87 Elephants found dead

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Originally Posted by Alter-Echo

I can't even look at these kind of articles anymore, too depressing and I know this kinda thing won't stop till they are all dead.

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it is depressing but these articles do spur emotions and action, however fleeting. one tragic article will probably generate a temp surge to donations towards conservation/animal protection, etc. it's a ban-aid but it helps.

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Originally Posted by hilabeans

Nooooooo!!!!

The poachers are just poor and desperate, usually. You need to, pardon the pun in very poor taste, cut off the head of the snake. That's the $$$ behind this, which typically stems from Asia.

Just gut wrenching and awful. My heart is broken.

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that's the other sad reality and truth to the hired help - a lot of poor locals. they don't get rich, they're trying to survive. they're still apart of the problem but it's the demand, middlemen and poachers at the top of the pyramid who suck the most.

Here's what you need to realize about poaching: one tusk will net a poacher about $1500. Since elephants have two, that's $3000 per elephant. That's also about five times the average annual income of the people who live in those areas, so poachers have a huge financial incentive to kill as many elephants as they can.

Now look at it from the perspective of the locals: elephants are essentially huge pests that destroy their crops. Farmers here in the US complain about losses due to deer, groundhogs, feral hogs, etc. but they've got nothing on a herd of hungry pachyderms. So, the locals don't see elephants as an asset, they're huge hungry liabilities destroying food that their families should be eating.

Then you throw in a ban on hunting/killing the elephants, and you get poaching, with the locals turning a blind eye or even participating because they are desperate to survive so of course they're going to give in to the temptation.

Compare that with areas where sport hunting is legal. Permits are expensive, with the money going to the local community, and a very few pre-selected animals such as overly-aggressive or older males are culled for the overall benefit of the herd. You would never find close to 100 dead animals killed just for their tusks. The meat also goes to the community families; with poaching it often doesn't because by the time anyone finds the carcass it has usually spoiled. The locals have a vested interest in stopping the poachers because the elephants are now an asset and not a liability; the community more or less "owns" the local herd, it receives income because of the herd, and so it protects the herd.