Rich Americans, Europeans and Japanese pay about 20,000 a time to kill a lion in Botswana. The government usually permits the shooting of about 50 lions a year by trophy hunters but decided to impose the ban in part because American shooters favour lions with thick manes for their walls, leading to a disproportionate killing of mature males. The shortage of such beasts is now so great that hunters have been making use of a mane-extension service back in the US where fake hair is weaved in to give their trophies an extra flourish before they hang the heads. Among those who campaigned for a ban on lion hunting in Botswana is Derek Joubert, the country's leading chronicler of big cats. We've also seen some bizarre situations arising.
Hunters target the primary males.
When they disappear the male cubs don't leave the pride, they're not chased out. So we've seen these young males breeding with their sisters and their mothers because the trophy males have been killed. Joubert estimates that the number of lions in Botswana has declined by about two-thirds in 10 years. That is average for the continent. Exact numbers of lions are notoriously difficult to measure but there is broad consensus among conservationists and governments that the population in Africa has fallen from about 50,000 to less than 15,000 over the past decade.