In its simplest form the practice of ‘canned hunting’ is the rearing of lions (wildlife is regularly kept captive not just lions) for slaughter. Hunters come to shoot these iconic animals within an enclosure they can’t escape. Often they are tame. You can look practically at any corner of the earth and find evidence of the war on wild life and animals. This is what the war on lions looks like:
Hunting
- 50 years ago there were an estimated 100,000 lions in Africa.
- Since then lion habitat has declined 75% and lion population has dropped to less than 20,000.
- Only 9 countries in Africa have more than a 1000 lions.
- Tanzania is home to 40% of the total population.
- Increase in human population has had a devastating affect on the species.
- Lions are routinely killed to protect livestock.
- Trophy hunting is a major cause of the decline of the species particularly as hunters want the pride male. Once he has been removed pride cohesion is broken, with competing males killing cubs.
- It takes 7 years for a pride to recover from the killing of the pride male.
Because there are so few wild lions left there is a growing demand for a constant supply of living targets.
- Lion farming is on the rise in South Africa.
- Captive lions now number at 8,000.
How it works:
- Lion farmers grow out lions for at least three years before they reach huntable size.
- To help pay the cost of rearing lions, lion farmers rent out their cubs to be played with by tourists. And they take in volunteers who pay to be allowed to work at a lion farm (deceitfully described usually as a lion sanctuary).
- Once they are too big to be petted they are mostly left in miserable conditions in small cages, usually malnourished and neglected, waiting until someone pays to shoot them.
Guaranteed Kill
- A canned hunt is a guaranteed kill as the hunting company only charges if there’s a kill.
- So the hunt is rigged.
- The lion is often drugged, dogs are sometimes used, meat is put out as bait, and it’s in a small enclosure from which it’s impossible to escape.
- The head is then exported to the hunter’s country of origin. The skin and bones are sent to China for use in tiger wine – a traditional medicine.
What you can do to help save the African Lion
- Cub petting. Do not patronise any tourist resort where cub-petting is allowed.
- Volunteers. Do not volunteer at any facility where breeding of lions takes place. If there are cubs then it is a lion farm breeding centre.
- Write to your MEP. And ask her to ban the import of African lion/leopard trophies in to Europe.
- Born into slavery and murdered for fun
- Please see http://www.cannedlion.org for further info.
With your help, understanding and passion, we can stop this cruelty and murder.
JOIN A GLOBAL MARCH FOR LIONS MARCH 15 2014
- Capetown South Africa
- Durban
- Vancouver, B.C. Canada
- Toronto, Ont. Canada
- Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- London, UK
- New York, USA
- Los Angeles, USA
- Perth, Australia
- Johannesburg, SA
If you still have doubts a video – not for the faint of heart.
Another great resource and testimonial to the horrors of lions being raised for slaughter. Kirsten’s Diary – Stop the Exploitation
My name is Kirsten and I would like to share my personal experience with you.Before you pay to volunteer with animals in South Africa, before you gleefully tell your friends that you are going to play with and cuddle lion cubs please read my story which will be posted on this blog site.
Join the March today! Spread the word, share this post.. If you’re a part of the twitter verse use hash tag #bancannedhunting or look for @GlobalMarchLion @PaulTully @ScotlandRoars @condofire
This blog post was written with contents and articles shared on the Global Organizers site including content from Christine Jordaan. Thanks to everyone for their hard work.
Condofire 