According to critics in Congress, top officials at natural history museums and animal rights advocates, this form of charitable giving allows wealthy hunters to go on big-game expeditions essentially at taxpayers’ expense — an arrangement so blatant that one animal trophy appraiser advertises his services under the headline: “Hunt for Free.” The taxpayer subsidies also encourage hunters to track down and shoot the largest, fittest and rarest of the world’s animals, the critics say.

Big-Game Hunting Brings Big Tax Breaks