Shipping Trophies has Gotten Outlandish

[Ontario Hunter]

The taxidermist I use now will only ship skulls if clients are asking for capes dip and pack. They told me it's to avoid taxidermists on this side blaming them for splitting skulls or cutting off horns incorrectly, etc. So that buffalo skull filled up a good size crate.

 

[MTA]

Thats a shame.. I received my first crate a month or so ago. Not too bad on the price for everything but I wont be doing anymore taxidermy except for special circumstances. More money for hunting or other travel and my house is already filled up with mounts as is

 

[375Fox]

Leaving trophies in South Africa or Namibia will mean paying a 15% VAT on trophy fee. If it’s paying to leave them there or paying to bring them home, I’ll be bringing them home.

 

[LivingTheDream]

Turkish Airlines are also a bunch of pirates.

It has to clear wherever it lands from overseas.

Dulles shipments get trucked to Baltimore to clear USF&W. Then shipped to where ever.

Turkish airlines is pretty good.

 

[.300RUM]

We went last August, trophies arrived mid March of this year, a Waterbuck, Gemsbok and an Impala. Dip and pack was about $600, crate and plane ticket with Turkish Airlines was about $1100 and Coppersmith imports was about $1250. Nothing about an African adventure is going to be cheap.

 

[Osama Mahdi]

Sorry for your trouble.
It is known to me that certain Airlines will not take the big five and I am just ordinary person. How they didn't know that.
I just used Badger Cargo. AAnd they booked on Turkish airlines

 

[dchum]

I'm not sure but the air cargo sounds cheap and it's been five years of so but trucking a crate from Atlanta to Baltimore was around $800. Call it Bidenomics and another reason to tell Delta to pound sand.

Should be much cheaper on the truck rate. 800 would be getting ripped of for lack of words.

 

[Doug Hamilton]

Leaving trophies in South Africa or Namibia will mean paying a 15% VAT on trophy fee. If it’s paying to leave them there or paying to bring them home, I’ll be bringing them home.

A 15% VAT Tax is just a down payment on getting your trophies home.

 

[Andrew62]

I made a great hunt last May to SA and was able to harvest a great Buffalo, Sable, Springbok and warthog (see my hunt report with Blackthorn Safari). Had the trophies picked up by Splitting Image on our last day there. They were to do all the dip and pack of my animals but no taxidermy which they did after just about exactly one year and $1100. They then passed them off to the shipping company who sent me an invoice for $2815 to get the animals to Baltimore where they could go through customs. I wired the money the day after receiving the invoice. After not hearing anything I inquired about the shipping and they said because Delta won't fly any of the big 5 and I have a buffalo they have to ship it on Turkish Airways which doesn't fly into Baltimore so it would have to be trucked from IAD to Baltimore and it would cost an additional $1018. This has gotten to the point where I probably will not go back to Africa or if I do I won't bring any animals back to the states. When you total all the costs up it will end up costing more to get the animals here and mounted than it did to do the hunt! Am I crazy or is $4000 too high for a relatively small crate with skins and horns?

Last March I fulfilled a 25 year long dream, I took a western savannah buffalo in Cameroon. I had my guide take pics, then I walked away from it. That's pretty much how I have been handling trophies for many years, the stress and costs of getting things mounted takes away too much from my hunts. Plus now I can take extra hunts. I'm very sorry for what you have had to endure, very frustrating!

 

[R eight]

Leaving trophies in South Africa or Namibia will mean paying a 15% VAT on trophy fee. If it’s paying to leave them there or paying to bring them home, I’ll be bringing them home.

If the cost of getting it home was only 15% of the trophy fees then there probably wouldn't be this thread.

My experiences with freighting stuff from Alaska to Australia is over the top. I can buy a business class ticket for less than the freight bill....and that was for a brown bear hide.

 

[YancyW]

My last shipment from Zim is the last time I'm bring much of anything home. If it is very special, I will consider it, everything else can just be a photo.

 

[matt85]

Buy a small plot of land in Namibia, have a hunting lodge built, send trophies there, and pay a local to maintain the place while you are gone..... Then retire there.

At least that's my fantasy.

 

[Hogpatrol]

The cost, hassle, worrying and dealing with the various government agencies and shippers both here and in Africa on trophy export/import for me wasn't worth it. Like a fellow hunter stated at my last venue, "After I die, everything will go in the dumpster anyway". If I had to do it all over again, I would have just done videos.
YMMV.

 

[Gerry Addison]

I don't give a second thought to driving 24-30 hrs to Montana every fall to hunt. Eight hours behind the wheel is a drive around the block for anyone raised in the West. And the flights to South Africa are almost as long as driving back to Montana (but I find those trips much more tiresome). I drove to Toronto last year to pick up my trophies ... about eighteen hours one way as I recall. Meah.

But you aren't allowed to pick them up because they have to go through customs and move from IAD to BWI. Must be transported by a bonded carrier. That is the problem. Costs $1015 to move 253 pounds 54 miles.

 

[Gerry Addison]

It has gotten considerably more expensive since Covid. What’s the significance of clearing the trophies in Baltimore? Seems like shipping and clearing at JFK then shipping to final destination would have made a lot more sense than flying to Dulles and trucking to Baltimore for clearing? Then trucking to final destination?

All the shipping companies warned against going through JFK. Said much more expensive.

 

[flying sailor]

The cost, hassle, worrying and dealing with the various government agencies and shippers both here and in Africa on trophy export/import for me wasn't worth it. Like a fellow hunter stated at my last venue, "After I die, everything will go in the dumpster anyway". If I had to do it all over again, I would have just done videos.
YMMV.

I am expecting mounts of my trophies in the next few months. I have estimates from the taxidermist and Coppersmiths. I have a feeling this will be the only trophies I bring back. The money would most likely buy another hunt.

 

[Red Leg]

It’s a shame so many feel this way but it is totally understandable. When I get to this point I’ll quit going overseas to hunt. To me the displaying the trophies is the culmination of the hunt.

Having arrived at the place you describe some years ago (simply no more room for dead fauna, I have taken the opposite position you describe. I realized that I collected things like ancient coins, fine art, and a library. But, I hunted for the experience. One more or less dead animal on the wall would mean very little to me and nothing at all to any guests. But another hunting experience in Africa, South America, or Europe would have very real meaning. So halting the taxidermy and shipping has actually freed me to enjoy the sport even more than I did before.

I try to take really good photography, build photo travel logs of every adventure (both hunting and when we are playing tourist), and occasionally add a new canvas print to the wall. For instance my best (by a large margin) sable and Kafue Lechwe. This way I even have my PH's mounted as well.

Finally, I am old enough to realize these mounts will be of no of no interest to any of my family. In fact, unlike a fine gun collection, they will simply be burden to dispose of at pennies on the dollar. The travel logs of our adventures, on the other hand. might actually interest a grandchild someday.

 

[MTA]

Leaving trophies in South Africa or Namibia will mean paying a 15% VAT on trophy fee. If it’s paying to leave them there or paying to bring them home, I’ll be bringing them home.

It certainly depends.. I mean 15% on a $400 impala is way less than getting it euro'd and shipped to DFW for me. For more expensive animals its definitely worth it to ship but I am a poor chump and I wont be hunting any big 5 anytime soon

 

[ActionBob]

It is over an 8 hour drive one way from my house to Dulles.

So it's close!

 

[ActionBob]

Dulles to Baltimore is about 60 miles, but they want $1018 to go that 60 miles. I would drive myself but it is 8 hours one way from my in Cincinnati.

Shop it out. I had a quote from one if those pirates for over $4000 Inland freight. I called a couple trucking companies and got it done for $2000.