CBL Banned??

[Garciamarquez1918]

I think it's when we don't hold ourselves to the highest ethical standards that we give ammunition to people who oppose hunting as a conservation tool.

It's ok for us to question current practices and for our ethics to evolve. That's not a gift to people who oppose hunting. Quite the contrary.

As an example, when my dad hunted in East Africa in the early 70s they would just cut the head off the animal and made no attempt to use the meat. For most people on this site, this would be ethically problematic. And if that were standard operating procedure today it would for sure be a gift to opponents.

The recent development of the "Dagga Boy" ethos is an example of positive evolution in ethics. Taking old, non-breeding animals rather than younger, breeding males is better conservation and truer to the values we claim to hold. And that makes our cause stronger.

 

[BRICKBURN]

I love how the article is short and provides no evidence or backing on their claim.

There are TWENTY news articles related to the link. Including several directly related to the OP's question. It provides a good place to start your research.

 

[375Fox]

I think it's when we don't hold ourselves to the highest ethical standards that we give ammunition to people who oppose hunting as a conservation tool.

It's ok for us to question current practices and for our ethics to evolve. That's not a gift to people who oppose hunting. Quite the contrary.

As an example, when my dad hunted in East Africa in the early 70s they would just cut the head off the animal and made no attempt to use the meat. For most people on this site, this would be ethically problematic. And if that were standard operating procedure today it would for sure be a gift to opponents.

The recent development of the "Dagga Boy" ethos is an example of positive evolution in ethics. Taking old, non-breeding animals rather than younger, breeding males is better conservation and truer to the values we claim to hold. And that makes our cause stronger.

My exact thoughts

 

[dchum]

Do you think killing every captive lion, in every zoo and only having completely wild and free lions is good for conservation? That’s how species go extinct

Man, hard to have a discussion when you completely twist my words.

Is that even remotely close to what I said?

HUNTING CBL does not benefit wildlife. Thats what I said. That still stands true.

Killing every captive lion? How did you get that from what I said.

 

[mark-hunter]

There’s not a shortage of lions.

You have to take a look on two things. Its about dynamics of extinction and trends

First is the trend of wild lion population in last 100 years:

Key Population Trends (1920s–2026):

• 1920s: Estimated 200,000–300,000 lions in the wild.
• 1950s: Estimated 100,000 lions.
• 1980s: Estimated 50,000 lions.
• 2000s: Estimated 20,000–30,000 lions.
• 2026: Estimated 20,000–23,000+ lions, with the largest population (~17,000) concentrated in Tanzania

Eventually it will come to zero, unless something change. I dont see anything stopping this trend, except CBL model.

Second thing to look is the range of African lion which is shrinking every where.

Just look at former range of lion, and present range od Lion:

So, if there is no shortage of lions, soon there will be.

And then in 100 or 200 years, somebody will say: How lion became extinct? They should have breed them when they could!

Some species survived only for the reason of being bred captive, and sold for hunting purposes.
For example, Scimitar horned oryx, addax, dama gazzele, Pere david deer, etc

Scimitar Oryx has been reintroduced in Chad, Pere Deer in China, etc.

In my opinion, this is the only viable model for lion to survive. Just take a look at the map. They are loosing the range rapidly.

 

[Dhutson]

Might be legal but from a hunting point of view not a killing POV it sure doesn't seem ethical and certainly has nothing to do with the sport of hunting. Sort of like those guys who pay someone to go and shoot an animal for them on video and then call themselves a hunter. Doesn't seem like much of a hunt when you wait for the person (certainly no ethical PH) to take them out of the cage so you can "sneak" up on them.

If one wants to kill this way, do it. Just please, for those of us who call ourselves hunter, don't call it hunting. And by the way I don't think shooting caged pheasant is hunting either. To me it is like shooting clay pigeons that I can eat. But, it ain't hunting. Hunting is not just killing or buying a killing.

Just a thought.

 

[Garciamarquez1918]

You have to take a look on two things. Its about dynamics of extinction and trends

First is the trend of wild lion population in last 100 years:

Key Population Trends (1920s–2026):

• 1920s: Estimated 200,000–300,000 lions in the wild.
• 1950s: Estimated 100,000 lions.
• 1980s: Estimated 50,000 lions.
• 2000s: Estimated 20,000–30,000 lions.
• 2026: Estimated 20,000–23,000+ lions, with the largest population (~17,000) concentrated in Tanzania

Eventually it will come to zero, unless something change. I dont see anything stopping this trend, except CBL model.

Second thing to look is the range of African lion which is shrinking every where.

Just look at former range of lion, and present range od Lion:

View attachment 763931

So, if there is no shortage of lions, soon there will be.

And then in 100 or 200 years, somebody will say: How lion became extinct? They should have breed them when they could!

Some species survived only for the reason of being bred captive, and sold for hunting purposes.
For example, Scimitar horned oryx, addax, dama gazzele, Pere david deer, etc

Scimitar Oryx has been reintroduced in Chad, Pere Deer in China, etc.

In my opinion, this is the only viable model for lion to survive. Just take a look at the map. They are loosing the range rapidly.

You could use similar mapping to argue that the Rocky Mountain Elk or Mountain Lion are inevitably going to go extinct. Lions are threatened, no doubt. The key to their survival is habitat and the key to habitat is, at this point, managed consumptive use. Ie, hunting. Wilderness has to pay its own way.

It's possible that at some point captive lions may be all we have left. But is doesn't therefore follow that shooting captive bred lions is ethical. Because as has been have pointed out, there are lots of captive lions who are not getting shot.

As @375Fox said early on, the CBL business is driven by profit motive not conservation motives. Breed lions, charge naive "animal lover" tourists to pet the babies, send the grown lions out to be shot, sell the bones.

This is why literally no conservation or hunting organization supports CBL with the excpetion of the South African Professional Hunters Association. And they have a huge conflict of interest.

 

[mark-hunter]

But is doesn't therefore follow that shooting captive bred lions is ethical.

You have touched the key point.
Ethics.
And because of "our" ethics, entire CBL program comes in question, and potentially the future of species?

But there are other peoples, whose hunting ethics is different.
Why should our ethics be the one end only measuring stick?

Even today, some cultures hunt with poison, or poison arrows. For them it is perfectly ethical to hunt with poison, while for us shooting CBL is not, while in the same time we discuss the future of the species.

In my humble opinion, (Ours) hunting ethics should be kept aside, and well being of the species should come first and be defined with economically feasible formula, but the bad thing is outside of hunting I dont see any other.
If you find any other workable model, please let as hear it.

I stand corrected. Actually there is a formula. Commercial farming again.
But Chinese farm the tigers for purpose of traditional medicine.
And it is not feasible for western culture.
For us, only hunting is commercially profitable.

 

[Killingtime]

You could use similar mapping to argue that the Rocky Mountain Elk or Mountain Lion are inevitably going to go extinct. Lions are threatened, no doubt. The key to their survival is habitat and the key to habitat is, at this point, managed consumptive use. Ie, hunting. Wilderness has to pay its own way.

It's possible that at some point captive lions may be all we have left. But is doesn't therefore follow that shooting captive bred lions is ethical. Because as has been have pointed out, there are lots of captive lions who are not getting shot.

As @375Fox said early on, the CBL business is driven by profit motive not conservation motives. Breed lions, charge naive "animal lover" tourists to pet the babies, send the grown lions out to be shot, sell the bones.

This is why literally no conservation or hunting organization supports CBL with the excpetion of the South African Professional Hunters Association. And they have a huge conflict of interest.

They have reintroduced elk all over the states.. I’ve seen elk in Tennessee and North Carolina and Kentucky I know the northern border states minn,Wisconsin,Michigan,New York all have them. They maybe struggling in the west but are growing everywhere else.

The same is not true for mountain lion these cats are just growing. The western states are getting more and more and they are branching out in to states toward the west at a pretty fast pace. I’ve personally seen them dead on the road side in Nebraska and Kansas and seen multiples over the years in Florida( in areas conservation swears they are not at).. never seen a tan bobcat weighting over 100lbs with a three foot tail lol. The problem it seems with predators like ive said is no one wants to live by them and the government wants to restrict you from hunting them

 

[375Fox]

You have to take a look on two things. Its about dynamics of extinction and trends

First is the trend of wild lion population in last 100 years:

Key Population Trends (1920s–2026):

• 1920s: Estimated 200,000–300,000 lions in the wild.
• 1950s: Estimated 100,000 lions.
• 1980s: Estimated 50,000 lions.
• 2000s: Estimated 20,000–30,000 lions.
• 2026: Estimated 20,000–23,000+ lions, with the largest population (~17,000) concentrated in Tanzania

Eventually it will come to zero, unless something change. I dont see anything stopping this trend, except CBL model.

Second thing to look is the range of African lion which is shrinking every where.

Just look at former range of lion, and present range od Lion:

View attachment 763931

So, if there is no shortage of lions, soon there will be.

And then in 100 or 200 years, somebody will say: How lion became extinct? They should have breed them when they could!

Some species survived only for the reason of being bred captive, and sold for hunting purposes.
For example, Scimitar horned oryx, addax, dama gazzele, Pere david deer, etc

Scimitar Oryx has been reintroduced in Chad, Pere Deer in China, etc.

In my opinion, this is the only viable model for lion to survive. Just take a look at the map. They are loosing the range rapidly.

This is a really misleading map when you only refer to lions. All game not just lions have disappeared from large parts of that map. Nearly all of the areas lions exist refer to national parks and hunting areas. Lions will be confined to suitable areas just like lions and tigers in India are confined to parks. The numbers will stabilize once they are confined to permanently protected areas. I ask again. They used only 24 lions to repopulate lions on 2 million acres in Mozambique (that’s now over 100 8 years later). Places like Save and Bubye have exceeded their carrying capacity where lions are destroying plains game numbers. Proper fenced big 5 reserves in South Africa use contraceptives to keep lions numbers in check. No fenced game farm wants lion prides because they eat lots of game. If there are further reintroductions in future they will use a small number of lions similar to the Mozambique effort. Furthermore, many areas would require a full ecosystem restoration not just reintroducing lions. Justifying 10,000 CBL lions raised as livestock as being necessary for reintroductions is justification after the fact. None of those lions are raised with conservation in mind. There are wild lion populations available and will be.

 

[BeeMaa]

The real question is where do you draw your ethical line on this subject.

Just because something is legal, doesn’t mean you have to agree with the ethics of it. But getting upset with those that choose to participate in the experience is another subject altogether. Conservation efforts and the hunting community don’t always need to agree on where the line falls.

I choose to support those that hunt by legal means, regardless of how I feel about the ethics of the actions.

 

[375Fox]

I apologize for the source but other articles required a paid subscription.

I’m shocked how many intelligent individuals here accept a possible reintroduction as justification to keep 10,000 CBL lions. Here’s a recent reintroduction attempt with elephants. Good intentions deadly results.

Charity faces legal action after relocated elephants in Malawi allegedly kill 10 people

People living near Kasungu national park say they are living in fear after translocation of 263 elephants by International Fund for Animal Welfare

www.theguardian.com

 

[mark-hunter]

This is a really misleading map when you only refer to lions. All game not just lions have disappeared from large parts of that map. Nearly all of the areas lions exist refer to national parks and hunting areas. Lions will be confined to suitable areas just like lions and tigers in India are confined to parks. The numbers will stabilize once they are confined to permanently protected areas. I ask again. They used only 24 lions to repopulate lions on 2 million acres in Mozambique (that’s now over 100 8 years later). Places like Save and Bubye have exceeded their carrying capacity where lions are destroying plains game numbers. Proper fenced big 5 reserves in South Africa use contraceptives to keep lions numbers in check. No fenced game farm wants lion prides because they eat lots of game. If there are further reintroductions in future they will use a small number of lions similar to the Mozambique effort. Furthermore, many areas would require a full ecosystem restoration not just reintroducing lions. Justifying 10,000 CBL lions raised as livestock as being necessary for reintroductions is justification after the fact. None of those lions are raised with conservation in mind. There are wild lion populations available and will be.

You have very good arguments!

The problem is that your last sentence has no proof, it is just a belief.
Therefor, I am not convinced.
What I see in the future for African lion when and if CBL is shut down, is exact copy of the fate of Asiatic lion, which remains only in one small population in one national park in India.

it is just a matter of time, when it will come down to that.

 

[camlo]

How ethical is driving around dragging meat for a scent trail, harvesting an animal solely or largely only for bait, hanging that bait from a tree and then waiting in a hide for a wild lion? Given enough time and money a wild lion will be killed.

Outfitters that place sedated CBL’s in small pastures to be harvested the day of arrival rightfully deserve to be put out of business. Outfitters that do it right per the law don’t deserve to be categorized the same regardless of how some feel about it. I just returned from a CBL trip and overall feel like it was a great experience.

Wild or CBL there are options for people wanting to take a lion. Personally, I would rather see someone engaged in lawful hunting and continuing the sport than not hunting at all. I just hope anyone saying CBL is completely unethical don't dove hunt this September over any milo or sunflowers.

 

[dchum]

How ethical is driving around dragging meat for a scent trail, harvesting an animal solely or largely only for bait, hanging that bait from a tree and then waiting in a hide for a wild lion? Given enough time and money a wild lion will be killed.

Outfitters that place sedated CBL’s in small pastures to be harvested the day of arrival rightfully deserve to be put out of business. Outfitters that do it right per the law don’t deserve to be categorized the same regardless of how some feel about it. I just returned from a CBL trip and overall feel like it was a great experience.

Wild or CBL there are options for people wanting to take a lion. Personally, I would rather see someone engaged in lawful hunting and continuing the sport than not hunting at all. I just hope anyone saying CBL is completely unethical don't dove hunt this September over any milo or sunflowers.

Jeez we are just repeating ourselves.

Comparing the hunting style is not the point!!!!
The hunt itself is not under criticism. You are completely missing the point of our argument.

The point is the CONSERVATION value of killing a captive raised lion, or rather - the lack there of…

One of the lion hunts supports PROTECTING wild habitat and other wild lions.

The other hunt gets some hunter a lion and then a South African pockets some money.

 

[Red Leg]

You have touched the key point.
Ethics.
And because of "our" ethics, entire CBL program comes in question, and potentially the future of species?

But there are other peoples, whose hunting ethics is different.
Why should our ethics be the one end only measuring stick?

Even today, some cultures hunt with poison, or poison arrows. For them it is perfectly ethical to hunt with poison, while for us shooting CBL is not, while in the same time we discuss the future of the species.

In my humble opinion, (Ours) hunting ethics should be kept aside, and well being of the species should come first and be defined with economically feasible formula, but the bad thing is outside of hunting I dont see any other.
If you find any other workable model, please let as hear it.

I stand corrected. Actually there is a formula. Commercial farming again.
But Chinese farm the tigers for purpose of traditional medicine.
And it is not feasible for western culture.
For us, only hunting is commercially profitable.

I have seen absolutely nothing that argues CBL in any form helps perpetuate the species. Moreover, I frankly think everything about saving this pastime and its real contributions to wildlife and habitat preservation must be driven by ethics. Both of our major hunting organizations seem to agree whole heartedly with that conclusion.

 

[Red Leg]

How ethical is driving around dragging meat for a scent trail, harvesting an animal solely or largely only for bait, hanging that bait from a tree and then waiting in a hide for a wild lion? Given enough time and money a wild lion will be killed.

Outfitters that place sedated CBL’s in small pastures to be harvested the day of arrival rightfully deserve to be put out of business. Outfitters that do it right per the law don’t deserve to be categorized the same regardless of how some feel about it. I just returned from a CBL trip and overall feel like it was a great experience.

Wild or CBL there are options for people wanting to take a lion. Personally, I would rather see someone engaged in lawful hunting and continuing the sport than not hunting at all. I just hope anyone saying CBL is completely unethical don't dove hunt this September over any milo or sunflowers.

There is a huge ethical difference and it has zero to do with the method of the hunt. What you are ignoring is that what the client is paying for that expensive non-canned hunt contributes greatly to the preservation of the species and the habitat it inhabits. CBL simply makes money for the lion factory proprietor.

 

[LivingTheDream]

I think the privatization of game animals has been a tremendous success. And though outfitters are making a profit, I think it would be hard to argue that there hasn't been some value to conservation through the South African model. Saying that only the outfitters profit, I think discounts the vital role that these outfitters have played in reviving the game animals across that country. I know the counter arguement to this isnt CBL is doing that, or doesnt help any rewinding efforts, but I don't think that is necessarily fair to discount the work that outfitters have done and the fact that many have used their profits to rewild more and more land.

And in full transparency, I hope CBL goes on for many years only so it takes the attention of the Anti's, the more funding they are pouring into stopping this issue the better. Once this is over they will focus on ballot initiatives in Colorado/California, import permits, or a good one would be resident vs non resident hunters and just kicking that hornets nest and letting us destroy each other.

This has been talked about for years on here and really doesnt go anywhere, I think we can all agreed to disagree, move on and hope someone posts a new hunt report soon, so at least we have something positive to talk about.

 

[Rare Breed]

How ethical is driving around dragging meat for a scent trail, harvesting an animal solely or largely only for bait, hanging that bait from a tree and then waiting in a hide for a wild lion? Given enough time and money a wild lion will be killed.

Outfitters that place sedated CBL’s in small pastures to be harvested the day of arrival rightfully deserve to be put out of business. Outfitters that do it right per the law don’t deserve to be categorized the same regardless of how some feel about it. I just returned from a CBL trip and overall feel like it was a great experience.

Wild or CBL there are options for people wanting to take a lion. Personally, I would rather see someone engaged in lawful hunting and continuing the sport than not hunting at all. I just hope anyone saying CBL is completely unethical don't dove hunt this September over any milo or sunflowers.

Incredibly well said!

 

[mark-hunter]

I have seen absolutely nothing that argues CBL in any form helps perpetuate the species. Moreover, I frankly think everything about saving this pastime and its real contributions to wildlife and habitat preservation must be driven by ethics. Both of our major hunting organizations seem to agree whole heartedly with that conclusion.

Breeding programs and game farming did save some species, and boosted the numbers.
Thats fact.
South African game numbers jumped 40 times over initial animal fund since the introduction of system, overall. SOuth African model is unique on entire continent.

We cannot ignore that.

Rhino is maybe the best example. Not only for the numbers of rhinos present on game farms, but there are also number of cases of white rhino reintroduction from south african reservoir to other countries like to Botswana.

Only the ethics put apex predator and one of the African iconic animal - lion - in different perspective.

Indeed, as of now, it only gives profit to lion farm owner, but just because reintroduction has not been implemented yet.
Lions reintroduced to Mozambique are apparently wild managed lions, but reintroduction was successful, which means, possible.

Having said that, I cannot go there and shoot CBL and after that look at myself at the mirror I see no honor in that, but I do not blame anybody else who does that.

And I still think, they have potential of reintroduction, because I see no evidence of the opposite.
On the other hand, if CBL program is closed, that potential will certainly be gone. Irreversibly. For ever.