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Oggie wrote:This is a touchy topic indeed. Being a hunter myself I have an opinion on this and I'd like to share the same. To me hunting is something I enjoy. It's as much about the planning and being outdoors as it's about the actual kill. Most hunts are armed treks anyway ! However I do have an opinion on hunting Lions. It's an opinion not a judgement. I cannot see the fun in hunting another predator. It just does not seem natural to me. Deer, Pigs etc that are traditional prey animals I have no problem hunting but cats - really ? Having said this and being a hunter one must accept that there is a part of a hunter that likes the thrill and danger associated with a hunt. This is obviously accentuated when hunting a big predator like a lion. In this case I'd have a great deal of respect for a hunter armed with a spear or perhaps even a bow and arrow tracking a big cat alone in it's territory. No guides, no back up rifles, no quad bikes or 4WD support....just the hunter and the hunted. Totally alone in the wild in the Lion's territory. Now that would be a true contest or would it ?
Agree completely , deer, pig well I agree but a lion ,tiger I can't comprehend killing such magnificence ,in such day and age ,rather shoot him with my nikkon ,that way more productive and will be ready to pay the conservation charges.Managing a lion or a tiger habitat is not as simple as that of the prey ,spanning 1000s of acres or many 100 square kilometers .Then add to that the difficulty of getting them to a size to man a pride .I completely side with the hunters in hunting the prey species and will says that's legitimate and most of the time necessary for conservation efforts .On top of that bow and arrow for a lion ??
Not sure how many people around here are into bows, but bows have changed a whole lot in just the past 20 years. They can be extremely powerful. They provide very deep straight-line penetration with a very destructive wound track. The only things lacking are temporary cavity and accuracy beyond short range.
I don't even hunt anything for the same reasons jatindra expressed. But I do support hunting and hunters. Where I live these are the most puritanical and extremist people I would associate myself with. If someone does something unethical or makes a dumb mistake, they will be relentless with them. If someone breaks a regulation, they will turn them in. In any other pursuit I would see such an attitude as a massive character flaw but for hunters it is becoming and a sign of their principles and honor.
A few days later, it was reported that "Jericho", Cecil's brother was poached (now it turns out that this might be false).
Since they don't want to acknowledge poaching as a problem, the media barely reported it and there was no "widespread outrage" (from all those people who don't have to work for a living and therefore can afford to protest in front of some poor guy's office on a weekday).
Apparently some people can only feel something is abhorrent when they have a scapegoat to gang up against. So I have to ask myself; poaching isn't a big deal for these people but legal hunting is? Have most people lost the ability to reason, to think logically?
C'mon people don't be sheep! Don't let the media tell you when you should be outraged and when you shouldn't. Make up your own mind.
On another note, I don't understand the people who condone hunting of some animals and not others. Is a Wild boar's life more important than a big cat's? Why is it OK to hunt one but not the other? Are we guilty of saying; "you're OK if you hunt what I hunt"? "You're an ass if you hunt what I don't hunt"?
I'm not trying to call anyone out, I'm just genuinely mystified by the logic behind those statements.
If you hunt at all, doesn't it smack of hypocrisy to condemn other hunters?
“Never give in, never give in, never; never; never; never – in nothing, great or small, large or petty – never give in except to convictions of honor and good sense” — Winston Churchill, Oct 29, 1941
Some very good points raised! I agree with you where no one raises a hue and cry about rampant poaching still prevalent like they did in case of CECIL. The fight against poaching needs to be addressed more seriously and punishments more severe no doubt.
However, in this particular case even if it was a legal hunt did this guy need to shoot a lion with a bow and arrow The animal suffered needlessly for 40 hours because before being put out of its misery - I don't think that hunting an animal like a lion with a bow and arrow (however powerful it may be- it is still a bow and arrow and very little chance of there being a 'one shot'clean kill), injuring it and then leaving it to suffer so long is in anyway acceptable. One can still understand if he had at least attempted to shoot it with a rifle and after realizing it was wounded, to have made the effort of going after it immediately or at least as soon as possible. I am sure you would be aware that a lot of animals are very 'hardy' for lack of a better word and it may even take several bullets from a heavy rifle before a quarry breathes its last. So personally speaking in this case the man deserves animosity he got for the sheer brutality of this hunt and definitely deserves to be persecuted!
I also agree with you that one animal's life is no more or less important than the others. However, I suppose one needs to consider the abundance and the availability of the game when assessing this. I remember reading somewhere that legal permits for hunts of some species are being issued in parts of Pakistan. If it is so, perhaps in the future permits may be even be issued for a snow leopard hunt- would this not be extremely alarming considering how few of these beautiful and elusive big cats we have left now? So in this case don't you think that a snow leopard would be far more valuable from the point of view of conservation of a species than say a sambar deer in the same region? In any case personally speaking I always thought no animals life is worth taking unless it is for your own survival, or if not survival at least for a meal. I doubt anyone would shoot a lion or a leopard for the pot
Well, I'm not going to [QOUTE] some of the statements here but [YOU] have been fed second or third hand information and taking the decisions based upon that is not going to be worth a dime.
> Yes taking a life of an animal is sad affair but we are on top of the food chain even then you some time also get hunted, there are countless number of legal hunters got killed even hunting deer. You can fall through ice, road accident, over the cliff, fall from tree stand are common.
> Hunting and Killing animals are two worlds apart, you hunt free range animals where upon research, study and sustainability are counted first.
Where any given animal has fair chances of escape and you can only use permitted method of shooting or maiming an animal, no snares such as.
You kill any animal on road accidents that can be protected leopards, a cobra, protected salamanders, protected owls or bald eagles, all sort of humans wear crocodile leather shoes for fashion, so that's all OK. And we kill all sort of animals for self defense such as feral dogs and cats.
> And you kill all sort of animals for food and goods, but you don't get to see them being killed, so we are a OK with them all time.
> Now, as hunters [WE] follow two set of rules, rules that are set by Gov't and second are called ethical. Gov't don't say you can't sleep with other women when you are married but as ethical set of rules, you don't. It's called ethical standard in hunting that what you are setting for yourself.
> Yes, the lion hunter may have lower the ethical standard but the hunt was legal and a permit was issued to professional hunter and land was secured and money changed hands. You can hunt here and not there, all sort of hallaballulla we read or heard in media. You can hunt a lion in Zimbabwe, on certain private lands and people been hunting. Discussion ends here. For 55 grand, I would throw my father-in-law in with lion as bonus.
OK -------- got a call, be back but don't qoute my post yet ...........
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. - Edmund Burke
@Hammerhead - I m not debating the merits or demerits of legal hunting. Of course the media is not to be believed at all most of the time but it is fairly clear by the mans own admission that he used a bow and arrow for this hunt - so yeah I think he deserves what he got!
"For 55 grand, I would throw my father-in-law in with lion as bonus."
There is no doubt that trophy hunting contributes to conservation. The basic funda being. That at the expense of few you save many more. The money earned goes into protecting the habitat and thereby the species.
In this particular case. I doubt the dentist was aware that he was shooting a famous lion which was part of a study.
I have hunted in Africa and as a client you shoot the animal your professional hunter tells you to shoot. This man has flown in from thousands of kms away. He does not know which animal has to be taken.
If anyone is at fault it is the PH and not the client.
As for the doc. He is an outdoors man with passion. To shell out 50 k is not everybodies cup of tea.
It is said that dangerous game gets dangerous after the first shot is fired.
I would never dare go after a lion with a bow and arrow and then follow it up on foot.
In Africa. If you shoot an animal and it is injured and lost in the bush. It is considered taken. This basically means that you pay for it.
Every hunter wants to take a clean shot and get the animal down in the first go.
But the variables involved in hunting are such that one can never be 100 percent sure inspite of all precautions.
Good articles, Haji and fencehen.
They bring out the absurdity of the American press and some of its people who can't make the distinction between reality and a cartoon character in Disney's Lion King.
“Never give in, never give in, never; never; never; never – in nothing, great or small, large or petty – never give in except to convictions of honor and good sense” — Winston Churchill, Oct 29, 1941
fencehen wrote:"In Zimbabwe, We Don’t Cry for Lions"
A little digging .........
Now that the hunters are gone there are no keepers of the Earth to watch out for poachers and such. Ask any anti hunter how much money or time they spend each year to look after animals and fish
The poisoning was first uncovered by a European hunter and his Zimbabwean guides who spotted a dead cow and her calf as they flew over the park in a helicopter.
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. - Edmund Burke
Just to add that I for the last one year or so I had started realizing the importance of legal hunting as a means of conservation but with a little apprehension. In this particular case I was only against the cruelty of the killing is all!
These articles,especially the last one shared by Hammerhead are truly eye openers and really drive home a point about how much more significant the role of legal hunting is and will be if we are to preserve what little we have left! Thank you truly for the education gentlemen!! Please do keep sharing more such articles...
@Hammerhead - I m not debating the merits or demerits of legal hunting. Of course the media is not to be believed at all most of the time but it is fairly clear by the mans own admission that he used a bow and arrow for this hunt - so yeah I think he deserves what he got!
Here is my 14 year daughter dropped a tank size deer with croosbow.
And from what we can call an "expert" on bow hunting...... Fread Bear !!!
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. - Edmund Burke
@Hammerhead- I wont post anymore on this as I now do see your point. I am aware that even with a rifle one can wound an animal very badly and it can suffer in agony endlessly.e.g. a shot to the lower jaw I must also admit that my part of the debate so far hails purely from 'bookish' knowledge with zero field experience in any hunting or tracking, compared to your practical field knowledge which is far removed and obviously far superior to ANY book knowledge. I do see your point now that this dentist could have had bad luck with a shot that DIDNT make a clean kill, so I change my stand and maybe he does not deserve all that has happened to him. I can also imagine with my rudimentary jungle experience that its darn tough to track a single animal in the bush, even if it is badly wounded. The guy has also admitted to being a bow and arrow hunter primarily, so I now think he may have actually also been a really good shot BUT with ultra bad luck as far as this hunt went. By way of small protest, I still only think he may have been better prepared for a shot at an animal like a lion who I believe can take several bullets even from a heavy rifle and still survive. But I do stand corrected on this one chief that's for sure!
The animal suffered needlessly for 40 hours because before being put out of its misery - I don't think that hunting an animal like a lion with a bow and arrow (however powerful it may be- it is still a bow and arrow and very little chance of there being a 'one shot'clean kill), injuring it and then leaving it to suffer so long is in anyway acceptable. One can still understand if he had at least attempted to shoot it with a rifle and after realizing it was wounded, to have made the effort of going after it immediately or at least as soon as possible. I am sure you would be aware that a lot of animals are very 'hardy' for lack of a better word and it may even take several bullets from a heavy rifle before a quarry breathes its last. So personally speaking in this case the man deserves animosity he got for the sheer brutality of this hunt and definitely deserves to be persecuted! 
