Extreme Huntress Rebecca Francis targeted online for hunting pictures

SHE’S killed moose, giraffes, lynxes and more, posing with a beaming smile next to animal carcasses. But now she’s the target of death threats.

“I would hunt you. You’re a disgrace to the human race” ... “May you die a lonely, horrible death” ... “That horrible monster needs to be caged and medicated” ... “I hope she goes after a bear next and it rips her face off.”

Those words were directed overnight at Rebecca Francis, a professional “huntress” dubbed by one of her detractors as “The Death Angel”.

Comedian Ricky Gervais got the ball rolling on Twitter when he posted the photograph of Ms Francis next to a dead giraffe. He wrote: “What must've happened to you in your life to make you want to kill a beautiful animal then lie next to it smiling?” Others quickly followed.

What must've happened to you in your life to make you want to kill a beautiful animal & then lie next to it smiling? pic.twitter.com/DyYw1T5ck2

— Ricky Gervais (@rickygervais) April 13, 2015

One user called her an “Evil f**king b**ch”. Another suggested she get hit by lightning. Twice.

Francis, who grew up in Utah and in 2010 won a US-based reality television show competition called Extreme Huntress, says she learned to hunt from an early age and wants to “share my passion with everyone, especially other women”.

On her website she boasts of fulfilling her dream of completing the Grand Slam of North America by shooting dead every subspecies of sheep with a bow and arrow.

But she has killed far bigger animals.

Rebecca Francis.

The ‘Extreme Huntress’.

“The animals I have taken with a bow include: a 10-1/2 foot brown bear, black bear, shiras moose, Alaskan moose, dall sheep, stone sheep, desert bighorn ram, rocky mountain bighorn ram, mule deer, whitetail deer, elk, mountain goat, antelope, arapawa ram, kudu, zebra, black wildebeest, giraffe, springbuck, blesbuck, lynx, badger, and squirrel. I have also taken many of the same species and more with a rifle.”

Her Facebook page features images of her standing on the carcasses of moose and pulling back the upper lip of a dead lion. She is always smiling, much to the disgust of many who come across her images.

She uses social media to get others involved in hunting but Facebook and Twitter and Instagram also expose her to people who want to see her suffer for the suffering she inflicts.

Rebecca Francis with a dead lion.

She is not the first woman to feel the wrath of social media for posing with her kills.

A petition was set up in 2013 to have trophy hunter Melissa Backman pulled from the National Geographic program Ultimate Survivor Alaska. The petition received more than 13,000 signatures and the NY Daily News reported controversy over her hunting style led to Bachman’s removal from the show.

Australian Extreme Huntress competitor Christie Pisani also poses with dead animals. The 30-year-old, who writes a column called “Babes and Bows” for Bowhunting Downunder magazine, said hunters often got a bad wrap for “just shooting animals” but hunting was more than that.

“I guess people hate what they don’t understand and that’s the biggest struggle,” Pisani told the Mt Druitt Standard.

“It might sound funny for people to hear but hunters and outdoors people probably have the biggest vested interests in protecting our environment for future generations to enjoy.”

Ms Pisani came to the defence of former Australian cricket great Glenn McGrath when pictures emerged of him posing with a dead elephant and holding a rifle during a 2008 African safari trip.

Christie Pisani with one of her kills.

McGrath apologised and said the photographs were “highly inappropriate” but Ms Pisani said he need not apologise.

“Glenn should not have to justify nor apologise for hunting African animals,” she told news.com.au.

“Having been in the public eye myself while participating in completely legal and ethical hunting activities, I, like many others, have endured very personal attacks by ‘anti-hunters’. These attacks are often violent — completely contradictory to the values of care and gentleness that these people claim to uphold.”

A spokeswoman for PETA said: “I recommend she gets a camera and shoots pictures, not animals”.

But Ms Pisani and Ms Francis will continue hunting, despite the attacks.

“I believe that you should live life to the fullest with no regrets, and push yourself to the limit,” Ms Francis says on her website.

“If you don’t experience everything you can in life, you’ll miss out on some irreplaceable memories. Life is so short and so wonderful that I don’t want to miss out on a single second.”

Glenn McGrath said it was “highly inappropriate” to pose with the dead elephant.