Don’t like the fact that the guy baited the lion, but if the authorities thought he was that valuable why wasn’t that area fenced off?
I don’t hunt anything that I am not going to eat, so that pretty much takes all predator animals off the list.
That being said I will kill any bear, mountain lion or other critter that becomes a danger to my family or my live stock.
When I have to do that, I use the meat from predators as dog food.
You know, early on in this kerfuffle, there was a line of reasoning from folks that I would call “regular hunters”, who like to head off in the fall, with a rifle, or bow, or a shotgun in search of some game to bring home, and a little bit of relaxation. We dress what we kill, and fill the freezer, hand carefully wrapped packages to friends and family and just generally share the bounty. The notion of wasting meat is abhorrent.
But there’s another kind of perfectly legitimate hunting, that I couldn’t even dream of affording, in which the hunter seeks the joy of the hunt, and the trophy. I don’t see why that should be controversial, but some of the first sort of hunters look down their noses at the second sort of hunter, partly at least due to the tendency to be annoyed by people who so ostentatiously display their wealth.
That said, in Africa, trophy hunting is the norm: the guides get the meat, the hunter gets the trophy and the habitat, thus made valuable by the much-hated rich guys paying thousands of dollars gets to continue.
Too bad to see one group of hunters square off against another, though. Once PETA fanatics finish off big-game trophy hunting, they’ll come for our deer rifles and bird guns. Count on it.
The baiting of bear here in the U.S. is a common practice during hunting season as is setting out corn and carrot piles for white tail deer.........Collars on wildlife are no different than tags on fish and water mammals. They're applied for tracking purposes only and does not exempt them from predation........
You don't like safari hunts, fine, I get it. But as pointed out in a number of posts, they're necessary in that part of the world to help preserve the species.
And as a side note, there are hunting outfitters all across this country dealing with every animal and fish from walleye and salmon to quail, to elk to bear and to mountain goats.
As far as Mr. Palmer goes, any attempt to claim wrong doing should be directed towards his outfitter.......
How do you think wildlife photographers manage to get their pictures/video ?
EVERY lion killed in Africa is baited. Fences don’t stop deer in my area, don’t stop lions, elephants either! You ought to see a herd of zebra go through a cattle fence at 40 mph!
What they described is normal hunting practices, an animal is shot for bait, drug behind the truck, just in case a lion (or leopard) happens across it by accident, he will follow the bait. I get a newsletter from Charlton/McCallum safaris in Zimbabwe, who have their own anti poaching group as well as guiding hunters, in just their hunting area, they have had 15 known people killed just by lions, so don’t discount it, you just don’t hear about it, and it’s doubtful they know of all of them.
By the way, bear is edible, and loins of mountain lion are definitely edible. Just like you, landowners in Africa would kill every lion that wandered onto their property.....if they couldn’t make money by allowing hunting.
By the way, I have been there and done it, in Africa, Alaska, BC, all the western USA.