What is it like owning a game ranch in South Africa?

[PeteG]

nah screw a dakota!! what about the russian boys sitting in the DRC with the BIG russian transport planes that do anything if you can pay????

Hmm, they frequent eastern congo and northern zambia... but i'm sure its just sightseeing!

 

[spike.t]

Hmm, they frequent eastern congo and northern zambia... but i'm sure its just sightseeing!

but of course !!

 

[spoonieduck]

I've looked at South African property for years. I made three serious offers. Once [years ago] I had a large property with some beautiful governmental buildings offered me for $250,000.00. Game wasn't abundant but there were 5,000 game fenced hectares and something like 20 white rhino. I didn't bicker. I offered their full asking price. The sellers thought about it for 24 hours and came back to me stating that now they wanted $400,000.00! I passed.

The second time I was offered a lovely ranch in the Waterberg. It was maybe 2,000 hectares in mountainous country with abundant water and a couple of artificial reservoirs full of fish. The house was large, old and rambling. When I was there, the owner's wife was happily working on her beautiful flower garden. The owner wanted [if I can recall rightly] $500,000.00 to $600,000.00 for the property and another $150,000.00 for the enumerated and supposedly numerous game. I drove over the property three times and didn't see much game. I told the owner that I'd like to wait until the middle of winter, when the leaves were mostly down, overfly with a helicopter and do a game count. Estimating that we'd see only half the game, I told the owner that I would pay him EXTRA for all game more than he estimated but I expected to subtract the value if the game was less than he estimated. He refused. It is an old, old practice to offer property up for sale with a given number of game animals and then game capture and sell them off before the property sells. Anyway, I said "no" but had the owner call me up TWICE, here in Texas, drunk as a friggin' skunk. He told me that he aimed to get divorced from his gardener wife and needed me to buy him out as quickly as possible. He intended to take the money and run out on his wife. I passed.

The third time, I bought. There is a large conservancy in Limpopo [I won't mention the name but those of you familiar with the Thabazimbi area will probably figure it out]. The property is about 70,000 acres of which the government owns about 2/3's. I won't go into the intricacies of the thing but there is the government's share and the other shares belong to 3 or 4 private ranchers. I bought one of the ranches. The Constitution states unequivocally that each rancher--plus the government--get one vote, which basically means that the private ranchers ran the place. We ran it well. Annual game counts. Annual assessments of adequacy of the veldt. Necessary game capture and culling. We had the full gamut of plains game plus elephant, leopard, cheetah, buffalo, white and about 12 black rhino. We had a full staff with an anti poaching unit that patrolled all the fence lines daily.

Weeellllllll.....the ANC government decided to ignore the Constitution and run everything all by themselves. They decided game capture was a bad idea. During a drought HALF the animals died. Then the government decided to shut the private owners out. The Conservancy was poached to absolute death. I got out just as fast as I could run. Now the property is a devastated shadow of its old self. Most recently, some fellows have developed an investment based on the incredible inflation in the prices of certain species like golden wildebeest, black impala, roan, King wildebeest, saddleback impala etc. I think I'll pass.

 

[BRICKBURN]

……………. I think I'll pass.

Good advice.

 

[Norwegianwoods]

I would love to own a game ranch in SA, but I don't trust the government there at all.

 

[ActionBob]

I would love to own a game ranch in SA, but I don't trust the government there at all.

+1

 

[slad68]

My best advice, if you really want to buy land is to buy a small portion +_2000 acres and start a breeding project for Bushbuck, Nyala, Sable and maybe Buffalo. Build a house or lodge where friends and family can visit.
The breeding of game will pay for itself and more over time.
Even better is to invest in an already existing breeding project with reputable breeders and owners.
Be careful for the breeding of color mutation animals such as Black Impala, Golden Wildebeest and all those.

 

[JustinC]

I have Posted a thread in General chat if anybody is interested.

 

[spoonieduck]

lbsa

My best advice, if you really want to buy land is to buy a small portion +_2000 acres and start a breeding project for Bushbuck, Nyala, Sable and maybe Buffalo. Build a house or lodge where friends and family can visit.
The breeding of game will pay for itself and more over time.
Even better is to invest in an already existing breeding project with reputable breeders and owners.
Be careful for the breeding of color mutation animals such as Black Impala, Golden Wildebeest and all those.

I don't disagree but a breeding project for bushbuck might be problematic. As one fellow, who had a lot of free range bushbuck on his mountainous farm, said. "Do you know how you fence-in bushbuck? You build an 8 ft high fence, placing tight wire strands one inch apart. Then before you put in any bushbuck, take a bucket of water and throw it against the fence. If more than half the water gets to the other side of the fence, you need more strands of wire." His point is that you can't fence bushbuck with anything much less than a solid fence. Recently I saw a very large bushbuck--17-18 inch horns--run when he saw us. I thought he'd hesitate at the very well-constructed game fence giving us a chance at a shot at about 90 yds. The fence didn't slow him down even a fraction of a second. He dove through the fence and disappeared into brush on the far side. I would have loved a slow motion film of the buck's doing this. You'd have though the fence would stop a grysbok--and maybe it would--but it didn't even slow the bushbuck a little bit.

 

[slad68]

I agree but what you need is a proper fence to keep them in

 

[enysse]

I agree Bossie, the fence you show would stop a bushbuck, but most fences are not that tight. Bushbuck are kind of a community animal, they go where they want too.

 

[slad68]

Bushbuck are kind of a community animal, they go where they want too

It is always wise to have the first 1.5m of the fence done with mesh wire. This will keep your crawling animals inside and predators outside. It is also advised to have an electrical fence, set at a 45* angle to prevent Leopards from going over the fence.

 

[enysse]

How far are the 45 degree angle wires out from the fence wall then?

 

[GAME 4 AFRICA SAFARIS]

Hi Guys
From down in the Eastern cape,
I would have to agree with buying a smaller piece of land.Would not go over 6000 Acres( Easy to manage).
For a foreign client investing in SA in my opinion you will need to buy a property which is developed- already stocked with game,Lodge/house, water and fencing. Definitely do a helicopter trip over the property and be sure you are 100% happy with buying the land.

Personally you should look at the (profit the Game Farm will make vs The Expenses of the Farm).If you can break even or make abit then you are fine. Get expert advice on Quotas of hunting and Capturing.
If you can Buy your own piece of Africa,have a Good manager with 5 workers and Hunt for free When you so wish, Why not buy.

Exchange rates are great at the moment. Yes there are bad stories but those bad stories do not make us all bad as Ranchers in SA.

Kind Regards
Wikus Coetzee

 

[Sable123]

Here is a bit of fun:

Lets say you did buy a farm in SA....money aside!

1. What would be the first 5 game species you would stock on the farm?

2. Purely rifle, bow only or both? Photographic?

3. nice big fancy lodge or rustic safari style tents?

4. Steep mountains and deep valleys or long flat open plains?

5. Walk and stalk only or a few blinds?

6. Anything else you would put on YOUR game farm that you would liked to see somewhere else?

7. Would introduce predators? If so, which species?

8. Your wife allowed you to buy this property on one condition? ..............?

Cheers
Jono

 

[slad68]

How far are the 45 degree angle wires out from the fence wall then?

The poles are set at a 45* angle and spaced 5m apart, then you put 8 or more strands of wire 6" apart. Just a pity I never took pictures of the fence we did this way.
But here is a picture I drew up to give you an idea what I am talking about

 

[Bsums]

Here is a bit of fun:

Lets say you did buy a farm in SA....money aside!

1. What would be the first 5 game species you would stock on the farm?

2. Purely rifle, bow only or both? Photographic?

3. nice big fancy lodge or rustic safari style tents?

4. Steep mountains and deep valleys or long flat open plains?

5. Walk and stalk only or a few blinds?

6. Anything else you would put on YOUR game farm that you would liked to see somewhere else?

7. Would introduce predators? If so, which species?

8. Your wife allowed you to buy this property on one condition? ..............?

Cheers
Jono

1. Roan, Sable, Buffalo, Lion, and Blesbok.

2.Both and maybe photographic but it would be a single group photo safari at a time were they rent the whole lodge. Otherwise I don't see it as profitable as having hunters.

3. I'd want to have a lodge.

4. I would prefer it to be hilly with valleys.

5. Both with blinds being over key spots such as main water holes, etc.

6. Not sure.

7. Yes; lions and leopards. If animals like jackals etc are their naturally then great but I don't see a need to bring them in.

8. Don't tell your wives until after its bought haha.

 

[slad68]

1. What would be the first 5 game species you would stock on the farm?
Bushbuck, Nyala, Sable, Tsessebe, Roan
2. Purely rifle, bow only or both? Photographic?
Both
3. nice big fancy lodge or rustic safari style tents?
Lodge like dining area with Tented chalets
4. Steep mountains and deep valleys or long flat open plains?
Mountain, Valley and Flats
5. Walk and stalk only or a few blinds?
Blind and tree stands
6. Anything else you would put on YOUR game farm that you would liked to see somewhere else?

7. Would introduce predators? If so, which species?
No way
8. Your wife allowed you to buy this property on one condition? ..............?
She works full time

 

[slad68]

The best parts of owning farms in SA are sometimes forgotten. Just a pity most will not understand but this is F***** funny.

 

[TokkieM]

I agree with doing a game count on a property, but a chopper is not always the way to go when it comes to Kudu and Bushbuck. Took a chopper over a 2000HA Game farm in the coastal belt of the EC and at best counted 5 trophy Kudu in 2 days, put feed out in winter and counted 30 plus bulls in 2 afternoons. Could not get a Eland calf to grow past 3 months of age on the same farm, ticks would chew away at the cows teats andthey that would starve the calfs. Even with dip applicators it did not work, had to put a few Nguni in to trap the ticks and dip them ever so often to try break the cycle. Do your homework.
Bossie we used the same type of fence with no electric wire, we had excemption for Blue Duiker and Grysbuck, warthog and bushpig rip those jackal fences to bits in a week. Our new fence was suppose to be Bushbuck proof, but those little bastards jump sideways through two strands of wire

Below is a photo of a blind bushbuck, both eyes, he was in pretty good condition, sure the prickley pear they love so much had something to do with it.