Heere Kitty Kitty... The Truth About Trophy Hunts

Have you ever seen the photos/videos of people petting and playing with young lion cubs? They’re cute and playful and seem a big kitten who is there just for you to enjoy.

This is one of those moments that you really ought to think about the long term effect.

Any animal that belongs in the wild, should not be taught at such a young age to rely on or be friendly towards humans. Especially considering that we humans are the ones hunting them for sport. I’ll explain more on this in a bit.

These adorable cubs are conditioned to live in a human’s world, not their own. Ultimately these cute cubs are stripped of the chance for a successful life in the wild where they can hunt and mate and live the way they were meant to.

There is an incredibly dark and sad side that these companies do not want the public to know.

After the cubs grow up and are no longer small enough to be handled by tourists, they are sent to breeding farms. Much like puppy mills, these lions are kept in small enclosures with many other lions. More often than not, these lions are provided with a less than adequate water and food supply. Many of these lions become malnourished, get injured and develop diseases and never will receive proper treatment.

Why do these lion breeding farms exist?

While the female lions are bred over and over again, eventually both males and females are sent to what are called canned hunts where tourists pay large amounts of money to basically drive into an enclosure about the size of a football field where they sit on top of a car with a rifle and shoot the lion, the tourists call themselves hunters but I think we all know what they really are. The lions see the humans and since they have been conditioned to like humans, they run right up to the vehicle, allowing for the soulless person with a weapon to take an easy shot and capture their prized trophy.
It’s an incredibly sad life for an animal as impressive as a lion. From birth to death they are being subjected to the nasty business of humans doing anything to make a profit.
Read more about it here

Tigers are in even more danger. Even after three species of tiger are now extinct due to poaching, there doesn’t seem to be much in terms of protection of the 6 species of tigers that are left. The bones of a tiger are extremely valuable in Chinese medicine. The bones of one tiger cost roughly $180,000. Of course they don’t curate these bones by foraging through the forest in search of a tiger who has died of natural causes. Just like the lions, tigers are also gathered into breeding farms. Once they have reached maturity, these tigers are gathered together and shot, harvested and sold for their bones which will be sent to China and made into tiger bone soup, tiger bone tea, etc.

Why isn’t this illegal?

Of course the government gets a cut of the profits made from the lion “hunts” and tiger bones. It is in their best interest that these businesses continue. This is yet another perfect example that governments care only for it’s own well-being, not the well-being of others.

The best way to stop this disgusting trend is by education others.

I recently visited a big cat sanctuary, a true sanctuary where I was not allowed to interact with the animals other than marveling at their beauty and taking as many photos as possible. I learned all about the crude businesses that these animals were rescued from; and how they’ve finally began to adjust to a healthier life. Unfortunately since these animals have been raised with human interaction they will never be able to be released into the wild. They cannot hunt for themselves and would ultimately die prematurely due to a lack of hunting and survival knowledge. Not to mention the fact that the reserves they would normally be released into are now all full, they are at maximum capacity. Yet these lions are being bred so much that they are producing lions by the thousands. Clearly they aren’t being bred to populate the wild lands of Africa.

The sanctuary I visited is a true non-profit that uses all proceeds for the benefit of the big cats there. They trade lion poo to the farmers who use it to scare off the caracals who tend to kill their livestock, in exchange for meat from deceased livestock which is used to feed the big cats.

(All Images used in this post were taken by @heiditravels using a Canon 5D Mark ii)

They truly care about the animals and want more than anything for the truth to get out about the companies who promote lion cub interactions. That’s when the light went off and I knew immediately I’d use this steemit platform to inform you all of this practice. If you or someone you know is planning on visiting a company who offers lion cub interactions, please, just don’t. Instead spend your time and (and very little) money at a true non-profit animal sanctuary to help stop the abuse of big cats in Africa.

I’ve always been a lover of animals, big, small, cute, ugly, and this past visit really resonated with me. To see these magnificent, powerful predatory animals be bound to a life in a cage all due to people taking advantage of them when they were young and wanting to make an easy buck, really makes me angry. It seems to me that in Africa, where around every corner there’s another wild animal or treacherous landscape, we ought to be far more careful to preserve that very wild nature. I know this is a life-changing experience for me to visit a place where nature still rules. I want to do my part to help it stay that way.