American downs Markhor in season's first hunt

GILGIT: An American hunted a Markhor in Gilgit-Baltistan (G-B), becoming first hunter of the season to hunt down the Himalayan goat.

The hunt cost John Amistoso $0.1 million, a fee he paid to the G-B government to purchase a hunting permit auction back in October.

“It was the season’s first hunt of Markhor,” Mujeeb Sardar, an official in the wildlife department of G-B told The Express Tribune on Sunday.

The hunt took place on Saturday in the Bunji area, a community controlled hunting area about 60 kilometres from Gilgit – the capital of G-B.

In compliance with local tradition, the community elders welcomed the hunter and gave him gifts after he got the trophy.



The next hunt is expected to take place in the adjacent Juglot area, where a community conflict over land and forests had earlier put the hunter in jeopardy, however, the area’s assistant commissioner Karim Dad was able to broker an agreement between communities at the last moment and resolve the conflict.

Under trophy hunting programme 2018-19, G-B wildlife department auctioned hunting permits for four Astore Markhor, 14 blue sheep and 96 ibex.

The minimum rate for a permit of hunting Markhor was fixed at $75,000, for blue sheep $8,000 and Rs100,000 for an ibex.

The hunting season in the region begins in November and concludes in April.

“This season so far at least 50 ibex and 12 blue sheep have been hunted under the programme,” said the official.



Trophy hunting programme was first launched in the Bar area of Nagar valley as an effort to discourage illegal hunting of endangered wildlife. The programme has reportedly paid off well as communities themselves safeguard the wildlife, which wasn’t the case before.

Hunting is carried out under the Convention on International Trade of Endangered Species of Wildlife and is allowed only in notified areas of G-B in collaboration with the relevant communities.

With each hunt, the G-B government provides 80 per cent share to the respective local communities, while the remaining share goes to government accounts.