Poaching is the stealing of game or fish from private property or from a place where shooting, trapping or fishing rights are reserved. Until the twentieth century, most poaching was subsistence hunting or fishing to augment scanty diets. Today, poaching is usually committed for sport or profit.

The Fish and Wildlife Service estimates that illegal trade in U.S. wildlife generates $200 million per year, a hefty slice of a $1.5 billion worldwide market. Big game animals are shot as trophies, and animal parts such as bear gallbladders are sold for "medicinal" purposes--usually as tonics to enhance male virility. Poaching also attracts organized crime because wildlife crime sentences, if tendered, tend to be lenient and probation requirements are difficult to enforce.

A poached rhinoceros with its horn removed. (Photograph by Warren and Jenny Garst. Tom Stack & Associates. Reproduced by permission.)

Poaching has a long history in this country: spotlighting a...