The slaughter continues

It is becoming a far too frequent sight in the Soutpansberg – yet another rhino brutally slaughtered for its horn.

The gruesome discovery of their prized rhino bull’s carcass on Monday left the Knott family of Greater Kuduland Safaris in the Tshipise area outraged.

“If you go to an auction now, you’d pay almost R1 million for such a bull,” says Mr Peter Knott and adds that the rhino bull boasted a horn of almost 31 inches in height. Needless to say, the horn was hacked off.

Peter’s son, Howard Knott, says he and his son, Gavin, were out with an American hunting client on Sunday afternoon when they came across the poached bull.

“I immediately checked the area and noticed that the rhino had been dead for less than eight hours. We got the police’s stock theft unit out and began tracking the three poachers till darkness caught us,” says Howard, adding that the poachers were very clever in using tricks like changing shoes and wearing socks over their shoes. “They have definitely been poaching rhino before,” says Howard.

The three poachers’ tracks were followed to where they were picked up along the Tshipise/Pafuri road. It was clear that they were also off-loaded there.

“They use a neighbouring farm as their hold and rest area as this farm has no day-to-day management and is uninhabited. It serves as an ideal rest area,” says Howard.

Although it is the first rhino the Knotts have lost to poachers, Howard says it is the eighth rhino being poach in the immediate area since the beginning of June.

“If our authorities do not allow the legal trade in horn, whereby rhino owners may harvest the horns and sell them legally on the open market, I’m afraid we will lose all our rhino before Cites meets again to discuss our plight and the devastating effect of rhino poaching,” says Howard. He says that government officials, the courts and all people need to start realizing the serious implication that rhino poaching is having.  “We have definitely lost more rhino north of the Soutpansberg in the past five years than have been born.  We are losing the war,” says Howard.

By the first week of August (7th) more than 550 rhinos had been poached and slaughtered for their horns in South Africa. On Tuesday this week, the number of rhinos poached in Limpopo alone stood at 69 since 1 January.

News - Date: 26 August 2013

Andries van Zyl

Andries joined the Zoutpansberger and Limpopo Mirror in April 1993 as a darkroom assistant. Within a couple of months he moved over to the production side of the newspaper and eventually doubled as a reporter. In 1995 he left the newspaper group and travelled overseas for a couple of months. In 1996, Andries rejoined the Zoutpansberger as a reporter. In August 2002, he was appointed as News Editor of the Zoutpansberger, a position he holds until today.

Email: [email protected]