The killing of Zimbabwe's best-known and most photographed lion, affectionately known as Cecil, has ignited a firestorm of controversy and debate. This essay will explore hunting and trapping, both of which play a key role in maintaining balance in the animal kingdom. Both sports have been a tradition since the beginning of humanity. Men needed to hunt and trap to feed their families and survive. For some people this is still true today and for others it is a hobby that has become a passion. Did you know that hunters pay $796 million a year in conservation programs? Athletes are a huge source of revenue in the United States. Additionally, hunters required an 11 percent tax on guns, ammunition, and archery equipment. All of these revenue sources add up to a total of $1.6 billion per year. If that money were cut out of the economy, it would hurt far more than the people fighting against hunting could ever imagine. In this article, the goal is to inform people why sports like hunting and trapping are necessary to keep the world going. Not only financially, but also to maintain a balance between types of wildlife. Hunters contribute more than any other group to maintaining and preserving wildlife habitat. According to this reliable hunting source, “By 1907 only forty-one thousand elk remained. Now there are more than a million,” hunters are the reason these moose populations have improved. This hunting source also says, “By 1900, only five hundred thousand whitetails remained. Hunters have now raised that number to thirty-two million,” hunters protect deer so they can continue to hunt them and keep the population strong and healthy. Waterfowl hunters fight to maintain habitat where ducks and geese can live and thrive in their area. This fact demonstrates the...... half of the paper......ber 17, 2008. http://www.consumerfreedom.com (accessed November 24, 2013).Evans, Kim Masters. Animal rights. Farmington Hills: Thomson Gale, 2006.Halls, Lowell K. Deer and Management. Harrisburg: Stackpole Books, 1984. Hunters vs. PETA. http://www.huntersagainstpeta.com (accessed November 24, 2013). Patterson, Charles. Animal rights. Hillside: Enslow Publishers, 1993. PETA Test Kills. http://www.petakillsanimals.com (accessed 24 November 2013). Samuel, Dr. Dave. Why we need hunters. 11 November 2009. http://www.bowhunting.net (accessed 5 December 2013). Scheffer, Victor B. A Voice For Wildlife. Bern Convention, 1974. The fur industry. http://www.peta.org (accessed November 22, 2013). Why We Need Hunting. http://www.commonsenseforanimals.org (accessed 5 December 2013). Wilhite, Mike. “Call hunters and predators.” What is the damage?, 2010: 20-25.