Canned Hunting - Our Endangered Lions

We did a post a while ago about the tragic decline in the African lion population and I was doing a little more research the other day and come across a shocking article from The Guardian online. The article explained the horrendous practice of canned hunting.

Lions are hand reared from cubs, growing up and bonding with the very humans who let them out into a small enclosure and then hunt them with a group of paying tourists. The article included cellphone footage from one of the hunts and to see the fear in the lions eyes was so saddening. Also, honestly, it riled so much anger in me towards the hunters and more so the game rangers who are supposed to be protecting our game.

These people become rangers supposedly to protect these animals and here they are putting these lions in the most frighting and traumatic experience you can imagine. These lions have bonded probably with the very ranger shooting them and helping tourists hunt them down.

If we are living in an era where our animal populations are so sensitive, we should be doing more to protect them and ensure that there are still lions around in the next 100 years. The problem is that tourism is a huge economic sector and tourists will pay thousands for the opportunity to shoot a lion "in the wild".

I have linked the article but is has footage that could be upsetting to some readers.Click here to see the article and here for more reading. 

*Image courtesy of Guardian UK