Big-game hunting

[4] The Schöningen spears and their correlation of finds are evidence that complex technological skills already existed 300,000 years ago, and are the first obvious proof of an active big game hunt.

H. heidelbergensis already had intellectual and cognitive skills like anticipatory planning, thinking and acting that so far have only been attributed to modern man.

[5][6] Based on cave paintings, it appears that early man hunted mammoth in groups,[7] using a combination of spears or large rocks, or alternatively driving the animal off a cliff.

Sharply rising in popularity during the Victorian Era, it peaked during the 20th century, and includes many famous big game hunters.

Among them are Philip Percival, who guided Theodore Roosevelt and Ernest Hemingway, themselves famous big game hunters; Bror von Blixen-Finecke, a friend of Percival's and husband of writer Isak Dinesen who wrote Out of Africa; Denys Finch Hatton, who was also a character in Dinesen's book; Major Percy Horace Gordon Powell-Cotton; and others.

Generally hunters approach the game stealthily, camouflaging their appearance, scent or sound depending on which sense is most likely to reveal them to their prey under the conditions.

Big-game hunting ethics require a clean, humane kill, and most hunters work diligently toward this end.

[13] Advances in ammunition and the guns to match have made longer-range kills of big game possible with margins of error considered tolerable.

The calibers and types of ammunition, and the firearms to shoot them, are numerous, and the science of ballistics is continuously improving to allow hunting in a tremendous variety of situations.

Primitive hunting using spears, spear-throwers, and other similar weapons is a skill that is popular among hunters seeking greater challenge and knowledge than more conventional weaponry.

[22] The examples of large economic impacts of big-game hunting abound, and many studies exist of the high positive effects wherever it is tried and managed well.

For example, due to conservation through hunting, the white-tailed deer population has increased in the United States from about 500,000 in the early 1900s to 30 million today.

Very few rhinos survive outside national parks and reserves due to persistent poaching and habitat loss over many decades.