The outcry over the death of Cecil the lion, illegally hunted and killed by an American dentist, outraged the internet – but what’s really outrageous is that these incredible creatures could be extinct within our lifetimes.
Here are 12 facts about lions that will make your blood boil.
1. African lion numbers are in massive decline
In the last 50 years the African lion population has dwindled by 75%, falling from around 100,000 to 32,000 today – and those numbers may be overly optimistic.The drop is entirely due to humans: we’re destroying their natural habitat, the savannah, even more quickly than we’re finishing off the tropical rain forests.
2. Cecil is just one of hundreds of lions killed for sport
More than 600 lions are killed legally every year by trophy-hunting tourists. That’s 2% of the total lion population every year, with adult males disproportionately targeted.
3. Rich Americans do most of the killing
A 2011 report by the International Fund for Animal Welfare notes that between 1999 and 2008, American tourists’ trophies – such as heads and skins – were responsible for 64% of all African lions killed for sport. The number of trophies imported into the US every year more than doubled during that period.
4. Killing lions is perfectly legal
With the right permits in the right areas, killing lions is perfectly legal. The US Fish and Wildlife Service has thus far declined to list lions as an endangered species, which would mean a ban on bringing trophies into the US; instead, it’s marked them as ‘threatened’, which means the imports can continue. Lions are the only big cats not currently protected under the US Endangered Species Act, and the law does have teeth: polar bear trophy hunts have been in decline since the US banned the import of polar bear trophies in 2008.
5. Making hunting illegal doesn’t stop the hunts
In South Africa, illegal hunting is ‘rampant’, according to the Southern African Development Community.
6. Killing lions is a great money spinner
The two men who killed Cecil reportedly received $50,000 for their efforts. The going rate is $20,000 to $70,000 per hunt.
7. Money from lion hunting doesn’t go to the local communities
Despite what pro-hunt organisations might have you believe, just 3% of the huge revenues from hunting go to the local communities.
8. Some people are actually farming lions so they can be shot
In South Africa, around 160 lion farms are ‘breeding more than 5,000 lions a year on a conveyor belt of brutality,’ the Ecologist reports. It fears that so-called ‘canned hunts’ – where farmed lions are killed, often painfully and slowly, by poorly trained shooters – are often a cover for illegal trading in lion bones.
9. Lions aren’t just being targeted by tourists
Bushmeat, the illegal trade in meat from wild animals, is decimating Africa’s animal population. It’s a huge business – much bigger than illegal ivory – and while lions aren’t directly targeted, they often get caught in and killed by the poachers’ snares. In Uganda’s Murchison Falls National Park, bushmeat snares were responsible for a massive 60% decline in the lion population.
10. Lions have already been wiped out in some areas
In 2005, thousands of West African lions were believed to live in 21 different locations. By 2014, they only lived in four areas – and there are just 400 West African lions left.
11. Hunters claim they’re saving lions by killing them
According to hunting groups such as Safari Group International, killing lions encourages lion conservation.
12. Lions really are an endangered species
The triple whammy of humans taking their natural habitat, the disproportionate number of male lions shot by tourists and the demand for lion bones in folk remedies is taking a heavy toll on lion numbers. Some experts believe that lions could be extinct in fewer than 20 years.
So sad that these beautiful animals are being killed. If they started a 'hunt lion killers' company - it would outsell the lion hunts I fully suspect.
Your thoughts?
