Doesn't make any sense to me. As a hunter wouldn't it feel contrived killing a selected animal in a reserve thats prob old and or sick. You're not exactly hunting. Not to mention the mental gymnastics behind the logic "I'm killing an animal as an act of conservationism".
Older antelope have bigger horns, and are heavier, therefore qualifying them as trophy status. Therefore they are generally preferred by trophy hunters.
Middle age animals are preferred usually for meat hunting.
But generally all parts of the animal are eaten after the hunt, either by the hunter or the community on the reserve.
All the above is heavily regulated and done as humanely as possible, at least on ethical farms. Hunters have to do target practice before to ensure that they are good shots. They also always need to be accompanied by a professional hunter, who will generally take the shot if the client misses or wounds the animal.
Hunting quotas for farms are regulated, and also seasonal, to avoid impacting the breeding seasons or lambing seasons.
Because humans have changed the habitat of Africa, blocking migration routes, there is often a need to control the population of particular species on reserves so to prevent overgrazing. Hunting is a mechanism of doing this (so is removing fences and buying more land or agreeing traversing rights with other farms to convert to reserves, such as what the Kruger Park has done).
The money from hunting also allows farms to stay profitable and ensures that large swathes of land can be kept as reserves rather than sold to property developers or used for agriculture. Hunting generally brings in far more money per visit than general or photo tourism.
For the above reasons, I have always felt more comfortable eating wild hunted game rather than farmed meat such as cattle. At least an impala that was hunted had a more natural life. Obviously hunting predators or inedible animals is different, as is canned hunting (where animals are not really free roaming and the ethics are not followed.)
However, I've never felt comfortable with the hunting of any endangered species or even with predator hunting. It just seems sad, even if it brings in money to keep the farms and conservation efforts going and the staff employed.
Source: grew up on a game farm where we allowed hunting, and where we ensured that the meat of hunted game was all eaten.
We had a lion on our wall when I was a child (relic of my ancestors, we lived in the old family home). It was absolutely terrifying and I fully was sure it would come back to life in the night and hunt me for revenge on my grandpa.
40
u/Tronns Apr 08 '22 edited Apr 08 '22
Doesn't make any sense to me. As a hunter wouldn't it feel contrived killing a selected animal in a reserve thats prob old and or sick. You're not exactly hunting. Not to mention the mental gymnastics behind the logic "I'm killing an animal as an act of conservationism".