More than 100 hippos have died in Namibia in a remote national park in the past week, the country’s environment minister said on Monday, warning that anthrax could be to blame. Images from the Bwabwata national park in north-east Namibia showed dozens of lifeless hippos, some flat on their backs, others with just their heads […]
Tag: Namibia
POLL: Should the export of young elephants to Chinese zoos be banned?
After being taken from her family and the only life she’s ever known, a young female elephant estimated to be just five years old is loaded onto a truck, while men repeatedly kick her in the head, hit her and pull her by a rope as they try to get her to move back. Her […]
POLL: Should the export of “legal ivory” be made illegal?
The United Kingdom ships more legal ivory beyond its borders than any other country, according to an analysis released today by the London-based NGO Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA). The announcement comes two days before World Elephant Day on Saturday. Globally, elephant numbers are falling, down 30 percent between 2007 and 2014 — a decline driven largely […]
Karma Strikes Again: Trophy Hunter Killed by Elephant
Karma has really been a bitch to trophy hunters in Zimbabwe over the past couple of months. Early last month Scott Van Zyl, the owner of a South African trophy hunting operation, was eaten by the crocodiles he’d intended to kill. On May 19, his friend Theunis Botha, the owner of another South African trophy-hunting […]
POLL: Should wild elephants be sold to Chinese zoos?
Last year more than 30 young elephants were captured from the wild in Zimbabwe and flown by plane to China. The elephants – some reported to be as young as three – were dispersed to a number of zoos throughout the country, including the Shanghai Wild Animal Park, the Beijing Wildlife Park and the Hangzhou […]
Elephant refugees flee to last stronghold in Africa
Chobe National Park, Botswana – The elephants swim across the river in a straight line, trunks jutting out of the water like snorkels. With low, guttural bellows, they push their bodies together, forming a living raft to bolster a calf too tiny to stay afloat on its own. This pachyderm flotilla has a dangerous destination […]
Take me to the place where the white boys dance…
To kick off this post, I have to apologise to the band “The Killers”, whose song title made a perfect title for this photo and its resulting blog post. As you may know, we recently returned from an amazing family safari-camping-roadtrip through some of the most iconic places in Namibia. One of the destinations was […]
POLL: Should Namibia’s cape fur seal trade be banned?
Namibian Sunshine isn’t what you might think. It’s oil derived from the blubber of the Cape fur seal, advertised online as rich in Omega-3 fatty acids and allegedly more readily absorbed by the human body—given its mammalian source—than fish oil. Since 2005 Namibia has exported almost 33,000 gallons of sunshine, nearly a third to China. […]