Trophy hunting is a form of hunting for sport in which parts of the hunted wild animals are kept and displayed as trophies. The animal being targeted, known as the "game", is typically a mature male specimen from a popular species of collectable interests, usually of large sizes, holding impressive horns, antlers, furs, or manes. Most trophies consist of only select parts of the animal, which are prepared for display by a taxidermist. The parts most commonly kept vary by species but often include the head, hide, tusks, horns, or antlers.
Trophies are often displayed in trophy rooms or game rooms, or in gun rooms along with the hunter's gun collection.Business Week On the hunt for a gun room?: Business celebrates a love of firearms, hunting big animals, Knight Ridder, 10/11/2009 (retrieved 10/11/2009)
Trophy hunting has strong supporters and opponents. The controversy focuses on the morality of hunting for pleasure rather than for practical use, as well as questions about the extent to which big-game hunting benefits conservation efforts.
Types of trophy hunting African trophy hunting
Trophy hunting has been practiced in Africa for centuries. Popularized by British hunters and conservationists such as Frederick Selous, Walter Bell, and Samuel Baker, who hunted and collected animals for natural history museums in British colonies in Africa and India. This resulted in the development of a new form of tourism industry that generates many millions of revenue for Africa per year.http://www.cic-wildlife.org/fileadmin/Press/Technical_Series/EN/8_.pdf One of the first renowned safaris recorded took place in the early 20th century by President Theodore Roosevelt and his son Kermit. Professional hunters such as Phillip Percival, Sydney Downey, and Harry Selby are among the first safari guides that contributed to molding the industry. The practice of trophy hunting predates that of ranch or farm hunting, but game ranches helped to legitimize trophy hunting as a facet of the tourism industry in Africa. The first game ranches in Africa were established in the 1960s and the concept quickly grew in proliferation. Statistics from 2000 illustrate that there were approximately 7,000 game farms and reservations operating within South Africa, established on about 16 million hectares of land in the country. Game ranches attract wealthy tourists interested in hunting, as well as foreign investors on a large scale.
North American trophy hunting
Trophy hunting in North America was encouraged as a way of conservation by organizations such as the Boone & Crockett club as hunting an animal with a big set of antlers or horns is a way of selecting only the mature animals, contributing to shape a successful conservation model in the country in which hunting takes a fundamental role, and trophy hunters have been deeply involved in preserving wildlife and wild spaces. Such is the case of president Theodore Roosevelt, who, after becoming president of the United States in 1901, he used his authority to establish 150 national forests, 51 federal bird reserves, four national game preserves, five national parks and 18 national monuments on over 230 million acres of public land.
Furthermore, hunting for meat, trophies or recreational purposes provides an income to each state for managing wildlife and their natural habitats through the Pittman Robertson Act, resulting in the expansion of natural habitats and increase of populations of big game hunting species across the country.
After the public response from the killing of Cecil the lion, awareness of this sport was raised worldwide. Attention also focused on North American sport hunting, in particular the cougar. The cougar, also called the mountain lion, puma, or panther, is hunted for sport across its expansive range. The only federally protected populations in the country are the Florida panther.
Several states—including Colorado, Utah and Washington—in recent years have proposed an increase in cougar hunting for various reasons, and California is currently the only state throughout the West that prohibits cougar hunting.SABALOW, RYAN AND PHILLIP REESE. "WHY WE STILL KILL COUGARS: California voters banned mountain lion hunting three decades ago, but the shooting never stopped" , The Sacramento Bee (November 3, 2017).
The Boone and Crockett Club claims that the selective harvest of older males aids in the recovery of many big game species which were on the brink of extinction at the turn of the 20th century. The organization monitors the conservation success of this practice through its Big Game Records data set.
North American trophy hunting should not be confused with 'canned hunting' or 'vanity hunting', which involves the shooting of (sometimes intensively bred) animals in a range designed for ease of kills, more for the purpose of collecting an animal for display than the sport. The Boone and Crockett Club disavows this practice and actively campaigns against it, as it removes the element of 'fair chase'.
Ranch hunting Ranch hunting is a form of big-game hunting where the animals hunted are specifically bred on a ranch for trophy hunting purposes.
Many species of game such as the Indian blackbuck, nilgai, axis deer, barasingha, the Iranian red sheep, and variety of other species of deer, sheep, and antelope, as well as tigers and lions and hybrids of these from Africa, Asia, and the Pacific islands were introduced to ranches in Texas and Florida for the sake of trophy hunting.
These animals are typically hunted on a fee for each kill, with hunters paying $4,000 or more to be able to hunt exotic game. As many of these species are endangered or threatened in their native habitat, the United States' government requires 10% of the hunting fee to be given to conservation efforts in the areas where these animals are indigenous. Hunting of endangered animals in the United States is normally illegal under the Endangered Species Act but is permitted on these ranches since the rare animals hunted there are not indigenous to the United States.
The Humane Society of the United States has criticized these ranches and their hunters with the reasoning that they are still hunting endangered animals even if the animals were raised specifically to be hunted.
In Pakistan Pakistan harbors a collection of the most uncommon types of wild sheep and goats on the planet. These include the Blue sheep, Kashmir, Astor, and Suleman Markhors, as well as Punjab, Blandford, and Afghan Urials, alongside the Himalayan and Sindh Ibex. Pakistan has developed a community-centered trophy-hunting initiative that relies on incentives as a means of conservation. This approach is meticulously structured to find an equilibrium between the preservation requirements of mountain ecosystems and the economic needs of marginalized communities that have shared their environment with wildlife for generations. The initial instance of such a program in Pakistan was the Chitral Conservation Hunting Program (CCHP) targeting Markhor, which commenced in 1983. Trophy hunting has produced positive results in Pakistan. Presently, the markhor population in the country has surged to a range of 3,500 to 4,000 individuals, in contrast to the figures of 1,500 to 2,000 noted in 2001. Within the framework of the trophy hunting initiative, indigenous communities are allocated 80% of the license fees, while the remaining portion is retained by the government. Despite its achievements, trophy hunting in Pakistan has raised apprehensions. Some privately operated and even certain officially registered trophy hunting operators have fallen short in upholding its principles. They have been criticized for providing foreign hunters with options to pursue and kill endangered wild animals that warrant protection.
Game auctions Game auctions have become another source of income destined to preserve wildlife and provide an economic value to their natural habitats. Such is the case of sheep hunting in North America, where large amounts of money are paid at auctions to hunt for them, such as bighorn sheep, dall ram, stone sheep and desert big horn, which constitute the grand slam of trophy sheep hunting. Hunting for sheep has helped to raise funds used to boost populations of these animals while preserving their habitats. Sheep hunt takes place in rugged mountain terrains where spot and stalk is the usual method to hunt for these species, making this hunt a challenge. Only old rams may be taken, and in order to be sure about their age, the sheep hunter has to identify the age and gender by reading the size and shape of their horns that happen to determine the trophy quality. However, the real trophy about this hunt is the whole experience rather than just the animal's head. This type of hunt was probably become so popular thanks to the writings of gun editor and hunter Jack O'Connor.
In Africa, game auctions help provide game farms and reserves with their wildlife. These facilities are important in terms of tourism in Africa, one of the continent's largest economic sectors, accounting for almost 5% of South Africa's GDP, for example. South Africa in particular is the main tourist destination on the continent, and as a result, hosts a large number of game auctions, farms, and reservations. Game auctions serve as competitive markets that allow farm and reservation owners to bid on and purchase animals for their facilities. Animals purchased at auctions for these purposes are commonly bought directly as game or are then bred to supply facilities. Animals used for breeding are generally females, which cost more on average than males due to the increased breeding prospects they present. In addition to sex, other factors that contribute to the prices of animals on auction include the demand for particular species (based on their overall rarity) and the costs of maintaining them. Animals that receive increased interest from poachers, such as rhinos or elephants due to their ivory horns and tusks, present additional risks to game farm operations, and do not typically sell well at auction. However other herbivores, specifically ungulate species, tend to fetch exponentially higher sums than carnivores. Prices for these animals can reach into the hundreds of thousands in South African rands, equivalent to tens of thousands of American dollars.
Legal issues and effects
Trophy hunting is legal in many countries, through policies that ensure that hunting practices align to a sustainable use of the country's natural resources. Restrictions on the species that can be hunted (e.g., protected species such as brown bears in European Union), are usually based on populations, hunting seasons, number of available licenses and types of arms, calibers and hunting procedures, asuring hunting ethics. Permits and government consent are also required. However, some countries such as Costa Rica,
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service imposed a ban on imports, limited to elephant trophies from Zimbabwe and Tanzania for 2014–2015. But the ban was lifted and it has currently granted permits afterwards.
In 2001, Botswana instituted a one-year ban on lion hunting. They had previously permitted the hunting of fifty lions each year, which caused a shortage in mature males in the population, as the hunters preferred the lions with the largest manes. After the ban, Safari Club International, including prominent member former President George H. W. Bush, successfully lobbied the Botswanan government to reverse the ban.
Botswana again banned trophy hunting in 2014, and now villagers claim they get no income from trophy hunters, suffer from damaged crop fields caused by elephants and buffaloes, and African lions killing their livestock. Some conservationists claim trophy hunting is more effective for wildlife management than a complete hunting ban.