Big game hunters crowned the most challenging and difficult African animals as the Big Five, a shorthand designation for their goal: to track, hunt, kill and bring home for display. Killing for sport, and in the process, depleting the natural balance of nature by pressuring the population of a number of species.

Recognizing this was not sustainable, the Kenyans in 1977 outlawed All hunting. Period. Yes, 46 years ago they chose to move their entire wildlife tourism industry to safaris focused solely on watching and observing and learning and enjoying.

Poaching was a problem simply because there were still profits available in guiding big game hunters and in harvesting things such as elephant tusks. Our Kenyan guide Edwin explained this was quickly solved – the Kenyan rangers simply bought bigger guns. And they used them on the poachers. They didn’t arrest, try and convict the poachers. Government policy was poachers will be shot on site. Word quickly got out that poaching for profits now came at an unreasonably high cost. The Kenyan rangers continue to patrol for poachers, but the problem has largely been solved.

The Big Five:

The Ugly Five:

Seeing the beauty in these wild animals it became apparent that beauty really is a relative assessment, and as time went by a consensus formed that there also existed on the African savannah a handful of species that were just plain ugly. Yes, there can be beauty in ugly, a few dog breeds come to mind, and yes beauty and ugly are in the eye of the beholder, but here are the Ugly Five: