01x06 - Episode 6

[bunniefuu]

(slow music)

- The exotic game trade has

existed in the United States

for quite some time.

Texas particularly, is a

stronghold for this industry.

(birds chirping)

I'm gonna take a closer look

at this thriving industry

and its impact on

wildlife conservation.

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Hunting has become a

controversial practice

in modern times.

My name is Dan Cabela

and I'm traveling the globe

to explore the true impact

that hunting is having on our

remaining wild landscapes.

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This practice goes as far back

as human history can remember

but does it have a place

in modern conservation?

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(seat creaking)

(engine rumbling)

The exotic trade

began decades ago.

The origins of the

exotic industry,

especially in Texas,

was fueled by surplus animals

that came out of public zoos.

(birds squawking)

(auctioneer rambling)

And if you look at today,

there is a very robust business

aspect to the game trading,

and specifically some of

the more endangered stuff

like the dama gazelles,

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king and mountain bongo,

the addax.

A lot of these

animals rarely occur

in their native

lands at this point.

There are far higher

numbers in Texas

than there are in Africa.

I'm heading to Mason Mountain

Wildlife Management Area

to learn more

about what it takes

to manage exotic

game on U.S. soil.

(birds chirping)

And this is a state-owned area

that was donated

quite a few years back

that actually has exotics

and native game on it.

Morning.

- Good morning, Mr.

Nice to meet you.

Welcome to the area.

- Morning. Nice meet you, sir.

- Glad to meet you, sir.

- At least we picked a

beautiful day to do this on.

- Oh, absolutely.

Come on in.

Spring, this is it.

- This is the area.

It's 5,300 acres

and it was acquired as

a donation from a guy

who was concerned

about conservation.

He bought this place in the '80s

and he set this up as

a breeding facility

for exotic wildlife,

mainly African stuff,

but it did have some

Asian stuff on it also.

But at the time it

was pretty unique

in that our commission said

we had to earn operation and

maintenance off the property.

We, here, started looking at,

hey we've got exotics on the

place 'cause we inherited them.

There's a need

to know how to manage

these things to some extent

and do less amount of damage,

you might say, to

the native wildlife.

(uplifting music)

- We're a piece of

the puzzle out there

in a very fragmented landscape.

And our role is to teach.

That approach has always

been based on plants,

carrying capacity, and

management of land health.

It's based on two

powerful principles,

prescribed fire which

we conduct a lot of,

as well as teaching land

owners about animal impacts,

including exotics here.

- So, we wanna go on the field?

- [Dan] In an increasingly

fragmented landscape

with competing

interest for land use

actively managing land with

tools like fire, amongst others,

is crucial to maintain

functional ecosystems.

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(gravel crunching)

- Every piece of ground

in Texas has been touched.

We can't put the

original ecosystem back

'cause we can't bring

a million buffalo

through this country.

- [Dan] That's right.

- So what you do is you

take a piece of property

and you try to manage

it the best you can

for all the native stuff

that are still here.

- [Dan] By having

wildlife on land,

either exotics or

native species,

it is still possible to maintain

functional natural habitats

around human development.

- All those plants are

contributing to structure

as well as providing

food at the same time.

And we're utilizing a grazing

impact in these grass systems

to open up space and allow

forbs or weeds to grow.

- By picking a species

such as scimitar,

they're not

attacking the browse.

They're not competing

for whitetail

for those browse and forbs.

What they're after

is more of the grass

that you see back here.

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- We manage these

systems with fire.

Our goals here are obviously

not to over-utilize

but understanding that this

land needs animal impact.

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- This is an area that's

burned in the wintertime

or cool season every other year.

And then this is an

area across the road

that is burnt,

typically, cool season

but hasn't been burning in

about four or five years.

(upbeat music continues)

- Well, I appreciate it guys.

I learned a lot today

and I appreciate you

guys taking us around

and showing us a different

way of doing this.

- Great coming out.

Glad to show you.

- Exotic game is primarily

in the private hands

of ranchers in

Texas at this point.

The buying and selling

of these exotics

has become a very

profitable business.

My next stop is one of the

largest game breeders in Texas,

to learn more about

how the business works

and the industry as a whole.

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Hey, Brian

- Hey, Dan. Good

morning. How are you?

- Morning. Good to see you.

- Yeah, likewise.

Nice to see you.

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In a nutshell, what we're doing

is we're creating

the full circle.

We provide the animals initially

to the people that

wanna buy them.

We offer consulting services

and then we offer

them the way out

when they need to

generate income.

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In 1963, we found an

article that talked about

there were 13 species

in Texas at the time.

In 2010, it's estimated that

there's 125 non-native species

that are living on

ranches in Texas.

When you start taking

into consideration

the amount of land that's

being used for wildlife habitat

here in the state

versus growing cotton,

or pecans, or whatever.

South Africa, they

converted 50 million acres

of marginal farmland into

native habitat for wildlife.

And the very same thing

is happening here

in Texas right now.

I think if you get a chance to

see what we're actually doing

on one of the ranches

versus just sitting here in

an office looking at numbers,

I think it'll kind of

bring this full circle.

- I said, we go down

there, we take a look

and I'm very excited to see

what you guys are doing.

- Brian and I head out

in search of a herd

of Kenyan mountain bongo

that they will be capturing

some individuals from.

The business model behind

the exotic game trade

is essentially the breeding

of these exotic herds

and the trading and

selling of them.

(vehicle humming)

Because it's privately owned,

this is what stimulates

the industry,

the commerce behind it, the

trading, and the selling,

and the demand, and the supply.

And so you've got very

specialized ranchers

who manage these populations.

(vehicle rumbling)

- So we're just

gonna circle back

and go back towards those bongo.

I figured we'd come

up here real quick

and there's some springbok

out there on the hill.

There's a group of

wildebeest over there.

(uplifting music)

Tad, can you get in with us

and start from here?

- [Tad] Absolutely. Yes, sir.

- [Dan] On our way, we

pick up Tad Honeycutt,

who is the capture team

manager at Wildlife Partners.

- [Brian] All good?

- Yes, sir.

(uplifting music)

(g*n popping)

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- What's neat about this drug

is once it starts taking effect,

the animals come to noise.

The animal usually gets clinical

between five and seven minutes.

(vehicle humming)

- They're Kenyan mountain bongo,

which are critically endangered.

The numbers that

remain in the wild,

it's not exactly certain,

but it's probably

somewhere around 100.

I estimate that here

in the United States

there's somewhere between

600 and 1,000 bongo.

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(squeaking)

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(squeaking continues)

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- [Tad] All right.

- As I said earlier, these

are Kenyan mountain bongo,

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Once we get it caught, we

put the blindfold on it

just to protect its eyes and

to reduce the stress load.

So, these are incredibly

beautiful animals.

They're extraordinarily rare.

And here in Texas, they

have tremendous value

which is the reason

why we breed them,

and take care of them, and

allocate space to them,

and do all these

things to make sure

that they're well taken care of.

This one animal generates

about $100,000 worth of

revenue for this ranch,

which goes a long ways

when you've take

into consideration

there's about 1,500 animals here

that we've gotta look after,

and provide veterinary

care for, and feed.

If it were not for

the economic value,

there's just no way

we could do this

on the scale that

we're doing it now.

- [Tad] 1, 2, 3.

(bongo grunting)

- The buying and

selling of these exotics

has become a very

profitable business.

The demand is high

because they're rare

and there's not a

surplus of inventory.

Some people are just hobbyists

who do it for the

conservation aspect.

Others do it for profit.

And I also think, just

the aesthetic value

of seeing gazelles and

different antelope on a property

versus cattle, or

sheep, or goats

is appealing to a lot of folks.

(slow music)

(g*n popping)

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A total of two bongo

calves are being captured

and relocated to a new property

as part of a study to learn

more about the species.

(uplifting music)

- Just give her little

more time, she'll be fine.

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All right, she's down.

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Check the sex.

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(slow music becoming

uplifting music)

All right, same thing.

We've got second

girl here, loaded.

She's fixing to

go to the trailer

and they're giving

all of her vaccines

and all that good

stuff right now.

So, it's going good.

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- The animals on this

ranch pay for this ranch.

This ranch doesn't

cost me anything.

These animals that live

here generate enough revenue

that they cover the overhead,

they cover the feed,

the people, everything,

and they cover the mortgage

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- The trading species like

the Kenyan mountain bongo

that are on the

brink of extinction

in their natural habitats

has directly led to

preserving viable populations

of these highly endangered

species in Texas.

When you look at it from

an economic standpoint,

if these animals in

their native range

had the value that

they do in Texas,

you'd probably have

a little more stable

environments for them.

- When you look at South Africa

and what occurred

between the early 1800s

all the way through

the early 1990s,

you had this

decimation of wildlife

in large part due to farming,

agriculture, and livestock.

And then in 1991,

privatization occurred

with the Game Theft Act

and it gave

landowners the ability

to extract value from wildlife.

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- The business model behind

the exotic game trade

has evolved over time.

And recently, auctions

have become very lucrative

to the exotic game trade.

(slow twangy music)

- Hey, Will.

- Hey, Dan.

- Good to see you, buddy.

- Good to see you, man.

- [Dan] Tell us a little

bit about, you know,

the kind of people that

are selling animals here.

What kind of ranch?

- So this is a 'by

invitation only' auction.

We basically decided we

were gonna do something

that was more along the lines

of the things we'd seen in

other parts of the world.

And so we started

during 2005, 2004.

We averaged $8,500 a sable cow,

across all the sable

cows we acquired.

And I mean, tomorrow, you'll

see me sell some for $80,000.

I mean, that's a huge

amount in 15 years.

Some of that's about

breeding for quality

and some of that's just demand.

It's been great.

You know, it helps the

value of the animals.

Those ranchers are

propagating the species

and that's always

been the goal, right?

I mean, it's about conservation

and preservation

of these species.

(upbeat dance music)

(people chattering)

(upbeat dance music)

- [Guest] Well, Mimi

is interested in

this one right here.

(auctioneer rambling)

- 95!

- Boys, y'all pay

attention. 100,000.

$100,000. Who's

the (indistinct).

Somebody give 100,000.

- The best role that

game trading plays

for the conservation

of these species

is the propagating

of these species.

As these herds grow of

these endangered animals,

even though they're not in

their native environment,

there's more of

them on the planet.

Over time,

if things become stable in

their native environment

reintroductions

could be possible.

We own exotics in

Texas, ourselves.

(upbeat music)

I find it to be very meaningful

to have these herds

on our properties.

We've always had

a love of wildlife

and have traveled to

Africa numerous times.

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Today is a special day,

as our herd will be growing

with some new arrivals.

We are about to unload two roan,

a female and a male, young ones,

and three young female addax.

(uplifting music)

(door creaking)

Okay big guy, let's go.

(hooves clanking on metal)

(hooves clomping)

(uplifting music)

Just offloaded a young male

and a young female roan.

Got off the trailer looking

in excellent condition.

So things are good, and

they'll join the others now,

and we'll get this herd started.

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I personally participate

in the industry

and own these exotic animals

because I enjoy watching

these herds grow.

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The exotic trade

industry certainly has

conservation value.

As these species decline

in their native areas

they're growing in

the state of Texas.

So it's insurance that

maybe later down the road

a reintroduction

could take place

if these environments

become stable.

As the exotic industry

pushes forward

one can only hope that

the further expansion

of these endangered

species is better realized.

(uplifting music)

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