The Lion is the most dominant predator within it's environment meaning that other animals pose little or no threat to them, with the exception of Hyena packs that can cause fatal damages to Lions particularly when they are on their own and food is about. Lions are seen as a great threat by many other species including both Giraffes and Elephants which are easily capable of fatally injuring a Lion to try and warn it off. The biggest threat to Lions though is people who not only kill them out of fear (and historically as trophies), but have caused severe declines in Lion population numbers due to growing Human settlements and the clearing of land for agriculture. Lion numbers have also been severely affected by diseases passed through Hyenas from Wild Dogs, with more than 1,000 Lions having died from canine distemper between 1993 and 1997.