December 2, 2025
The hum of the little plane went right into my bones. Every vibration felt magnified, every bump in the sky another reminder of how fragile we humans really are when the ground disappears beneath our feet. My husband sat at the controls, calm and steady, as he always is in the air, on the hunt, and in life.
December 2, 2025
When Elzanne contacted me to request a contribution for this year’s Huntinamibia edition I was hesitant. First of all, the hunting season until then had not delivered something really noteworthy and moreover I have a feeling that after a quarter of a century of contributing to this publication, as not to become boring, it must come to an end. Therefore, I replied: "I don’t have something in mind at the moment. But I still have a last safari at the end of September. Should this hunt deliver something notable, I will contact you."
December 3, 2025
That is why I came here: to put my hunting skills at the service of a community. My first African safari, in pursuit of the Greater Kudu five years ago, brought me to the magnificent backdrop of the Erongo Mountains. It was an intense combination of strenuous hiking and meditative glassing of the mountain slopes and dry river courses. I returned again two years later, that time in the surreal expanse of the Namib Desert. The previous week I had hunted on the edge of the Kalahari at Petersfarm, going after hartebeest, gemsbok and warthog – the typical game species there. I thoroughly enjoyed all these hunts.
December 3, 2025
Experiencing intense moments in nature, embracing physical exertion and deprivation as a challenge in order to come to know hunting in a way that is rarely possible in today’s hunting grounds in Germany. This was the motivation for my hunting companion Holger and me to travel to Namibia.
December 3, 2025
Stories are manifold of the great springbok migrations in the South African Free State and up the Karoo towards the end of the 19th century, a migration (or trek) that involved many thousands of springbok and formed herds of several kilometres wide. Farmers and hunters of those times told of spurring on their horses in order to get out of the way of the masses of these “trek-bokke”. In Lawrence Green’s book Karoo an incident is related of how a Karoo farmer, Gert van der Merwe, moved his sheep and cattle between grazing lands, assisted by his shepherds and a Khoi wagon leader. “The trek-buck are on their way, and we’ll be trampled to death if we stay in the riverbed”, the driver warned when only a cloud of dust was visible in the distance.
December 3, 2025
White-backed Vulture J151 should be an ambassador for Namibia to become the first African country to ban lead ammunition for the benefit of nature and humans. All vulture species known in Namibia are either extinct as breeding species (Egyptian Vulture), critically endangered (Cape Vulture), endangered (Hooded Vulture, White-backed Vulture) or vulnerable (Lappet-faced Vulture, Whiteheaded Vulture). Numerous factors have led to the decline of the vulture populations in Namibia, in the region and in Africa in general. Habitat loss, disturbance, poisons and illegal killing are the main reasons. Lead-poisoning through ammunition has only recently been discovered as another dangerous factor leading to the decrease of these valuable birds.
December 3, 2025
Sometimes you hear someone speak and their words settle deep inside you, reshaping the way you see the familiar. That happened to me when I listened to Kai-Uwe Denker’s reflections on hunting in Namibia at the previous NAPHA AGM. His words were not polished marketing talk, nor defensive arguments about why hunting matters. Instead, he spoke about wilderness, authenticity, and what it really means to portray Namibia to the world.
December 3, 2025
In a world where the balance between wildlife conservation and human progress grows ever more delicate, it takes exceptional conviction to defend nature’s most pragmatic truths. Few embody this balance more steadfastly than Dr Clemens von Doderer, the 2024 recipient of the Namibian Professional Hunting Association’s Conservationist of the Year award.
December 3, 2025
I walked in circles around the fallen old warrior for several minutes, studying the scars and characteristics that told the 14- year story of a rugged life lived in the furtherest shag of Mozambique’s northern Zambezi Delta. From the prominent snare marks encircling his neck and right hindfoot, to the smallest tick bites, each blemish in the bull’s weathered skin offered a glimpse into what he had endured since the day he was born, long ago when I was just eleven years old. As much as I wanted to know every episode of his feral life, imagination and speculation would be as close as I could get. The now-forgotten details of the battle that had once been so forceful as to snap his left horn in half will forever remain a mystery.
December 3, 2025
From the rural reaches of Namibia’s expansive wilderness to the often monotonous moments spent collating data at a cluttered desk, Richard Freyer’s work rarely follows a routine. As a Control Warden with the Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism (MEFT), Freyer is part of a team tasked with maintaining one of Namibia’s most delicate balances: conserving wildlife while supporting the people who live alongside it. Each year, Freyer contributes to setting wildlife quotas, a cornerstone of sustainable resource management in the country. These quotas are not arbitrary numbers: they are based on field data, aerial surveys and close cooperation with all 86 communal conservancies in Namibia. This annual process then determines quotas for the next threeyear cycle.
December 3, 2025
We were kneeling in the hot sand. It was early April, yet the sun was burning down on us mercilessly. Poldi was sitting behind me. It was his second visit to Namibia and therefore he now knew that in Africa, too, the scorching heat and biting flies do come to an end.
December 3, 2025
Hunting for me goes beyond the obvious, beyond the daily grind and the collecting of trophies. Even beyond the now hackneyed phrase of “collecting memories” ‒ something probably nobody can really define. Once you allow yourself as a hunter to actually and consciously take in moments and breathe in air, you realise that there is so much more to hunting, and being a hunter.
December 3, 2025
Namibia’s hunting community stands at a pivotal juncture. For five decades, professional hunters, trackers, operators, conservancies and rural partners have protected wildlife and ensured that land remains dedicated to conservation. Our model, grounded in ethical hunting and sustainable use, is recognised worldwide as one of the most successful conservation systems. Yet today, we face increasing external pressure from anti-hunting activists, misinformation campaigns, international policy interference and transport restrictions. These groups present a united front and do not distinguish between ethical and unethical hunting, between a conservancy and a freehold farm, or between a professional hunter and a conservation biologist. Their aim is absolute: to end hunting entirely.
December 3, 2025
Each year at the Namibian Professional Hunting Association (NAPHA) Annual General Meeting the spotlight turns toward those who uphold the country’s proud hunting traditions through quiet dedication, skill and humility. The 2024 awards once again reminded the industry that the heartbeat of conservation and safari excellence lies not only with professional hunters but also with the men and women working alongside them – in the camps, the kitchens and in the wilderness.