The villagers don't have to worry about their marketability at all, because they all know that the ivory will be made into beautiful handicrafts and sold for millions.
It is for the high rewards that these Yakut ivory hunters, under the instigation of Han Peacock, all act like crazy, spreading around, casting wide nets, and fishing in the sea.
Of course, they are not without any danger. In this lawless place with no strict legal restrictions, in addition to natural dangers, there are also Russian vicious police.
Although the mammoth ivory trade is booming, the Russian police are also eyeing this group of Yakut hunters who make a living on ivory.
Russian border police will use helicopters to patrol this area. If they find hunters "illegal hunting" on the island, they will drive them off the island for incomplete procedures and confiscate their ivory.
Therefore, hunters not only have to avoid polar bear attacks, severe storms, but also helicopters.
Of course, the Yakuts are not afraid of this. They have learned to carefully hide their ivory and hide on the ice sheet.
Hunters who have been working on the ice sheet for more than ten years have not seen a real summer for too many years, and this year, they are about to experience the hottest summer.
For the past five months, Karl Gorokhov has been tracking his ancient prey on a deserted island in the East Siberian Sea, trekking 18 hours a day across the icy tundra.
At this time, he was cold, tired, and so hungry that he had to eat the seagulls as well.
Even the two polar bears that attacked his tent were starving. After shooting them, he cut open their stomachs and found nothing inside.
Gorokhov, 46 years old, has wind-chapped cheeks and a messy red beard. When he sets out every day, he has to pass nine graves near the tent.
He guessed that these were the resting places of the unfortunate people who came to this island to escape the Soviet concentration camps.
A late summer snowstorm is raging on Courtenay Island, 1,000 kilometers north of the Arctic Circle, and another season of severe cold in the North is approaching.
Gorokhov's fingers and palms began to itch, which he considered a sign of good luck.
An itchy body usually means he's getting closer to what he's after: the milky white tusks of a mammoth.
These furry giants, which roamed northern Siberia in the late Pleistocene, became extinct about 10,000 years ago. However, isolated sporadic elephant groups still survived on the islands in northern and eastern Siberia until they were completely extinct about 3,700 years ago.
Mammoth tusks, which can grow more than 4 meters long, are now reappearing from the permafrost, driving the ivory trade that benefits residents of the Siberian Arctic.
Gorokhov has been exploring one of the world's most inhospitable areas since he first started hunting for tusks nearly a decade ago.
Now, trusting the cues of his itchy fingers, he searched the tundra until he almost tripped over a jutting tusk.
"Sometimes the ivory will appear in front of you like this, as if it has been guiding you." After seeing the Korean peacock, Karl Gorokhov smiled with wrinkles on his face, because the appearance of the Korean peacock meant that his
This harvest is guaranteed.
Without the wine and food brought by Han Kongque, he would never have had enough physical strength to dig out this big thing.
After nearly 24 hours of non-stop work, Gorokhov dug out the ivory from under the gravel-strewn ice.
The unearthed ivory is as thick as a tree trunk, weighs 70 kilograms, and is almost in perfect condition. Such well-preserved ivory can definitely be sold for a high price.
Before dragging the tusks away, Gorokhov threw a silver earring into the cave he dug and dedicated it to the local gods.
In the past, Karl Gorokhov still needed to safely transport this ancient relic home. Now after meeting the Korean Peacock, all problems have become easier. Now he can get more than 60,000 US dollars as long as he delivers this perfect ivory.
good price.
The mammoth ivory trade barely existed when Gorokhov was born in northern Siberia in 1966.
He remembered seeing rotten ivory on the banks of the Yana River near the fishing village of Ustyansk where he lived as a child.
Free trade was prohibited during the Soviet era, and many locals believed that disturbing the tusks would bring bad luck because they believed the tusks came from giant mole-like creatures that lurk deep in the permafrost.
Yet these ancient tusks fascinated Gorokhov, who grew up in fertile Yakutia, an area the size of India but home to less than 1 million people today and officially known as Yakutia.
Republic of Sakha.
According to local legend, when the Creator flew over this area, he dropped rich treasures: gold, silver, diamonds and oil because it was too cold.
But what fascinates Gorokhov the most is the real-life story told by his school teacher about pioneers buying and selling mammoth ivory in the 17th century.
A few years later, he came across photos of explorers from the early 20th century in the library's collection: bearded men standing on Courtenay Island, dwarfed by mammoth tusks, and ships piled high with ivory.
"I always wonder if there are more tusks out there," Gorokhov said.
No one, not even Gorokhov, could have predicted that mammoth tusks would become the economic lifeblood of Yakutia, which was virtually abandoned after Soviet-era mines and factories closed.
The Ustyansk district in Yakutia covers an area of tundra equivalent to three Switzerlands, and its population has declined from 80,000 to 8,000 in the past 50 years.
Today, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of Yakut men who have become ivory hunters, following in the footsteps of their ancestors, surviving the same harsh living conditions and pursuing the same Paleolithic beasts.
Although seemingly primitive, the tooth rush is not driven by ancient impulses but by powerful modern forces.
The collapse of the Soviet Union and the subsequent frenzy of border capitalism, the international ban on the elephant ivory trade and the search for alternatives, and even the advent of global warming.
At the end of the last ice age, rising temperatures made the mammoths' fate even more inevitable.
Their grassland habitat was flooded and shrunk, leaving the elephants stranded on the isolated islands where Gorokhov now hunts his tusks.
Today, as the permafrost that resembles a mammoth cemetery is melting and eroding, coupled with the influx of ivory hunters, these animals are gradually coming back to light.
In September 2012, on the Taimyr Peninsula in Russia, a well-preserved juvenile mammoth was accidentally killed by an 11-year-old boy because one of its ancient feet protruded from the semi-frozen sedimentary layer.
Discover.
However, the primary reason stimulating the mammoth ivory trade is the rise of China.
About 90% of the mammoth ivory exported from Siberia ends up in China—estimated at more than 60 tons per year, and the actual number may be higher to satisfy China's newly wealthy ivory-loving people.
The surge in demand has some scientists worried and lamenting the loss of precious data.
Ivory, like tree trunks, contains many clues about diet, climate and environment.
Even the Yakuts are wondering how quickly this non-renewable resource will be exhausted.
Although millions of mammoth tusks, perhaps more, are still buried deep in Siberian permafrost, they have become increasingly difficult to find.
Some people once hoped that mammoth tusks could alleviate the pressure on elephants, but things don't seem to be that simple. Although the mammoth ivory trade lacks perfect regulations, it is still legal.
Furthermore, the two types of ivory can be distinguished by the ivory texture known as Schreger lines, and the prices are roughly the same.
However, the demand for elephant ivory in Asia has not diminished slightly. On the contrary, the slaughter of African elephants has intensified. In 2012, Xiangjiang Customs seized a record high of 5.5 tons of elephant ivory.
Compounding the problem, illegal elephant ivory and legal mammoth ivory often end up in the same Chinese carving workshops.
During his expedition to northern Yakutia, none of the ivory hunters Karl Gorokhov encountered had ever traveled beyond the Siberian tundra.
But this summer is obviously different. At this time, not only Karl Gorokhov, but also more Yakut ivory hunters are on the surrounding islands.
When Karl Gorokhov first met Han Peacock, after knowing that Han Peacock was a pure Chinese, he immediately came over mysteriously and asked Han Peacock the same question: "Can you help me talk to some Chinese buyers?"
Is the family on the line?"
This is often when Han Peacock is most proud. He never thought that trading mammoth tusks would be so much easier than he imagined.
Of course, this kind of transaction can be regarded as everyone getting what he needs. Just like Karl Gorokhov, he found a mammoth tusk in very good condition and was able to get nearly 70,000 US dollars.
And this is his harvest, and this harvest is comparable to the income of many middle-income families in the United States. Even in the United States, such an income can be considered a middle-income group.
These ivory hunters are well aware of the demand in the Chinese market. These demands have caused the price of top-quality mammoth ivory in Yakutsk, the capital of the region, to double in the past two years, with 1 kilogram selling for nearly a thousand dollars.
When the ivory enters China, the price can double again, and a full-length ivory with exquisite carving can be sold for a sky-high price.
Han Peacock once saw a 3-meter-long mammoth ivory product in an antique shop in Shanghai. The price was $8 million.
Karl Gorokhov was considered a first-generation ivory hunter, so he was very familiar with the entire Siberian tundra. With his help, Han Peacock harvested more woolly ivory tusks in the following days.
Also with the guidance of Karl Gorokhov, Han Peacock found Jiuduo’s camp, or the ivory hunter group. (To be continued.)