This is a topic that has been hotly debated here on HN. I've thought long and hard whether I should drop my pennie's worth, and decided that if I don't, things might be distorted to one side, without giving thought to the other.
How do you choose your outfitter and/or PH? That is extremely difficult if you have not hunted in Africa before. You either pick one at random, or you allow someone else (who you also do not know) to point you towards someone. Chances are that you can have an extremely good hunt, or an extremely bad one either way. I would like to believe that most outfitters and professional hunters are honorable men/women. Whether this is true .... I do not know. The jury is still out on that one. But I would like to believe it anyway. I could never be so arrogant as to imply that I can judge an outfitter, especially when I do not know him/her. There are a lot of good outfitters and good PH's out there that I do not know, and it would be grossly unfair of me to tell someone not to hunt with them
From time to time I hunt for certain outfitters (only 3) as I trust them, and they trust me. On 2 occasions recently (within the last 8 months) I had the opportunity to hunt for these outfitters with some other freelance PH's. I do not consider myself as freelance as I only hunt for these 3 outfitters, and when I hunt with one of them, my focus and loyalty is with the one I'm hunting with. They are actually 3 very close friends, and that makes it a lot easier for me and for them. On these 2 occasions they could not obtain the services of the guys that normally hunt with them, and had to get in freelance PH's.
Both these experiences has made me very, very wary of professional hunters who offer their services freelance. On both occasions these freelance PH's were trying to "sell" other outfitters to the clients, which I view as being highly unethical. Unfortunately for them the clients had some loyalty towards the outfitters they were hunting with, and reported this to the outfitter. Both of them will never hunt for one of the 3 outfitters ever again. What makes this even worse is that both of them are members of a professional body in South Africa.
There are a few, and I mean really only a few, freelance PH's in South Africa that I will ever use and/or recommend, because I know them and I can vouch for them. But otherwise I am seriously wary of free agents.
My advise to anyone who would like to come and hunt in South Africa is to pick an outfitter who a friend or family member has hunted with before, or follow your gut instinct. If the PH you hunt with tries to "sell" you an outfitter other than the one you are hunting with, you better know something is wrong. He'll let you shoot a 30" gemsbok or 42" kudu, and blame it on the outfitter for not having proper hunting concessions whilst he is the culprit. Report such PH's to the outfitter you are hunting with because he has an agenda that only benefits himself, and he has no loyalty towards you, the client, or the outfitter. His only loyalty is to himself.
My wish for every foreign hunter that sits foot on the African continent is that they will enjoy a wonderful and memorable hunting experience, irrespective of who they hunt with. Happy hunting.
I would also like to hunt plains game such as kudu, eland, etc. What is... more
