denen DEB ON SB: Li Dk hreN LZ, 
about the future of their animal neighbors. It appears that economic 
advantages of tourism to these people are slight and indirect, at least at 
the present time. 
Threats to wildlife are continuous and varied. First, legal hunting is 
of minor importance, it is claimed, because areas open to hunting are now 
limited, and what game may be taken is restricted in quantity, by sex, size 
and age. Licenses, especially for big game species, are very high, and 
hunting of animals on “endangered lists” is strictly prohibited. 
Second: Poaching, unfortunately, remains prevalent, both in protected 
preserves and outside. The least damage is done by natives for meat: They 
have been accustomed to doing it for countless generations, and for sport 
which is negligible. Mainly they hunt for profit, for there is always demand 
fer elephant ivory, for rhinoceros horns (wealthy Asians still believe in 
their aphrodisiac properties), for spotted cats (mainly leopards and cheetahs) 
to make coats for European and American women, and even for giraffe, 
wildebeest and zebra tails to make coveted fly-whisks. Tribes still hunt 
with spears and bows and arrows and with cruel wire snares which fre- 
quently leave entrapped animals to die a slow death by starvation or 
gangrene. 
A far more serious threat to endangered species is by the professional 
poachers who use land rovers with searchlights, trucks and high-powered 
rifles. They usually raid by night and can be miles away, perhaps across 
a national boundary, by morning where importation and exportation laws 
are either weak or non-existant. 
Parks and game preserve officials are alert to prevent poaching, but 
they are far from effective in some areas due to limited personnel and lack 
of equipment. Frequently we asked officials what was needed. They ex- 
pressed their need, in one park or another, for camels, trucks, land rovers, 
power boats, airplanes, helicopters, and rifles to use in policing the areas. 
A Murchison Falls National Park ranger said he did not believe his country 
of Uganda had even one tranquilizer gun, needed for transferring animals 
from over-crowded habitat to new areas and for treating sick and injured 
animals. Two of the eighteen rare white rhinos recently brought to his 
park from South Africa were found in poacher’s snares. They were alive 
and at least one might have been saved if it could have been tranquilized 
for treatment and released. 
In Murchison Falls Park, we saw the disheartening sight of a posse 
of eight natives setting out on a two-week expedition to apprehend poachers. 
Only two or three had guns. Several had spears. This brave group likely 
could arrest natives with primitive weapons but would have serious 
trouble with armed professionals. 
The park planners, some of whom have studied or visited in our 
country, are taking a long look at National Parks in the United States in 
order to gain from our experience and profit by our mistakes. 
In spite of odds some progress is being made, for there has been a 
decline in the market, at least for furs of spotted cats. Within a year prices 
ot leopard skins in the Kenya black market dropped from $200 - $300 to a 
1969 average of $123. This is said to be mainly due to present and pro- 
spective stiffening of laws governing exportation. Conservationists of the 
world would like to believe that one factor has been propaganda against 
the wearing of these furs. 
—826 So. Wabash Ave, Chicago 
