Elephant bone and Ivory and great material to work with and make very unique pieces however, and due to human abused and animal cruelty, those materials are near impossible to obtains in legal markets. The black market on those products are alive and well but something that I don't want to get involve with however, elephant bones are found readily all over the Africa Continent and collect by locals free of any problems, what so ever but Government regulations had to try to stop the killing of such animals for trade purposes, that has put the elephant bones in the same prohibited items list, as a result. Shame, really...!
Cheers
George
George
This information is incorrect. Elephant Ivory is a CITES listed product and as such may not be traded, bartered sold etc. This does not apply to elephant bone.
There is, however, still ivory to be had in the form of Warthog tusks, which are not prohibited.
There are numerous suppliers of Ivory in the USA which was collected prior to the ban. As a sidenote, it is legal for you guys to come over here and legally hunt an Elephant and then take the Ivory back to the States for sale, trade etc but I can't send you a piece to make a pen with. Go figure??
G'day Terry,
Glad that you are in the position to give me an update on the situation, as the issue has had a few changes through the years...!
The Ivory that I was talking about was specifically the elephant one, as I know that Warthog tusks are sold legally...!
The last time I read an article about the issue was a few years ago and was in a time where the Authorities have very most started an open war with the poachers and traffickers, the time where government as created "patrol" teams with orders to kill on the spot any poachers.
The article did address the issue of elephant bones trade and the solution at that time, was to restrict and is this case prohibit the collection and sale of elephant bones, as were in most cases the poachers that killed the elephant for their tasks only, that would benefit the most from the bone traffic , as they knew where they had killed those elephants and would benefit again from returning some time later to retrieve the bones.
There was also the aspect of poachers still have a reason to keep killing these animals as, was still profit to be made out of them...!
That also would create a situation that, would make these armed "patrol" guards, not only invest time and effort chasing people though as poachers resulting in most cases in their death, before the truth could be achieved.
Those were very violent times (and probably still are) where you shoot first and ask questions later...!
I suppose, I could see from that article, the benefit in making the elephant bone collecting and trafficking illegal, as poachers would be very wary of getting around and get caught by the "patrol" guards and possibly be shot...!
Most of "army services" was served in Mozambique in 1973-1974, I hunted quite a bit and travel a fair bit in that Continent, I visited South Africa just before I departed in middle 1974.
I also kept contact some some of the hunting safari outfitters and spoke to many of their clients that I had the opportunity to me and discuss the legal side of "legal" hunting in Africa and the process of treatment/preservation requirements to satisfy Customs from the various countries involved, including the requirement imposed by the Government from the Country those animals were shot and conditions to export such items.
Trophy's, included all sorts of animals parts, including the whole animal so, I'm in no way surprised that today, people are still allowed to pay a Safari outfitter to guide him/her/them to kill animals like the elephant, and be allowed to bring the task home...!
Safari hunting has become a very serious business in Africa, and that is a good thing, considering the possibilities. I know also that elephants have start to become a big problem in certain areas, due to "protection" that they have been surrounded by but, like the crocodile in Australia that was almost shot to extinction, due to their skins value then, a complete ban to kill these animals was imposed by Governments, and all these years later, we have crocodiles killing and eating people all then time due to over population.
These sorts of issues are always very political, attracting people from both sides of the fence, where no one has a magical answer and or solution, however, these issues have to be dealt with by someone, regardless..!
In any case, I still have no answer to your last question, sorry...!
I appreciate your input on the issue...!
Cheers
George
