# Black market ivory buyers, and the poachers who fill their demand **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [September 25, 2013, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-market-ivory-buyers-and-the-poachers-who-fill-their-demand/669655 "2013-09-25T16:42:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2013, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-market-ivory-buyers-and-the-poachers-who-fill-their-demand/669655/21 "2013-09-27T02:40:48Z")
Hey, how can you tell when an elephant is having her period? There’s a quarter on your nightstand, and your mattress is gone! ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2013, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-market-ivory-buyers-and-the-poachers-who-fill-their-demand/669655/22 "2013-09-27T02:41:55Z")
Why do ducks have webbed feet? To stamp out forest fires! Why do elephants have flat feet? To stamp out flaming ducks! ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2013, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-market-ivory-buyers-and-the-poachers-who-fill-their-demand/669655/23 "2013-09-27T02:44:05Z")
Why do elephants put springs on their feet? So they can jump up into the trees and rape monkeys! Why should you never go into the jungle between 2 and 4 in the afternoon? Because that’s when the elephants are jumping out of the trees! Why are pygmies so short? They went into the jungle between 2 and 4 in the afternoon! ---
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2013, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-market-ivory-buyers-and-the-poachers-who-fill-their-demand/669655/24 "2013-09-27T02:58:31Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > Are there sources for legitimate, non-poached ivory? Apparently Siberia is lousy with mammoth remains, and during the summer thaw the locals scour the tundra for tusks. I own a guitar pick made of mammoth ivory. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2013, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-market-ivory-buyers-and-the-poachers-who-fill-their-demand/669655/25 "2013-09-27T03:31:22Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > Are there sources for legitimate, non-poached ivory? It occurs to me that elephants could be farmed/ranched for ivory. After all, an elephant in captivity does not really need its tusks. But I don’t know if it would be economical, elephants eat a **lot**. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2013, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-market-ivory-buyers-and-the-poachers-who-fill-their-demand/669655/26 "2013-09-27T03:43:04Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > It occurs to me that elephants could be farmed/ranched for ivory. After all, an elephant in captivity does not really need its tusks. But I don’t know if it would be economical, elephants eat a **lot**. Of course, after you extract the fully-grown tusks, you can kill the elephant and sell the meat! Win-win! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2013, 12:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-market-ivory-buyers-and-the-poachers-who-fill-their-demand/669655/27 "2013-09-27T12:13:00Z")
> [@Jamaika\_a\_jamaikaiake](#): > > (bolding mine) > You three will be among the first flattened to pancakes in the coming elephantpocalypse. There is an overpopulation of humans, and they are getting in the way of the elephants. Heh, sequel to Sharknado: _Elephantcane_! ---
**Author:** ![Waxwinged](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c2a13f/32.png) [@Waxwinged](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Waxwinged)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2013, 12:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-market-ivory-buyers-and-the-poachers-who-fill-their-demand/669655/28 "2013-09-27T12:33:49Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Of course, after you extract the fully-grown tusks, you can kill the elephant and sell the meat! Win-win! 🙂 Not to derail the pitting, but is elephant meat actually any good/what does it taste like? ---
**Author:** ![Suil\_Dubh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/85f322/32.png) [@Suil\_Dubh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Suil_Dubh)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2013, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-market-ivory-buyers-and-the-poachers-who-fill-their-demand/669655/29 "2013-09-27T13:54:31Z")
Smells like hippo, tastes like rhino. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2013, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-market-ivory-buyers-and-the-poachers-who-fill-their-demand/669655/30 "2013-09-27T16:46:31Z")
> [@Waxwinged](#): > > Not to derail the pitting, but is elephant meat actually any good/what does it taste like? I dunno, but I’ve seen pix in _National Geographic_ of pygmies butchering elephants for meat. And Kalahari bushmen, in _The Gods Must Be Crazy 2._ In that story, the bushmen come across one a poacher has just killed, and call a neighboring tribe to help them eat it. “The Heavy People had done a senseless thing as usual. They had taken the useless tusks, and left all the valuable meat!” Of course, hunter-gatherers have to get used to eating anything edible that they can kill or find, doesn’t necessarily mean it’s any good. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2013, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-market-ivory-buyers-and-the-poachers-who-fill-their-demand/669655/31 "2013-09-27T18:02:51Z")
[Previous threads](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=695332&highlight=poachers) [on the](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=645748&highlight=poachers) [subject.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=645748&highlight=poachers) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-market-ivory-buyers-and-the-poachers-who-fill-their-demand/669655.md?page=1)