Shoot a poacher a day!

 I just watched a fairly long news item about rhino poaching - centring mainly around a particular black rhino called Phila. This poor thing was shot a number of times (more than likely with an AK, either 7,62 or 5,56) & went down. The poachers were scared off before they were able to cut off the horns & the rhino survived. It was taken to a 'secure' boma within a vet compound where it recovered under treatment. It was finally decided by the owner that, to try & preserve it's life, they would dehorn Phila. With only stubs of horns remaining it was thought that the animal was now fairly safe. The bastards broke into the boma area & shot the animal from the enclosure fence (I think another 6 or 8 times). Why? To take the stubs of what was left of the horns? Or maybe just to prove a point to the owner? She still did not die but was eventually transferred to the Johannesburg Zoo, maybe death would have been preferable?
 Are people so enamoured with money or the status that wealth can bring that they are prepared to annihilate a specie of animal - possibly a link with the dinosaurs - that they will go to these lengths? That they will not only kill a pregnant cow but also a calf with no more than a stub for a horn?
 Now, presume that the sale of both Elephant ivory & Rhino horn were made legal. The horn could be harvested by darting the animals & removing the horn under anaesthetic & then placed on the market. Horns & tusks removed from animals dead from natural causes could also be marketed. Many Parks Boards have been forced to destroy tons of horn & ivory by burning. CITES insistence. The monies accrued from the sale could have gone to furthering education & combating poaching. By 'flooding' the market, the price would have dropped considerably thereby reducing the expected income for the poachers & making it less attractive for them.
 Then you have the idea of adding a poison to the horn under pressure. Now you get the civil rights bung heads going that it would not be right to poison unsuspecting 'users' & maybe (hopefully) killing a few! Sod that! I reckon the last is a much better idea, at least the poor bloody rhino get to keep their horns! And make the poison terminal to 'humans'! Doesn't help the elephant much tho'......