Elephants with the largest tusks

[Nhoro]

Maybe PAC was incorrect wording, TR2 was completed, export and import CITES was completed for parts, not tusks I have replicas. Also year was before any dates you posted.

I am not here to start any pissing contest. I replied to OPs question with an alternate option to largest elephant.

MB

Hi Mark, Don't get too stressed, IvW is giving you the correct information- a Problem Animal Control elephant would be done under a different permit that is not open to Non-Zimbabweans. I can see that you hunted the animal under a normal hunting permit- I would guess in a communal area which is given a hunting quota each year. The animal may have been in the fields and harassing people but it is a hunting permit and not a problem animal control permit.

We all know what happened when a certain dentist did some dodgy "permits" with his equally dodgy "PH". Dont get on the wrong side of Zim government or the press.

 

[Nhoro]

I have heard of 2 elephants exceeding 100 lbs per side in Zimbabwe in the last 10 years. One was shot in the hunting areas near Gonarezhou and the other was shot by an apprentice PH while doing Problem animal control. This was bordering the Save conservancy and needless to say the landowners in the conservancy are a little irritated with the young man ! How to win friends and become un-employable !

I have friends in Botswana and you will get a larger than average bull there but not sure if there are any 100 lbs bulls there. I am sure a couple are hidden away in the parks there.

 

[MarkB]

Hi Mark, Don't get too stressed, IvW is giving you the correct information- a Problem Animal Control elephant would be done under a different permit that is not open to Non-Zimbabweans. I can see that you hunted the animal under a normal hunting permit- I would guess in a communal area which is given a hunting quota each year. The animal may have been in the fields and harassing people but it is a hunting permit and not a problem animal control permit.

We all know what happened when a certain dentist did some dodgy "permits" with his equally dodgy "PH". Dont get on the wrong side of Zim government or the press

You nailed it, that is exactly what and how we hunted. Outfit and PH is on here and his reputation is outstanding. My mistake calling it a hunt name it was not.

Thanks

MB

 

[IvW]

Hi Mark, Don't get too stressed, IvW is giving you the correct information- a Problem Animal Control elephant would be done under a different permit that is not open to Non-Zimbabweans. I can see that you hunted the animal under a normal hunting permit- I would guess in a communal area which is given a hunting quota each year. The animal may have been in the fields and harassing people but it is a hunting permit and not a problem animal control permit.

We all know what happened when a certain dentist did some dodgy "permits" with his equally dodgy "PH". Dont get on the wrong side of Zim government or the press.

Correct so it was not a PAC elephant....

 

[MarkB]

Correct so it was not a PAC elephant....

That's what I said in last sentence. Guess you want to hear YOUR RIGHT.

MB

 

[IvW]

That's what I said in last sentence. Guess you want to hear YOUR RIGHT.

MB

Not at all no need to get your pants in a knot.....or type in bold letters, I was not replying to you either.
If you do not like what I post use the ignore function it works.....

 

[AES]

100# from Bots this season.

 

[elephantmaster29]

100# from Bots this season.
View attachment 407826

that is an amazing bull, great job.

 

[jacques smith]

Wonderful bull. Kinda figured there would be some floating around after the season was closed. Congrats to entire team. Want to elaborate on area hunted and with who.?

 

[rookhawk]

Where can we find huntable Elephants with the largest tusks? Country and hunting area, and which outfitters have the hunting rights in these areas?

i know this is an old post, but I thought I’d reply. The largest tuskers are most often the race of elephant from Western Zimbabwe and Eastern Botswana. You must be careful because the Tuli Circle (Zim) and Tuli Block (Botswana) are a smaller race found in the southern zone.

The best operator I’ve seen for getting big tuskers that has access to the land just south of Hwange and also the corridor of Plumtree-Figtree on the Zimbabwe side are the concessions owned by Mapassa Safaris (Garth Adam’s and Vaughan Whitehead-Wilson). I think @GarthAdams88 occasionally reads this forum if you’re interested in learning more about these elephants. You can also hunt the same elephants when they migrate to Botswana but it’s more expensive and since it’s a new era with Botswana just allowing elephant hunting again, you need to be extra careful selecting a Botswana operator.

 

[John Telford]

Chobe CH1 next to Chobe game reserve has great bulls. @NKWE SAFARIS has recently hunted this area with success! 70 pounds on three occasions I believe. I’ll be going there soon to do a buffalo but last time I was there earlier in the year we saw lots of elephant and at least two that would go 70 plus. A little known fact about Botswana elephant is that they almost always weigh out heavier that perceived due to the thicker root canal.

 

[John Telford]

i know this is an old post, but I thought I’d reply. The largest tuskers are most often the race of elephant from Western Zimbabwe and Eastern Botswana. You must be careful because the Tuli Circle (Zim) and Tuli Block (Botswana) are a smaller race found in the southern zone.

The best operator I’ve seen for getting big tuskers that has access to the land just south of Hwange and also the corridor of Plumtree-Figtree on the Zimbabwe side are the concessions owned by Mapassa Safaris (Garth Adam’s and Vaughan Whitehead-Wilson). I think @GarthAdams88 occasionally reads this forum if you’re interested in learning more about these elephants. You can also hunt the same elephants when they migrate to Botswana but it’s more expensive and since it’s a new era with Botswana just allowing elephant hunting again, you need to be extra careful selecting a Botswana operator.

The Tuli Elephants are not a smaller race rather they are a gene pool of small ivory carriers. Back in the day they were the closest herd to the SA hunters so all the big bulls were shot out. Most of the population today stem from a small group of 40 that moved into the area in the 1920’s or so. Many are tuskless and they are notoriously aggressive. We lost two staff that were stomped on ! The tallest elephant I have ever seen was in the Tuli block on the Mashatu property this grand old bull stood a head taller than all the other bulls - a true “taller than the trees” bull but had ivory that would not make 50 pounds.
today the herd has swelled to over a thousand and have all but destroyed the vegetation in the Tuli circle .

 

[rookhawk]

The Tuli Elephants are not a smaller race rather they are a gene pool of small ivory carriers. Back in the day they were the closest herd to the SA hunters so all the big bulls were shot out. Most of the population today stem from a small group of 40 that moved into the area in the 1920’s or so. Many are tuskless and they are notoriously aggressive. We lost two staff that were stomped on ! The tallest elephant I have ever seen was in the Tuli block on the Mashatu property this grand old bull stood a head taller than all the other bulls - a true “taller than the trees” bull but had ivory that would not make 50 pounds.
today the herd has swelled to over a thousand and have all but destroyed the vegetation in the Tuli circle .

I think the Tuli circle is a semi-circle 10 miles across? I cannot believe the notion that there is a herd of a thousand in Tuli. In the time I spent there cumulatively (nearly a month) I think I saw maybe 7-8 elephants, all cows with calves. Granted, I wasn’t looking for elephants. Even adding in the Thuli Block on the Botswana side (huge amount of land) I’d be surprised if it were a thousand elephants, but maybe. I do know that just south of there at the confluence of the Limpopo and the Shashe near Eugene Small’s place in RSA there are a fair amount of elephants. I think he gets 6-7 permits issued a year. I also hear on good authority the best they are is 25-35 pounds In that lineage.

What I think is interesting about your origination story @John Telford is that in all that time, a hundred years, no genetic turnover happened from a big Botswana bull to the NW or from a Krueger or Ghonarazhou bull slipping in from the East Right by walking right along the Limpopo. That race is only a couple hundred KMs from huge bodied, large ivoried elephants.

 

[IvW]

The Tuli Elephants are not a smaller race rather they are a gene pool of small ivory carriers. Back in the day they were the closest herd to the SA hunters so all the big bulls were shot out. Most of the population today stem from a small group of 40 that moved into the area in the 1920’s or so. Many are tuskless and they are notoriously aggressive. We lost two staff that were stomped on ! The tallest elephant I have ever seen was in the Tuli block on the Mashatu property this grand old bull stood a head taller than all the other bulls - a true “taller than the trees” bull but had ivory that would not make 50 pounds.
today the herd has swelled to over a thousand and have all but destroyed the vegetation in the Tuli circle .

Yip....smaller thinner tusks...biggest PAC I shot on SA side from Tuli was 44lbs....most are 15 to 30 lbs....and yes some have an attitude problem more so than your average ele...

 

[AES]

Not sure if it has been mentioned but SMJ in Nyae Nyae produces the largest, on average, elephants per season, I believe.

 

[rookhawk]

Not sure if it has been mentioned but SMJ in Nyae Nyae produces the largest, on average, elephants per season, I believe.

I don't recognize the acronymns. Could you mention what country and region that would be?

 

[John Telford]

By Tuli I mean the greater Tuli area and not the Tuli circle only. The circle is actually a part of Zimbabwe that is on the Botswana side of the Shase river and was created back in the day as a buffer around Fort Tuli. There are no fences only a cut line to show the border. The Elephant move up and down this area as far as Francistown in the North and often raid the SA farms in the South as food is becoming scarcer .

 

[IvW]

Tuli block ele are small compared to the rest of Botswana. I hunt enough PAC in the area...

 

[Wishfulthinker580]

I don't recognize the acronymns. Could you mention what country and region that would be?

SMJ Safaris – SMJ Hunting Safaris

smj-safaris.com

Pretty certain this was who was referenced.

 

[rookhawk]

SMJ Safaris – SMJ Hunting Safaris

smj-safaris.com

Pretty certain this was who was referenced.

I can't speak about the Nyae-Nyae as I'd never even heard of it previously. I remain a bit skeptical that the Namib desert is holding animals of that quality on average, but only because I see animals in the 35-45lb in many Namibia hunting reports.

As for the Botswana-Hwange corridor elephants, I know that Garth Adams and Vaughan Whitehead Wilson hold those concessions. They have hunted elephants over 100lbs. When I visited them a year ago to see some of their non-profit conservation work going on near one of their camps they had 3 sets of tusks hunted the week prior. All were over 70 pounds. They hunt the Zimbabwe side of the border but they are the same huge elephants that cycle in and out of the Botswana-Zim border south of the Hwange national park as a point of reference.