This thread reminds me of all the guys I've known over the years who have really been career equipment collectors rather than hunters. They have a safe full of rifles and shotguns that they seldom use -- with more on the way -- but for hunting they sit around and wait for the state of Oregon to award them a mule deer and/or elk tag, and with the way the broken drawing system in our state works, that means they get to hunt about every-other-year. But in the meantime, they're trading rifles, punching paper at the range, buying more camp gear for do-it-yourself elk hunts, reloading stuff, clothes, new trucks, 4-wheelers, etc.

But approach them about spending the same money they do every year on equipment to do a basic African plainsgame safari, and they look at you like you're nuts, and then they declare that they "can't afford it". What they really can't afford to do is let so many years slip by with so little hunting in between, but they just don't know it. They can't afford all of the money they lose on gun trades and truck trades, either, but they're addicted to a habit, and they won't change for the most part.........

Here's what I suggest:

1) Get together a basic battery of high-quality, practical rifles that you'll really use, and be done with it. Leave the gun collecting to the pilgrims who don't know any better and the gun collectors. Build some real personal hunting history with your basic rifle battery. In the end, you'll prize those rifles far more than a safe full that don't get used, and you'll save a ton on money that you can apply to safaris.

2) Sell all of the current hunting gear you own that you haven't used in the last two years. I used to have a barn full of elk and mule deer camp gear that was largely redundant, plus horses, mules, tack, trailers, etc. I sold most of it, and I don't miss it. It was a burden and a money pit............

3) If taxidermy bills get in the way of your ability to conduct another safari, forget about taxidermy altogether. Great photos make great -- and in most ways, the best -- trophies. So develop your skills as a photographer, buy yourself a really good digital camera, and forget about a trophy room, if necessary.

One of my friends just spent a fortune on taxidermy for a major safari that he was on a couple of years ago. I asked him how he liked his trophies, now that he had them on the wall. His reply: "I wish I'd never invested in all of that work, and I feel like I wasted my money. What I spent on all that stuff I could have spent on another safari!"

AMEN to THAT!!!!!!!!!

I also think the record book race, and the "Levels of Achievement" race is a racket. Lots of guys spend money hunting stuff they're not really interested in, and all for the sake of that sacreligious "BOOK", and to keep ahead of the other contestants, I mean sheeple, excuse me........ I mean people!

Hunt what you're interested in hunting, and hunt where you really and truly want to hunt, as you can afford to do so. Leave the book race to those buffoons who won't be able to take it all with them in the end anyway..................

AD