All posts by David

Lawsuit Filed Against State of California

SUPERIOR COURT OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

FOR THE COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

Plaintiff:

IVORY EDUCATION INSTITUTE,  a California non profit, unincorporated association, on behalf of itself and its participants and the taxpayers of California who own ivory objects of historic, artistic, cultural and practical importance created prior to 1977.

Defendant:

THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA, by and through its agency the Department of Fish and Wildlife.

COMPLAINT FOR INJUNCTION TO PROHIBIT IMPLEMENTATION OF CALIFORNIA ASSEMBLY BILL 96 (California Fish and Game Code Section 2022)

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Keep Your Hands Off Africa!

Ron Thomson was deeply involved in the management of both Hwange and Gonarezhou National Parks in Zimbabwe. He is the author of many books on conservation in Africa (http://www.ronthomsonshuntingbooks.co.za).  He is an expert who has lived and managed wildlife. Listen to his words about elephant populations in southern Africa, the animal rights groups, and the attitude of American government agencies toward the environmental and conservation problems that Africa is experiencing.

Godfrey Harris
Managing Director
Ivory Education Institute

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As someone whose passion is wildlife management – and who has a special interest in elephants and rhinos  – whose belief it is that maintaining biological diversity is the ULTIMATE and singlemost important goal of living resource management in a national park, I have to tell you that ALL our southern African national parks are horrifically overstocked with elephants – and that the elephants are busy turning their habitats into deserts.

In 1960 it was agreed by the National Parks Board of that time, that the Hwange National Park’s elephant stocking rate was no more than one elephant per two square miles (I still believe that is about right); and Hwange National Park is 5000 square miles in extent.  Between 1960 and 1964, therefore, I was involved in trying to reduce the elephant population of Hwange from (then) 3500 to 2500 – by shooting every elephant that crossed the park boundary into the tribal lands beyond.  Tim Braybrook and I shot hundreds of elephants during that period, but we  never achieved our objective because elephants were all the time invading Hwange from Botswana – attracted by the 60 boreholed game water supplies we provided for our game in Hwange during that same period of time.  And, in those days even, the elephants of Hwange were already rendering extinct several species of trees in the Hwange habitats.

Nevertheless, in 1960, lets say the ‘desired’ number of elephants for Hwange was 2500.  Compare that to the numbers today: over 50 000.  That means Hwange is currently overstocked with elephants by 2000 percent!  The Gonarezhou is now carrying 11 000 elephants – and the habitats have been trashed.  The 2000 sq mile Gonarezhou should be carrying  no more than 1000 elephants.  So the Gonarezhou is over 1000 percent overstocked.  Kruger should be carrying no more than 4000 elephants; it is currently carrying between 16 000 and 20 000 (depending on whose elephant assessment  you believe).  So Kruger is 400 to 500 percent over stocked.  Botswana is now carrying in excess of 200 000 elephants; yet in 1960, when irreparable habitat damage was first reported from Chobe National Park, the comparable count was (about) 7 500.  So Botswana is carrying, arguably, 27 times as many elephants as it should – and its other wild animal species populations have crashed by up to 60 percent (so far); in some cases by as much as 90 percent.  If you care to look at the situation in Namibia you will find the the same kind of elephant overpopulation situation exists there, too.

So where do these damned First World animal rightists get their propaganda figures from?  And why is the IUCN et al, not more concerned about elephant habitat damage than they are concerned about elephant numbers?  You NEVER hear IUCN so-called “experts” talking about the state of the habitats.  They only express positive comments when elephant count numbers are UP; and dismal forebodings (about extinction) when numbers are DOWN.  The IUCN is worse than the animal rightists!  Elephant population numbers and the health of elephant habitats go hand in hand.  They should be considered as one entity.  Don’t these people understand ANYTHING about the principles and practices of wildlife management? The world has gone crazy with its concern about the predictions of elephant extinctions contained in the animal rightists’ false propaganda. Do the figures I have quoted give you any reason to believe that the elephant, as a species, is facing extinction?  Nothing could be further from the truth.   Yet in America – from Barack Obama’s office down through the governments various administrations – everybody is going cuckoo over the possibility.  Aren’t the people of America normal, thinking and intelligent people?  Don’t they understand that the animal rights movement is a confidence industry.  The purpose of them propagating such disinformation is to make money – vast amounts of money – from the gullible public.

And all these people are now telling Africa HOW it should manage its wildlife.  That idea is preposterous!  These people should keep their hands off Africa!

Ron Thomson

Antique Definition

 

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service needs to offer a substantive justification for basing a major element of Rule 4(d) on an outmoded definition of what is or is not an antique.

  • Using the economic reasoning behind the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930 hardly seems relevant to the need to protect and preserve artifacts for American society that are culturally significant, historically noteworthy, and artistically important.
  • Using an antiquated and inadequate definition is contrary to the commitment of the Service to adhere to the underlying spirit of the Office of Management and Budget’s goal of getting the Nation’s regulatory system “to promote …………….. READ FULL ARTICLE

Opposition to Revisions to Rule 4(d)

OPPOSITION TO PROPOSED REVISIONS
TO RULE 4(d) FOR THE AFRICAN ELEPHANT
50 CFR Part 17

The Fish and Wildlife Service includes the following statement in reviewing the regulatory background revising the rule for the African elephant:

“In November 2013, the Service destroyed nearly six tons of contraband African and Asian elephant ivory that had been either seized at U.S. ports or as part of law enforcement investigations over the past 25 years for violation of wildlife laws.”

Nowhere in the long preamble to the proposed rule change has the Service offered any evidence that the ivory crushed had been tested or professionally examined to determine that all six tons destroyed were, in fact, African elephant ivory (Loxodonta Africana). Does the Service really pretend that no legal ivory from walruses, boars, warthogs, mammoths or mastodons had been confiscated in the 25 years?
Put another way, how can the Service be trusted to …………… READ FULL ARTICLE

Letter to the Governor

Hon. Jerry Brown
Governor of lhe Slate of Califom1a
State Cap.tol
Sacramento, CA 95814

September 15, 2015

Dear Jerry:

When you were first running for a seat on the Los Angeles Community College Board, your Dad asked me to see what I could do to help you. I soon learned that I couldn’t do much because you had the campaign well in hand. I remember telling your Dad that you were busy learning what worked for you personally in a political sense and that it was best that you did that on your own and without any consultant Interference.

Your Dad and I began working together after his appointment to the Board of Investors Overseas Services. I remember taking him to Chile to meet the President and driving him to visit the Nixon Presidential Library. I captured part of that Chilean trip 1n a few paragraphs from a new book I have written on political euphemisms.

One of the first times I heard an original euphemism was on an airplane from Los Angles to Santiago, Chile. I was accompanying former California Governor Edmund C. (Pat) Brown to a meeting with Chilean President Eduardo Frei to discuss potential investments in the latter’s country. About two hours into the flight, Pat got up from his seat and announced: “I gotta go to cast a vote for Ronald Reagan.” Brown was dearly about to visit the airplane’s restroom.

But in using a colorful euphemism to mask the reality of his intended action, he was also making a
political statement about the events of 1966. That was the year Ronald Reagan — a mere Hollywood actor with no experience in public office or in major electoral politics — soundly defeated Brown in the latter’s bid for a third term. Pat was smarting because he had handily beaten Richard Nixon, a major national political figure, in California‘s 1962 gubernatorial election. Nixon had been US Vice President in the Eisenhower Administration and had barely lost to John F. Kennedy in the 1960 Presidential race. It was in fact, after that 1962 California election defeat by Brown that Nixon had famously, petulantly and, as it turned out, incorrectly told the press that he was leaving politics and that they wouldn’t have “Nixon to kick around anymore.”

The visit to Yorba Linda 1s memorialized in the accompanying collage containing a photo of your Dad and me and his kind thank you note.

All of this is background to my concerns about AB 96, an act that allegedly protects elephants but will do nothing of the kind. Instead, it kills a segment of California’s economy and discourages collectors without any actual evidence that it will save one elephant. My format statement of opposition is contained in the attached separate memo of Ivory Education Institute. This letter is a personal plea for you to do what you have always done so well: Put the anticipated, political, comfortable and often easiest course of action aside to consider alternative, politically tougher solutions that harbor a better chance of doing more good for the greatest number of people. Why not involve the Department of Fish and Wildlife, knowledgeable specialists in the State, and thoughtful members of the legislature 1n formulating a California-centric plan of action that has a chance of actually protecting endangered elephants. providing a reliable means of distinguishing the age and among the types of ivory and ivory substitutes, and addressing new measures to control the demand for ivory In est Asia.

Sincerely

Godfrey (Jeff) Harris
President,
Harris / Ragan Management Group