This is a very interesting, though long, essay. I find it particularly interesting since it’s about the real problem with elephants, but also because I’ve been to some of the places it describes. In 1983, I shot my first elephant bull in Deka, just along the northern border of Hwange, and spent some time around Pandamatenga and Kazuma Pan areas, right on the Botswana border.
In 1986, I shot another bull, this time in Matetsi unit 3 (back when Peter Johnstone had it), and we also spent time camping in Chobe Park, seeing the destruction he describes first hand. Chobe NP was a dead forest once you got very far from the river, but there were tons of elephants along the river corridor, especially near Kasane. Even back then, the overpopulation problem was obvious. The only green vegetation was near the river.
In 1989, I finished up a long Botswana hunt with 16 days hunting along the Linyanti, Kwando and Selinda Rivers, all just west of Chobe NP. Interestingly, the Linyanti swamps were lush and there weren’t all that many elephants in the region where we hunted. I doubt we saw 100 total elephants in the 16 days we were there, but I’ll never forget one very old bull we bumped into near the Selinda spillway. He was all alone, very dark skin with deeply sunken temples and had one broken tusk that we thought was still over 60 lbs. But the other tusk was long and thick, about 5 1/2 or more feet showing, heavily stained and over 90 lbs. I told Cecil Riggs to stop the truck and when he did, I jumped out with camera in hand and started toward the old bull. Cecil simply told me to be careful as he stayed in the truck. The bull wouldn’t let me get closer than about 60 yards and turned away to leave. Even trotting after him, he quickly out distanced me. I’ve been fortunate to see some very large elephants over the years, but I’ll never forget that old fellow.
