Companies that are shooting record-breaking animals

Hunting companies are competing to see how many of the world’s largest animals they can shoot on their estates.

Hunting groups such as Safari Club International have a ‘Record Book’. It’s a bit like the Guinness Book of World Records. Instead of recording great human achievements, however, it catalogues the defenceless, innocent animals that have been shot by hunters for fun.

There are currently 892 different species and sub-species listed in SCI’s Record Book, and almost 200,000 ‘record-sized’ animals that appear in the book.

The Record Book tells hunters where to find the biggest animals and how big an animal must be to be eligible. Lions, leopards and cheetahs shot by hunters have their heads measured after they’re killed. For elephants, hunters weigh the animal’s tusks. Rhinos have the size of their horns measured.

It’s the dream of every trophy hunter to get into the Record Book. It’s like a cricketer wanting to get their name on the Board at Lords for scoring a century or taking 5 wickets, or an American Football player getting inducted into the Hall of Fame.

However, because the Record Book is encouraging hunters to shoot the ‘strongest’ and ‘fittest’ animals there are fears this is accelerating the extinction emergency. Trophy Hunting is the opposite of Natural Selection, where the fittest survive and pass on their genes and thus ensure the continuity of the species. Scientists says make animals could go extinct as they can’t adapt quickly enough to survive accelerating climate change.

The industry’s own records indicate that lions are indeed now smaller than they were 30 years ago. Scientist have found that their gene pool has shrunk by 15% over the past century. They say that shooting just 5% of the best male lions left could push them past the point of return. US government officials warn that lions could go extinct by the year 2050.

Elephant tusks have shrunk dramatically in size too. There are now just 40 ‘Big Tusker’ elephants left on the planet, and the growth in numbers of tuskless adult elephants has been dramatic.

Hunting companies, meanwhile, are making millions from helping eager Trophy Hunters get their names into the Record Book. Hunters often have to shoot a large number of animals before they get one big enough to be eligible for the Record Book – meaning even more animals are shot.

Below are some of the hunting companies with the most entries in Safari Club International’s Record Book. While many are in Africa, some of the biggest are in the US where animals are brought from Africa for American hunters to shoot on ranches in Texas. There are also companies in Spain and New Zealand, while other leading firms are British-owned.

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