Kruger Lions: Hunting for Skye and the truth

This is in response to Kruger lions: Who really cares about conservation by Peter Flack.

Let’s get this straight. The gratuitous killing of wild animals for pleasure and profit under the guise of conservation is not only highly contested and refutable, but is at the heart of the public outrage over the trophy killing of a male lion on the borders of the Kruger National Park last week.

We do not yet know if the hunted male was Skye, the dominant pride lion in Umbabat Private Reserve. However, suspicion is at fever pitch as he has not been seen since the hunt on 7 June.

This is being fuelled by both Umbabat and the Mpumalanga Tourism and Parks Authority failing to say which lion was hunted, how, by whom and who the “outfitter” was.

None of the protagonists has come forward and their silence is damning. The parks authority has ignored a legal demand for a copy of the permit and access to the skin to verify the identity of the lion killed. They have also been asked not to issue a permit for the export of any trophy resulting from the hunt.

The key debate, though, is the role SANParks is playing. Although the Protected Areas Act prohibits hunting in the Kruger National Park, wild animals from there are being killed. SANParks took the decision to remove the fences. It is now disregarding its mandate and responsibility to protect them by allowing hunting to take place in the private areas adjacent to it.

Wild animals that move across imaginary human boundaries are being killed for profit and pleasure by a few people benefiting from an agreement which allowed the fences to be taken down.

The main tenet of the agreement was to “create ecological unity”. Surely this means it must be managed according to national park principles and not for trophy hunting purposes. Those who wanted to support trophy hunting should not have been allowed to be party to the agreement. But there was no public participation around the agreement’s formulation.

It simply cannot be proved that trophy killings in the Associated Private Nature Reserves are of animals that are the property of the reserves. They are a national heritage and the owners of those properties should not have the right to decide on the future of this heritage.

The SANParks website estimates that in 2011 there were between 1 620 to 1,750 lions in Kruger. A growth of 50 lions (if we are to believe Flack) since 2011. This can hardly be used to describe the lion population in the park as “healthy and growing”. This is the first problem with Flack’s argument.

The second problem is his contention that, because of the so-called growing lion population, young male lions are forced out of prides. We could find no proof for this statement. It’s the sort of made-up “fact” hunters commonly use to justify their killing.

In fact, young males leave prides anyway, not because of overpopulation, but to take over another pride to guarantee healthy offspring. According to conservationist Dereck Joubert:

The use of animals for sport is an emotive issue. But this cannot be used to discredit the article, written by Don Pinnock, grounded on available facts as the story unfolded. Flack’s response, based on emotions, a few thumb-sucks and no scientific facts, also discredits his own attempt to taint the reputation of Ian Michler, who is respected internationally for his work in conservation.

The Umbabat lion was baited, which was confirmed by Umbabat warden Bryan Havemann. So much for “ethical” hunters and their so-called “fair chase” methods. This was nothing more than a canned hunt, to benefit certain private reserve owners. As an American, the hunter could be disbarred from Safari Club International, the world’s biggest hunting association, of which he is undoubtedly a member, for baiting and canned lion hunting.

Any agreement between the private reserves and Kruger that animals on the “wrong side” of the invisible fence can be trophy hunted, should be deemed illegal, as due process was not followed when this agreement was drawn up.

Who will benefit from the money (about R1-million) the hunter paid for this trophy? The animals? Definitely not. The community? Definitely not. Kruger? No. Indeed the Kruger letter of 6 February specifically queried Umbabat’s failure to identify hunting proceeds as going towards conservation or socio-economic objectives as Kruger requires.

Some explanation by Flack of where all the millions spent on trophies go would have been helpful.

Flack states that Umbabat Private Nature Reserve is “effectively part of the park (Kruger)”. There is a reason why it’s called a private reserve – because it is NOT part of the KNP. As with any privately-owned facility, the landowners are responsible for the upkeep and maintenance.

People who live in private reserves are privileged to be part of nature.

Instead of killing wild animals for profit – of course all done under the ruse of “conservation”– they should provide a safe haven.

Flack appears to – no, wait – he DOES attack animal rights organisations for trying to protect the animals he believes hunters have the right to bait and kill for “conservation”. Some science would have given his argument a little more credibility.