San Antonio light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1911-1993, 1925-08-30
BIG CAME I'm.
FINAL STAND
AGAINST MAN
70.
In Another Fifty Years Big
Game in Africa Will
Disappear. |
By Universal Service.


remnants of all the royal families of
the age Of mammals are making a
last stand against the pitiless enemy
called civilization"
So writes a distinguished American
scientist who recently arrived in Cape
town from an expedition into the in
terror of Africa to study the wild life
of the continent.
The result of his investigations has
filled him with dismay, for he arrives
at the disturbing conclusion that in
another 80 years big game in Africa
will be extinct. Fortunately, how
ever, there is reason to believe that
so far as Central Africa is concerned,
he is unduly pessimistic, as both the
British and the Belgian authorities are
becoming increasingly alive to the ne
'cessity of preserving the wonderful
fauna of the territories committed to
their charge. Applied to South Africa,
however, his prophecy, it is feared, lis
only too well founded.
Colonel Deneys Reitz, former Mn
lister of Lands in South Africa, has
been making an eloquent appeal IN
Cspetown for the preservation of the
fast diminishing big game. He di.
rected attention to the critical posi-.
ton of the few South Africa Gle
plants that are left in the Aldo Bush,
a mere remnant of the herd that was
almost exterminated not many years
ago. They are the only elephants
left in all that is now the Union of
South Africa, and they belong to an
interesting and specialized variety.
ANY other country would long since
have taken great care for their pres
ervation as a truly remarkable sur
viyal of the big game which once
r0amed the country from end to end.
These unique animals maintain a pre-
earious existence as regards their food
supply, yet the only damage they do
is in their journeys every few days in
search Of drinking water. Unfor-
tunately they have been deliberately
cut off from access to any river or
spring, and can drink only by crossing
cultivated land.
FARMERS FOR DESTRUCTION.
The farmers of these districts are
openly demanding the destruction of
this remnant of a famous herd. Such
treatment of domesticated animals
would rightly be considered as bar
barous," states the johannesburg
Star" in a plea for the preservation
OF these animals, but because il Is
merely the last group Of elephants in
our country it is nobody's business 10
interfere, and the public is not expect
ed to be interested through its gov
ernment-until the elephants have
gone the way Of the quagga and the
bluebuck into oblivion, when there
will be the inevitable regrets but no
sign Of self-eritcism."
There was never such danger OF
rapid extinction of wiid life in South
Africa as there is today. Motor
cars, electric light, and long-range
magazine rifles are all brought into
use for the purpose. Even a gorilla
is supposed to have proved again his
inferiority to man when he falls to a
soft-nosed bullet, fired in a blaze of
artificial light, from a safe distance,
by an invisible enemy. The white
rbinoceros Is so nearly extinct that
some men who land in Africa are OBJ
sessed with a desire TO shoot the last
one. Animals which can now be
numbered only by the hundred in
South Africa are the bontebok, noun
tain zebra, roam antelope and nyala.
Others moving rapidly to extinction
are the black rhinoceros, Gland, Vaal
rhebok, grysbok and southern oribi,
while the sable antelope and the ku-
du are seriously decreasing in num-
bers.
During the recent Budget debate in
the South African Parliament, one of
the members Of johannesburg, II. b.
Papenfus, drew attention 70 this mat
ter and urged the necessity for estab.
fishing a national park or adequate
game reserves. He appealed alike 10
those who remember how the plains
Of the TransyaIl and the Free State
once swarmed with game, and TO 9TH
.ers, whether sportsmen or econo-
mists, who can see the advantage Of
preserving the wild animals while
there are any left. As warnings he
mentioned what had happened not
only in South Africa but in America,
and he pointed out the inadequaey of
present efforts at preservation, honor.
able as these are to the men respons-