn't kill one. Those types of adventures are becoming harder and harder to come by.

You raise a great point about the meat. My question is can you actually do the above? Africa has just been at the bottom of my list because of how canned and contrived the whole experience seems, same thing for any exotic in Texas. I've done a various hunts and activities, in a bunch of different ways, private lands, guided, unguided, totally DIY, etc. the guide ones always let me with a bad taste in my mouth. Maybe I just worked in the 'guiding' (skiing) industry to long, but when I get the sense from those around me that success is guaranteed and your just another client and their grinding it out, it pretty much ruins the experience for me.

If there was a hunt I could do, on public solo, or with a guide one on one, backpacking, where I felt like I was putting some blood, sweat, and tears into the experience then I would definitely be interested. Probably the limiting factor as much as anything is my lack of experience in that environment and no one would let me do that because I would probably get killed on day 1 by a buffalo, snake, etc.

Not a macho thing, I just don't like the feeling of being rich person being catered to after a decade of being on the other end of that equation.

 

[buffybr]

Even though Botswana has re-opened elephant hunting, there is still the problem that Americans have in getting a USF&W Cities permit to bring any parts of the elephant back to the US.
There is also a growing number of states, and bills in Congress that would prohibit the importation and in some cases the ownership of some or all African Big 5 animal trophies.

I have been lucky enough to have made multiple hunts in 3 different African countries, but not Botswana, and I have not been on an elephant hunt. As soon as I win the Lottery, I'll put an elephant hunt on my bucket list.

 

[2rocky]

I think the only way I'd feel good about an Elephant hunt was if it was a specific rogue elephant. i'm not Disneyfied, but I've been Severely Ruarked Over...