Conservation & Hunting

Conserving the Cape Vulture: EWT report 2012

Written by WRSA media

The Cape Vulture Task Force operates under the auspices of the Birds of Prey Programme of the Endangered Wildlife Trust and is made up of dedicated individuals and organisations focused on conserving the Cape Vulture; to prevent further declines of this species, to protect its natural habitat together with its foraging and distribution ranges and to mitigate threats, putting sound conservation actions into practice which will reduce further loses of this species and finally lead to the increase in the population throughout its range.

During March 2012, this dedicated Group spent 2 days reviewing the 2010 Conservation Plan proceedings and reviewed identified threats and identified conservation actions together with allocating responsibilities to individuals to address these objectives with measurable time-frames. Thus, the species conservation goals became more refined and targets were set to make these more achievable and measurable.

Dehorning procedure

Written by WRSA

Rhino dehorning has been used historically as a tool to reduce the threat of poaching in parts of southern Africa, and continues to be employed on a large-scale in Zimbabwe. Dehorning is a contentious matter due to uncertainty regarding the effectiveness of the method at reducing poaching, and due to potential veterinary impacts and adverse effects on the behavioural ecology of rhinos.

Rhino Round Table

Written by WRSA

In 2008, a total of 13 rhino were killed for their horns in South Africa. In 2009 this number more than sextupled to 83. In 2010, it has risen to a then shocking 333, in 2011 with a hundred more to 433 and this year, following the full moon on 2 August, it already stood on 302! Police believe it may well rise to 556 by the end of the year.

This escalating numbers caused a national outcry for action against the massacre of South Africa’s rhino population. Earlier this year the Department of Environmental Affairs’ (DEA) Minister Edna Molewa announced that round-table discussions will be held with rhino owners and stakeholders in the country as part of its bid to combat rhino poaching, which she says has reached an unacceptable level.

Damned if you do and damned if you don't

Written by WRSA

My journey to Vietnam in June 2012 By Damien Mander

Founder & CEO International Anti-Poaching Foundation www.iapf.org This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

The rhino is being hunted to extinction for its horn. As it becomes increasingly rare, the market value increases, further aggravating the situation. It has now become an ornamental object of status within Vietnamese society. A number of examples exist in Vietnam whereby status-driven animal products were desired. When the market was over-supplied with these products, the value dropped off and with it the demand. Could this work with the current stockpiles of rhino horn and subsequent harvesting of specified rhino across the world?

Bedreigde roofdiere yl gesaai

Written by Karin Espag

Bedreigde roofdiere yl gesaai Hulle is Suid-Afrika se mees bedreigde roofdiere maar word op geen Cites-lys gevind nie want, sê die Trust vir Bedreigde Natuurlewe (EWT), daar word nie met hulle handel gedryf nie. Daar word egter beoog om wildehonde wel binne die afsienbare toekoms op Cites gelys te kry. Daar is vyf subspesies van die dier (Lycaon pictus) geïdentifiseer. In Suid-Afrika kom die subspesie Lycaon pictus pictus voor.

Met hulle vier tone – gewone honde het vyf – is wildehonde bekend as meedoënlose jagters. Hulle jag in ’n trop en hardloop deur die veld in ’n spesifieke formasie: die leier voor en die res agter, elkeen gereed om oor te vat wanneer die voorste dier moeg sou raak. Met ’n bestendige pas van sowat 60 km/h hou die trop dan aan tot die prooi neerslaan van uitputting.

The magnificent giant sable

Written by John Frederick Walker

The magnificent giant sable A national symbol valued by all Angolans. This is the awe-inspiring giant sable, endemic to this country north of Namibia.

The expedition’s helicopter lifts off from the warden’s camp at Cangandala National Park in central Angola, pitches nose down, and roars south toward the Luando Strict Nature Reserve. This bubblenosed, bumblebee-yellow Hughes 500 has only one door, making the four of us on board dependent on our seatbelts to keep from falling out, but the upside is that we get unobstructed views of the flat, desolate landscape slipping away beneath us. Vast blackened swathes left by recent annual burnings make the miombo forest below, dry and parched before the arrival of next month’s rains, look ghostly.

The rhino moratorium curse

Written by Retha Fourie

The rhino moratorium curse Some views of Wildlife Ranching South Africa (WRSA), the Private Rhino Owners Association (PROA), the Endangered Wildlife Trust (EWT), the Wilderness Foundation and conservationist Braam Malherbe, compiled by Retha Fourie.

South Africa holds about 93% of the African population of near threatened southern white rhino, Ceratotherium simum simum, and critically endangered black rhino, Diceros bicornis. The black rhino is slowly recovering from a 90% decline in the 1970s, but rhino poaching in South Africa has escalated rapidly since 2008 and has also spread from historically targeted protected areas to privately owned populations.

When hunting becomes the hunted

Written by Willem P Frost, a South African game rancher

When hunting becomes the hunted Throughout the Western civilisation the debate over hunting has escalated into an aggressive verbal brawl leading nowhere.

Hunting is often criticised by the animal rights and anti-hunting fraternity as unacceptable human behaviour and a threat to conservation. They portray hunting as barbaric, unnecessary, wasteful, devoid of merit and without any deep meaning. These activists do not recognise the differences between the various forms of hunting and poaching. Nor do they accept the concept of conservation through sustainable utilisation.

Winning farmers for conservation

Written by Tim Snow, Manager, Endangered Wildlife Trust Wildlife Conflict Mitigation Programme

My position as ‘chief of field staff’ is not a specific position, but a role I was asked to fulfil to pass on experience and to mentor and guide EWT field staff. I see and hear what the younger team are up to, process that and then offer positive guidance on whatever I can. Quite apart from that, I still work at the farm interface all the time, so I too am continuously learning.

In my view it is important to be a community person and accepted in one’s immediate community, but I don’t believe one must be confined to a suburb, district or region at all. One must be able to associate and integrate with the farming and rural communities that many of us work in. So it was that at a recent braai at a nearby farm that we got to talking, cajoling and heckling about jackals, poisons, farm profits (and losses), game bird populations, wildlife and so on. Even though some thorny issues were discussed, we are after all friends and neighbours who respect one another, we are all entitled to opinions and the differences make up for a healthy debate in a mature group of people.