I was looking at this piece of legislation again tonight to see if the bill had been signed. I clicked on the lobbyist declarations, Iowa Bowhunters for, Iowa Conservation Alliance for, Izaac Walton League for, Iowa Outdoor Partnership for, Iowa Chapter Sierra Club AGAINST. Go figure.
I went to the Sierra Club (International) web site just to refresh my memory. I read an article about a guy who started a foundation that trains and equips an anti-poaching army in Africa.
Here is a copy and paste from the article:
In 2004, ivory was $200 a pound. Now it's approaching $2,000 a pound. There are now an estimated 35,000 elephants a year being annihilated—it could be as high as 50,000. That's 10 percent of the estimated remaining elephant population being killed off each year, so that basically leaves us not even a decade. There are an estimated 20,000 lions left in Africa today, probably less. That's a 75 percent drop in the last 20 years. There are probably fewer than 10,000 cheetahs left. I hardly see them. If you look through my new book, there are no cheetah photographs. It became too damn hard to find them. Nick Brandt
The jump in the price of ivory struck me. Why did it jump? Supply and demand. If the supply of ivory had remained relatively constant instead of being cut by the exportation and/or importation ban the price wouldn't have escalated making ivory more attractive to poachers therefore creating more poachers?
When elephants are poached to near extinction because of the price of ivory there will be fewer poachers, the elephants will make a comeback and the supply/poacher cycle starts all over again. While I'm all for training and equipping de-facto game wardens I just have to wonder if the Sierra Club is partially to blame for the demise of some species.
I realize the demand will probably always be there and as long as there is a demand there will be a supplier, but with dwindling supply there will be fewer suppliers/poachers.
Anyway, this is just my relatively uninformed and perhaps naïve opinion. I'm just on an anti anti-hunting rant.