GRUESOME pics show a Brit safari boss posing over the corpses of dead lions reportedly bred in captivity for rich trophy hunters. Alex Goss – who allegedly charges thousands of pounds for “canned hunting” experiences – is seen beside the bodies of the two majestic beasts after they were slaughtered in South Africa. He’s thought […]
GRUESOME pics show a Brit safari boss posing over the corpses of dead lions reportedly bred in captivity for rich trophy hunters.
Alex Goss – who allegedly charges thousands of pounds for “canned hunting” experiences – is seen beside the bodies of the two majestic beasts after they were slaughtered in South Africa.
He’s thought to be the only British safari operator organising the controversial hunts – in which lions are bred to be tracked and killed in fenced enclosures purely for sport, the Mail On Sunday reports.
It comes after a reported 12,000 lions are bred in farms in South Africa that are destined to either be shot by callous hunters or slaughtered for “traditional” Chinese medicines.
Goss, of Oswestry, Shropshire, is the owner of Blackthorn Safaris – which organises big-game hunts in South Africa and Zimbabwe.
In other pics on his website, Goss is seen posing beside a dead crocodile, a hippo, a buffalo, and a pair of zebras.
The lions he is pictured with were bred in captivity and later shot on heavily fenced game ranches, according to experts spoken to by the Mail On Sunday.
Dr Pieter Kat, director of conservation charity LionAid, said: “Wild male lions have scars all over because they have to constantly fight to take over a pride and to maintain their position.
“But the mane is perfect and this is not typical of any wild lion, whose mane will be scruffy.
“It is only in a captive-raised environment that a male can develop a mane of this size.”
South Africa is the only country that allows large-scale lion breeding.
There are reportedly more than 200 farms and compounds where the animals are kept in fenced enclosures.
There is no suggestion that Goss has broken any laws.
But campaigners have slammed the grisly practise of “canned” hunts.
Eduardo Goncalves, of the Campaign To Ban Trophy Hunting, said: “For a British company apparently to be actively organising canned lion hunts will make people sick to the stomach.”
Goss did not respond to requests for comment – and last night the Blackthorn Safaris website was taken down.
It had claimed that “hunting is conservation” – adding: “Habitat, research and wildlife law enforcement work, all paid for by hunters, help countless non-hunted species.”
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