- 1 day ago
Kevin Richardson takes Thor’s Pride out for a walk while opening up a difficult conservation debate: trophy hunting of lions. The discussion centres on Blondie, a collared male lion from Zimbabwe’s Wanki National Park who was reportedly shot by a trophy hunter after being lured out of the park, sparking outrage and strong opinions on both sides.
Richardson weighs the arguments carefully, from the ethics of hunting a research lion with a collar to the claim that trophy hunting concessions help protect large tracts of land and the wildlife living there. He also talks about age, pride tenure, cub survival, corruption, permits, and why the issue is far more complicated than a simple yes or no. All the while, the walk with the lions continues, adding a powerful wildlife backdrop to this conservation commentary.
This is a thoughtful lion conservation video, wildlife discussion, and animal behaviour walk that blends field footage with honest reflection on trophy hunting, habitat protection, and the future of big cats in Africa.
Created for viewers searching for lion documentary commentary, wildlife conservation discussion, trophy hunting debate, lion behaviour videos, and African wildlife content. It also suits anyone interested in ethical hunting, habitat protection, big cat conservation, and thoughtful nature commentary with real-world context.
Richardson weighs the arguments carefully, from the ethics of hunting a research lion with a collar to the claim that trophy hunting concessions help protect large tracts of land and the wildlife living there. He also talks about age, pride tenure, cub survival, corruption, permits, and why the issue is far more complicated than a simple yes or no. All the while, the walk with the lions continues, adding a powerful wildlife backdrop to this conservation commentary.
This is a thoughtful lion conservation video, wildlife discussion, and animal behaviour walk that blends field footage with honest reflection on trophy hunting, habitat protection, and the future of big cats in Africa.
Created for viewers searching for lion documentary commentary, wildlife conservation discussion, trophy hunting debate, lion behaviour videos, and African wildlife content. It also suits anyone interested in ethical hunting, habitat protection, big cat conservation, and thoughtful nature commentary with real-world context.
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AnimalsTranscript
00:00Hello guys. What is everybody looking at? Yes, we're gonna go. Yes, okay.
00:13All right, good morning everyone. We're gonna be taking Thor's group out for a walk. Six
00:19lions in their prime. Today's video is going to be interesting. I released a video. It was
00:27to do with snare poaching in the great Kruger National Park and many comments came in about
00:34the lion that was lured out of Wangi National Park, affectionately known as Blondie. It was a
00:41collared male lion and he was shot by a trophy hunter and it caused a massive amount of outrage.
00:49So I've been asked by a lot of you what my thoughts and opinions are. Watch the entire video and
00:56let me
00:56know what you think.
01:03I did want to say a big thank you to all of you who have been subscribing to the channel
01:11of late,
01:12the YouTube channel that is. Obviously subscriptions make a big difference. The more the channel grows,
01:19the more YouTube tends to put it out there. A massive thank you to the members and pride leaders.
01:25You are the guys obviously that help keep the channel afloat. You guys are the ones that are
01:31contributing financially which is a massive help to the cause and then I would be amiss not to thank
01:38guys the Facebook people and I don't know why I always tend to overlook the Facebook people and
01:44we have a massive following on Facebook and we do have these Facebook subscribers guys and
01:52the they are just as important to the channel as as the YouTube members and pride leaders. So
01:58thank you Facebook subscribers you've been you know overlooked but yeah not forgotten. I really do
02:08appreciate all the the the support and commentary on on Facebook and all the channels in fact I mean
02:13guys if you're not following us on on on the other platforms I am active on Instagram personally and
02:20then I have my team who helps me with all the other platforms but please be aware guys I just
02:27must say
02:27this there are so many scamsters and fraudsters on these respective platforms these days they're even
02:34going as far as to be to put these fake blue ticks the only platform that I'm not blue ticked
02:40on is TikTok
02:42and and and unfortunately TikTok is probably one of the worst out there. I must also just say guys I'm
02:50not
02:52active on a platform called Telegram so please please please if somebody contacts you on Telegram
03:01saying that it's me and I want to entice you into a personal conversation trust me guys that's not how
03:08I
03:08operate so please ignore it it's a scam so we have had people caught by these scamsters and we are
03:15trying
03:15to track them down we report them but just doesn't it just doesn't get done quick enough and on these
03:24platforms where it's not a specific handle or not a specific number associated then it becomes
03:30that much easier for these scamsters to operate so guys I will never reach out to you asking you
03:35for a personal conversation it does I just that's not the way I operate sorry so certainly I'm not going
03:43to be engaging with people asking for these private conversations and I'm especially not going to be
03:48asking you for personally for your money so that I can put it into my personal bank account that would
03:57be nice but no we we have the foundation and we have the channels that you you support and that's
04:06that's how we operate all right guys so as I mentioned earlier
04:12recently in Zimbabwe more specifically Wangi National Park a well-known park in Zimbabwe
04:21a collared lion named Blondie or affectionately known as Blondie was being monitored and researched by
04:29the Oxford University the collar sponsored by a magazine over here in South Africa it's online magazine
04:39now called Africa geographic and as you can imagine
04:46there's been a massive amount of uproar or a massive uproar because this lion was lured out of a
04:57national park allegedly baited look at look at the energy playing
05:08there's still a lot of water around
05:17they thought they were going to cross here but I don't think they're going to cross although
05:24to be honest this lioness is not scared of water are you going to jump in
05:36I don't think they're going to cross here but I don't think they're going to cross here
05:39all right guys so what makes this trophy hunt extremely controversial
05:49is the fact that this lion a was collared it was a research lion
05:54but b the lion was allegedly lured out of the park by bait so that hasn't been confirmed
06:05it's been labeled this hunt has been extremely unethical and it yet again highlights this debate
06:19you know as to whether trophy hunting is in this day and age acceptable and you will always get the
06:29people arguing for it and you will always get the people arguing against it
06:40tree hugger
06:55I must just emphasize that according to the Zimbabwe wildlife authorities the hunt was legal so that
07:03must just be specified it wasn't an illegal hunt there was a permit to hunt that lion but again one
07:11of the
07:12issues surrounding this lion was his age Blondie was a lion estimated to be about five years and three
07:22months and I suppose I say that because I'm sure the researchers knew his birth date so it's not
07:30estimated it's probably accurate that the lion was about five years and three months and the problem with
07:36that guys is that a lion of that age has tenure over a pride is souring offspring and had cubs
07:43so that
07:44particular lion had cubs within a pride that he had tenure over which means that now with him
07:51gone a new male will come in and most likely kill those cubs so that is another
08:00issue as to why so many people are up in arms about this particular trophy hunt but it did then
08:09raise
08:10the questions as to why why why on earth are people trophy hunting lions in this day and age I
08:18mean come on
08:20that is so antiquated it's so primitive it's barbaric and then you have the trophy hunters
08:28who are saying well guys you know if it wasn't for trophy hunting a lot of these uh tracts of
08:36land
08:36where we find lions wouldn't exist because these uh trophy hunting concessions are actually looking
08:45after these tracts of land these uh trophy hunting outfitters um protecting these large swathes of land
08:55which in turn protects the other animals in the land this is what they're saying um and the impact
09:06I love it when they play like this guys I apologize for inter for for stopping my chains of thought
09:12but
09:13you know I need to bring you those happy happy images
09:21the lions are so big yet they can make themselves so small
09:27all right so I'm not winning here spider webs low hanging tree branches oh man hello my girl
09:39oh oh they're in the water let's go go go go yeah they're all in the water
09:46well not all
09:55what i do for you guys to get you a shot but now i'm not sure i'm gonna get there
10:18okay
10:19okay let me catch up with them here
10:23i'm full of blackjacks sounds like i'm complaining today hey
10:27i hate blackjacks okay so the trophy hunting outfitters are arguing
10:35that without the protection of these large tracts of land those areas would just be
10:45um barren desolate um land masses because you know local people will probably invade their
10:55poach out the animals like what's happening in the greater kruger national park area
10:59so they they argue that they protect those areas and they do because if you think about it it makes
11:04sense you don't want to be inviting people from all over the world um to to come trophy hunt if
11:12you don't have
11:13any animals to to trophy hunt so it makes sense for them to protect the animals um or to have
11:19animals in those areas
11:21um and the alternative is is yes those tracts of land uh are unmanaged and
11:28unfortunately we know what happens when um you know things are left to their own devices people
11:36move in they poach the animals they graze their herds of cattle when the cattle get eaten by lions
11:42there's retaliatory killing so there's all sorts of other drama
11:46if those tracts of land are not managed by these hunting outfitters so that is one of their arguments
11:55hazards of the job just fallen into a warthog hole
12:03what are you looking for
12:08looking for a warthog
12:12maybe i need to go and join up with the other group because
12:18she's just going around in circles looking for
12:21warthogs that don't seem to be here although having said that don't ever underestimate
12:30jubari and now having just said that i see some fresh activity of warthogs but i'm going to leave jubari
12:44to dig for warthogs i'm going to hook up with the pride i'd just like to touch on a few
12:51of the
12:51arguments that the critics use against trophy hunting killing for sport is becoming more and more
12:58unsavory in today's day and age in today's world and you know what makes it even more unsavory is the
13:06lion that was shot had a collar so the ethics come into play
13:14the critics will argue that the guidelines that are put in place for trophy hunting are often
13:21breached i spoke about that it's really pertaining to the age of the lion uh blondie was a five year
13:29and three month old lion and um you know the ethics or the the guidelines state that the lion should
13:36be
13:37six and over uh and shouldn't be uh having tenure over a pride that is another uh no-no um
13:48so yeah um
13:54the the one thing that yeah it's hard to argue against in this day and age is a lot of
13:59the critics
14:00will argue that there's so much corruption that permits are given that shouldn't be given uh money
14:07doesn't go where it's supposed to um bribes are being paid uh for certain activities to be swept under the
14:16carpet uh etc etc and you know if i if i didn't live in south africa i'd probably you know
14:25say ah well
14:26that's just people being bitter or or or against it you know but living in south africa you realize
14:34that yeah these things um are real corruption is is rife there's neji's waiting she's going where's
14:44everybody hey nej look at you you look like a wet cat in fact you smell like a wet cat
14:50too because
14:52you've been swimming hey beautiful hello big boy
15:08Charlie why are you being so affectionate hey you're not normally this affectionate my boy hey
15:15he's been oh he's been super affectionate yeah he he's saying to me he wants uh he wants some
15:24her bro mancing hello my boy hey hey look at her hiding in the grass you wouldn't even see her
15:36hello my sweetie pie you've been oh everyone's been very nice to me today i wonder why what do they
15:47want
15:55oh
16:03oh
16:06oh
16:08oh
16:33I'm just gonna say that was super cute from Lola I've never heard a roar
16:37a roar like that if you can call it a roar it was more like a calling roaring oh oh
16:47it's like our mother a lioness calls her cubs but they are waiting for the other
16:52two to come through the bush felt yeah so maybe that's what it was
17:04oh he's been very cheeky Charlie now and I don't mean Charlie I mean Thor that little
17:11attitude run of his never a good thing
17:31all right folks so as you can see from my you know chat today
17:41there isn't an easy solution I know everyone's gonna come back and I know
17:46everyone's gonna have their their their own version or take but there isn't an
17:52easy solution trust me if there was an easy solution I think people would have
17:56adopted it by now my feeling is we should always try and park emotions when it
18:03comes to conserving an ecosystem I think we do need to do that and I think we
18:07need to utilize science and we need to say what does the science say does the
18:11science say that this particular area is overpopulated with X or Y species the
18:17bigger the system obviously the less intervention and I mean I'm wearing my
18:24save habitats save lines top and I think that's that's pertinent you see save
18:31lions saying save line habitats yeah you like it I like it save line habitats and I
18:42mean it's as simple as that if we save habitat more and more if we expand
18:47reserves we then have to do less so there's less need to interfere so yeah
18:57saving habitats is absolutely the key protecting habitats the key this whole
19:03Disney-fied effect that people think will happen is if you just remove man out of
19:11the equation yes I would say that that is a true statement if you removed man out
19:17of the equation and I mean totally out the equation and we all know that that's
19:23not really going to happen guys so we we need to also be realistic and say that
19:28well that's not going to happen so we need to think about solutions yeah that are
19:34that are actually going to work
20:02I hear squills I hear squills I hear squills
20:06of a warthog I think these guys have caught something yeah guys so I did say
20:11earlier when I was trundling through the bush and Jabari was being very
20:16persistent and then I saw fresh warthog you know digging so you could see
20:23they'd been scratching around and rolling in the mud and the burrows were
20:27quite active and then I said Jabari is persistent did I not and yep that cat does
20:36not give up and she caught herself a warthog
20:42persistency pays off I will say that that's it for today's video guys I'm
20:50gonna call George we're gonna move some lines around move these lines into a
20:54different camp so yeah from me Kevin and all the lines bye
21:06bye