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. 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. 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. 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.
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