Adrian
AH fanatic
With the latest book by Eduardo Goncalves who is naming UK hunters coming out, The Times in the UK wrote a nice little promotion for him.
I will post some of the questions asked of me by the journalist in due course. The level of stupidity that Goncalves displays and is putting forward to his readers is astonishing.
Fortunately for him, it's doubtful any of his readers will bother checking his 'facts'. Unfortunately for the rest of us, these people will be heard more than the African continent and it's wildlife.
It should be pointed out that the part that mentions me in this book has been copied and pasted from this forum although Goncalves has told The Times he contacted me personally under a false identity which is untrue. He has amalgamated hunts spanning five years and mixed them up in no chronological order making no sense.
Dominic Kennedy, Investigations Editor
Thursday July 01 2021, 12.01am, The Times
South Africa
Alex Nielsen of West Sussex told an online forum of his activities in South Africa
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The slow deaths of big game animals targeted by British hunters in Africa are disclosed today as pressure mounts for a ban on the import of trophies.
Hunters admitted shooting meerkats, monkeys and a cat-like animal called a genet out of trees for relaxation in between stalking more impressive targets in the plains and bush.
Many of the species they shoot are expected to be left out of the government’s promised legislation to stop the import of trophy animals. MPs from across the Commons are now demanding a complete clampdown.
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A glimpse into the world of safari enthusiasts was provided by Eduardo Gonçalves, a campaigner who posed as a would-be hunter seeking advice from Britons who had hunted in Africa.
His findings are published today in a book to mark the sixth anniversary of the shooting of Cecil, Zimbabwe’s most celebrated lion, with a bow and arrow by an American dentist. The wandering lion’s hours of wounded agony before he was finished off with a gun provoked international outrage.
Britons have provided graphic descriptions of how game creatures are sometimes difficult to kill cleanly and quickly.
Adrian Cawte, of Wellington, Somerset, told a hunters’ website that he shot a zebra in Namibia which “reared and ran, through the thorns, over rocks, stumbling and falling, blood appearing on the chest area before laying down and kicking weakly”.
Nielsen’s exploits included shooting a zebra, which continued to run for 200m
He found it “was still clinging to life so I dispatched it with a shot to the chest. My original shot had been a little too far forward and while undoubtedly a mortal wound I was not happy to watch an animal suffer. Unfortunately this zebra had damaged its hide on the sharp rocks and thorns in its death throes which was a shame.”
Alex Nielsen, of Henfield, West Sussex, killed a zebra in South Africa. “The shot was good and stuck low on the shoulder and into the heart and lung region. Believe it or not with a broken shoulder and the top of the heart completely destroyed he managed to run some 200m,” Nielsen told an online forum.
A British expatriate energy worker described to Gonçalves how a shot zebra had run away in South Africa. “I probably hit high above the heart ... They found it about two weeks later and sent me pictures where it travelled virtually the whole length of the area because it is a fenced farm.”
Paul Roberts, 79, from West Sussex, chairman of a gunmaking company, reminisced on video for a gun magazine about hunting big game in Africa many years ago. Once he had to shoot a leopard repeatedly. Another time he wounded an elephant and needed to change to a new rifle with extra penetration.
Some animals try to escape. A British businessman is quoted telling the author that an impala ran into a waterhole and “buried itself up to its neck ... I went and got it.”
Gonçalves, founder of the Campaign to Ban Trophy Hunting, told The Times: “I was genuinely shocked at the incredible suffering experienced by many of the animals.”
Hunters told him of their amusement at nabbing smaller creatures. Gonçalves asked Stuart Eborall, a deerstalker from Rugby, whether monkeys and meerkats were shot at a ranch he visited in South Africa. Eborall said: “Yeah, yeah ... We go and grab a few beers and get up on one of the rocks looking over some tree’d area where all the monkeys are and just have a bit of fun shooting the monkeys.” Eborall was contacted for comment.
Christian Evans, a property expert from North Yorkshire, told the author that in South Africa “we did genet cat lamping, shooting genets out of trees with the bows. Really cool, really fun!”
The expatriate said: “We’ve had quite a few beers and gone out rabbit bashing as they call it, and we’ve gone out at night ... They shine on a hare or a rabbit or spring hare ... Then you chase with a bit of wood.”
The trophy hunting industry entices customers through marketing deals. One ranch offers a $3,900 (£2,825) couple’s package with six animals in a week including ostriches or warthogs. Another business promotes father and son “bonding” holidays.
The trophy hunters operate within the law. Permits are sold by African countries seeking foreign revenue to use for anti-poaching measures.
Whitehall sources said that Defra’s proposals on banning imports had been delayed by the pandemic.
Sir Roger Gale, who chairs the all-party parliamentary group on banning trophy hunting, which is being launched today, called for all trophy imports to be banned. He accepted that wild animals sometimes needed to be killed but said it should be done professionally by skilled people.
Walter Palmer, left, the dentist who killed Cecil the lion six years ago, poses with a kill in 2015
REX SHUTTERSTOCK
“There is no need for any numbskull to go and murder beautiful, magnificent, proud animals,” he said.
Sir David Amess, the Tory MP who submitted an early-day motion demanding jail sentences for offenders, said that many animals besides big game were threatened by these hunters. “A ban on the import of trophies would make these ‘hunting holidays’ less attractive,” he said.
Some hunters passionately defended their pastime. Nielsen, a wildlife manager, told The Times that a ban on imports threatened well-managed hunting areas that preserved populations of game animals. Species would decline if land was transferred to human use as “people and these large dangerous animals don’t get on very well”. He accused campaigners of using emotive arguments.
Cawte, 49, a Ministry of Defence dog handler, pointed out that species were conserved because “as long as it pays to set aside land for wildlife, land users will do just that. At the moment, hunting is by far the most efficient way to earn a living on wildlife in very remote areas.” If farming became better business wild habitats would be lost and turned into livestock farms, he said.
Evans and Roberts declined to comment.
Undercover Trophy Hunter by Eduardo Gonçalves, Green Future Books, 111 pages, £7.99; ebook £3.99
I will post some of the questions asked of me by the journalist in due course. The level of stupidity that Goncalves displays and is putting forward to his readers is astonishing.
Fortunately for him, it's doubtful any of his readers will bother checking his 'facts'. Unfortunately for the rest of us, these people will be heard more than the African continent and it's wildlife.
It should be pointed out that the part that mentions me in this book has been copied and pasted from this forum although Goncalves has told The Times he contacted me personally under a false identity which is untrue. He has amalgamated hunts spanning five years and mixed them up in no chronological order making no sense.
How hunters’ trophies die in agony
Britons have admitted killing for fun and chasing down wounded big game
Dominic Kennedy, Investigations Editor
Thursday July 01 2021, 12.01am, The Times
South Africa
Alex Nielsen of West Sussex told an online forum of his activities in South Africa
Share
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/how-hunters-trophies-die-in-agony-lbktrhprs
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https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/how-hunters-trophies-die-in-agony-lbktrhprs
Saved
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/how-hunters-trophies-die-in-agony-lbktrhprs
The slow deaths of big game animals targeted by British hunters in Africa are disclosed today as pressure mounts for a ban on the import of trophies.
Hunters admitted shooting meerkats, monkeys and a cat-like animal called a genet out of trees for relaxation in between stalking more impressive targets in the plains and bush.
Many of the species they shoot are expected to be left out of the government’s promised legislation to stop the import of trophy animals. MPs from across the Commons are now demanding a complete clampdown.
IN YOUR INBOX
Best of Times
We’ll send you our top stories, across all sections, straight to your inbox. Simple as that.
Sign up now
A glimpse into the world of safari enthusiasts was provided by Eduardo Gonçalves, a campaigner who posed as a would-be hunter seeking advice from Britons who had hunted in Africa.
His findings are published today in a book to mark the sixth anniversary of the shooting of Cecil, Zimbabwe’s most celebrated lion, with a bow and arrow by an American dentist. The wandering lion’s hours of wounded agony before he was finished off with a gun provoked international outrage.
Britons have provided graphic descriptions of how game creatures are sometimes difficult to kill cleanly and quickly.
Adrian Cawte, of Wellington, Somerset, told a hunters’ website that he shot a zebra in Namibia which “reared and ran, through the thorns, over rocks, stumbling and falling, blood appearing on the chest area before laying down and kicking weakly”.
Nielsen’s exploits included shooting a zebra, which continued to run for 200m
He found it “was still clinging to life so I dispatched it with a shot to the chest. My original shot had been a little too far forward and while undoubtedly a mortal wound I was not happy to watch an animal suffer. Unfortunately this zebra had damaged its hide on the sharp rocks and thorns in its death throes which was a shame.”
Alex Nielsen, of Henfield, West Sussex, killed a zebra in South Africa. “The shot was good and stuck low on the shoulder and into the heart and lung region. Believe it or not with a broken shoulder and the top of the heart completely destroyed he managed to run some 200m,” Nielsen told an online forum.
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A British expatriate energy worker described to Gonçalves how a shot zebra had run away in South Africa. “I probably hit high above the heart ... They found it about two weeks later and sent me pictures where it travelled virtually the whole length of the area because it is a fenced farm.”
Paul Roberts, 79, from West Sussex, chairman of a gunmaking company, reminisced on video for a gun magazine about hunting big game in Africa many years ago. Once he had to shoot a leopard repeatedly. Another time he wounded an elephant and needed to change to a new rifle with extra penetration.
Some animals try to escape. A British businessman is quoted telling the author that an impala ran into a waterhole and “buried itself up to its neck ... I went and got it.”
Gonçalves, founder of the Campaign to Ban Trophy Hunting, told The Times: “I was genuinely shocked at the incredible suffering experienced by many of the animals.”
Hunters told him of their amusement at nabbing smaller creatures. Gonçalves asked Stuart Eborall, a deerstalker from Rugby, whether monkeys and meerkats were shot at a ranch he visited in South Africa. Eborall said: “Yeah, yeah ... We go and grab a few beers and get up on one of the rocks looking over some tree’d area where all the monkeys are and just have a bit of fun shooting the monkeys.” Eborall was contacted for comment.
Christian Evans, a property expert from North Yorkshire, told the author that in South Africa “we did genet cat lamping, shooting genets out of trees with the bows. Really cool, really fun!”
The expatriate said: “We’ve had quite a few beers and gone out rabbit bashing as they call it, and we’ve gone out at night ... They shine on a hare or a rabbit or spring hare ... Then you chase with a bit of wood.”
The trophy hunting industry entices customers through marketing deals. One ranch offers a $3,900 (£2,825) couple’s package with six animals in a week including ostriches or warthogs. Another business promotes father and son “bonding” holidays.
The trophy hunters operate within the law. Permits are sold by African countries seeking foreign revenue to use for anti-poaching measures.
Whitehall sources said that Defra’s proposals on banning imports had been delayed by the pandemic.
Sir Roger Gale, who chairs the all-party parliamentary group on banning trophy hunting, which is being launched today, called for all trophy imports to be banned. He accepted that wild animals sometimes needed to be killed but said it should be done professionally by skilled people.
Walter Palmer, left, the dentist who killed Cecil the lion six years ago, poses with a kill in 2015
REX SHUTTERSTOCK
“There is no need for any numbskull to go and murder beautiful, magnificent, proud animals,” he said.
Sir David Amess, the Tory MP who submitted an early-day motion demanding jail sentences for offenders, said that many animals besides big game were threatened by these hunters. “A ban on the import of trophies would make these ‘hunting holidays’ less attractive,” he said.
Some hunters passionately defended their pastime. Nielsen, a wildlife manager, told The Times that a ban on imports threatened well-managed hunting areas that preserved populations of game animals. Species would decline if land was transferred to human use as “people and these large dangerous animals don’t get on very well”. He accused campaigners of using emotive arguments.
Cawte, 49, a Ministry of Defence dog handler, pointed out that species were conserved because “as long as it pays to set aside land for wildlife, land users will do just that. At the moment, hunting is by far the most efficient way to earn a living on wildlife in very remote areas.” If farming became better business wild habitats would be lost and turned into livestock farms, he said.
Evans and Roberts declined to comment.
Undercover Trophy Hunter by Eduardo Gonçalves, Green Future Books, 111 pages, £7.99; ebook £3.99
