Hunting - What's the attraction?

[le Voyageur]

I hunt. The differance is, is that it allows me to touch base with my roots, to be a part of something that has longed past, to walk in quite woods with the spirit of my ancestors. I also hunt to put on food the table, and often, to put food on a neighbor's table.

 

Often times hours are spent tracking, stalking and manuevering for the best shot. Getting close quietly is a must, a single shot musket allows for only one shot that must be true to allow death to come quickly.

 

Hunting is truth, and is more honest and honorable than the proxy killing that puts hamburgers, steaks, chickens, and pork products on the dinner table. It forces us to honor life, all life. Not to be wasteful, to take only what can be used......

[Prairie_Scouter]

Thanks, le Voyageur, for an excellent post and thought.

 

And, for the record, when I started this thread, I wasn't looking to anyone to "justify" why they hunt. I was just interested, like I said, in the attraction to the sport. Thanks to all those who gave it a "shot".

[SemperParatus]

from today's local paper...

 

 

 

Boy Scouts council opens woodland to hunters

 

For the first time since Harry S. Truman was president, hunters are taking their weapons into a 1,700-acre section of woodland just outside the little town of Dublin in search of deer.

 

The Baltimore Area Council of the Boy Scouts of America has opened its Broad Creek Memorial Scout Reservation in northeastern Harford County to hunters in an attempt to control an exploding deer population.

 

"It's the first time since 1948 that hunting has been allowed," said Reed Blom, director of support services for the Boy Scouts council. "Neighbors have been pleading with us to do something about the deer population."

 

The deer have been damaging small trees on the property and neighboring farmers' crops, Blom said.

 

After deciding to open the campground to hunting, the council sent letters to eight local hunting clubs, inviting them to bid for the rights to the property.

 

He said the council met with representatives of the clubs to explain the bidding and the ground rules, which included a 10-person limit for a hunting outing.

 

"We limited it because we didn't want people running all over the property," Blom said.

 

The campground - bordered roughly by Whiteford Road, Castleton Road, Peach Orchard Road, Susquehanna Hall Road, Flintstone Road and Paddrick Road - surrounds a 50-acre lake and draws about 4,500 Scouts each week during the summer.

 

"We don't want to wipe out the deer population," he said. "We only want to control it."

 

Karina Blizzard, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Natural Resources, said each hunter could kill as many as six antlered deer and 30 antlerless deer during the hunting season, which runs from Sept. 15 to the end of January.

 

She said the rules require that two female deer must be taken before a second male is pursued.

 

Blom declined to identify the club that was awarded hunting rights to the property or the value of its winning bid.

 

"That's corporate business," he said.

 

He disclosed that the winning club did not necessarily submit the highest bid. There were other factors besides money, he said.

 

"We asked the groups what they could bring to the property, if they could help us with programs," he said.

 

He said the winning group agreed to put new roofs on two buildings and do other work on the property.

 

Rules established by the Boy Scouts prohibit hunting on weekends. There are also "blackout days," such as the Friday after Thanksgiving, when no hunting is allowed.

 

Blom said hunters also must follow DNR hunting regulations, which establish seasons for bow hunting and for shotguns. No rifle hunting is allowed. Blizzard said deer hunting with rifles is prohibited in the area because it is too close to population centers. Rifle bullets travel farther than the slugs used in shotguns, she said.

 

She said that the muzzleloader season also applies to the Boy Scouts camp property.

 

The senior ranger at the campground has received only two complaints about the hunting, Blom said.

 

"We have received a lot more compliments from people living in the area," he said.

 

It has not been determined whether hunting will be allowed on the property next year. It will depend on the size of the deer population and the amount of damage they do, Blom said.

 

 

[Prairie_Scouter]

Sounds like a fairly responsible way of managing the resources.

[scoutingagain]

I was searching Council camps that might offer winter camping when I found the Danial Webster Council's Camp Bell. Camp Bell apparently offers a camping experience designed around turn of the century scouting, around 1910. One of the activity areas under their mountain man program is described as:

 

Hunting

The archer hunts for his food, and patrols that participate in the hunting day will have the opportunity to earn the merit badge. An action archery course provides opportunities to hunt deer, bear, and wild foul in the deep woods. Practice on targets to develop accuracy.

 

http://www.dwcbsa.org/camps/CampBell/progarea.htm

 

Has anyone heard of this program or attended? I'm neither pro or con hunting, just have never heard of a scout camp offering hunting as an activity.

 

SA

 

[Venividi]

Am wrapping up my first hunting season ever - at 49. Had some friends looking for a place to hunt geese. I have access to my father's farm. So I went with them. It was a chance to reconnect with the beauty of the land - which is vanishing quickly - two adjacent farms are owned by developers, a third purchased by the city of Elgin, IL for a park.

 

I did not get one bird. Didn't care. Saw lots of Canada geese, ducks, doves, pigeons, blue jays, sandhill cranes, etc. Saw some snow geese for the first time. I would not have been spending the amount of time there had I not had an objective. Photography - I great reason to get outside. So is hunting. Around here, geese are a problem because of the ideal environment that the encroaching urban areas provide for them to live. Canada geese were rare around here 30 years ago.

[Prairie_Scouter]

Venividi,

Did you see the news about those morons in the north suburbs who got out on their snowmobiles last week and ran down a couple of dozen Canada geese? If I remember correctly, Canada geese are protected, so at least if they get caught they'll hopefully spend some time in the slammer.

 

Enjoying our Midwest winter?

[Fishsqueezer]

As a practicing fisheries biologist and a trained wildlife biologist I have read this thread with great interest. From what I read, those that do not hunt cannot understand why someone would want to kill an animal while those that do hunt(me included) find it very difficult to explain why it is such an important part of the experience. I will try to explain some of my thoughts.

 

I have noted a lot of discussion about "modern weapons" and how they take the fair chase out of the hunt. The assumption is that with these new weapons the animals don't have a chance. If you review success rates for most species that are hunted (at least for those in the mountain states) you will see success rates of about 20%. Essentially an elk hunter will get an animal, on average, in one of every 5 years. If this was just for the kill then hunting livestock would be a much more practical act. The mere act of owning a modern firearm does not make one a successful hunter any more than owning a computer makes me a programmer. It is a skill that must be learned and developed and even then there are factors that can challenge you in the field - temperature changes, elevation changes, wind, branches, movement, fatigue, etc. There is no magic bullet you can fire into the woods that will hit your deer every time (though I am sure there are those who would buy it if it was ever invented).

 

There is also the fact that states do hire professionals to ensure that only a safe proportion of the population is allowed to be taken. As was mentioned earlier, every habitat has a carrying capacity. The allowable harvest is designed to keep the population near that capacity. As an analogy the harvestable population is like the interest on a trust fund. You can spend the interest without damaging the fund, but unlike a trust fund where kept interest makes things better, kept animals does not.

 

I don't remember who said it, but somebody mentioned just letting nature take its course and let the animals starve - that is natures way. You are right that nature is a cruel master and will use death to its fullest, but what cost are you willing to pay to allow nature to take its course? In prehuman days (or at least when the population was insignificant) nature operated in a intricate balance of population swings often referred to as an arms race between predators and prey. Neither population had the upper hand for long so there were very few dramatic population swings. If we are honest with ourselves we can no longer say that nature functions as it did before man. Like it or not, we have impacted the environment and there is no going back. We have what we have and we will have to do the best we can to keep from losing more. If we allow deer to overpopulate and starve we would lose the deer, but what else would we lose? We would permanently alter existing habitats through severe long-term, overgrazing. This would not just impact the deer. Our environment also includes many non-game animals, songbirds, fish, amphibians, reptiles, insects, flowers, shrubs, trees, etc. All would be impacted in a long negative cascade. Even the physical environment would change with altered erosion rates, water infiltration, changes in river and spring flows, fire regimes - all of which can impact far from the area where those starving animals are dying. I personally believe the loss of a few animals is small cost to pay when weighed against the risk of an entire ecosystem. If you doubt the potential impact you need only to delve into the scientific literature. If you have a profound knowledge of nature that has somehow been hidden from all those people that study nature for a living, I congratulate you and pray you will share your special knowledge with us. Science is based on fact. While you may personally disagree with the conclusions, I can promise that there has never been nor likely will ever be a biologist that wants to preside over the loss of a species or an environment. I have never had as a goal to have the worst fishing lakes in the state even though there are anglers that accuse me of such.

 

As far as the kill itself, I believe that the kill is neccesary because hunting is a whole package that involves much more than just the squeeze of the trigger. Hunting is a year-round activity. Most hunters don't just wake up one day and say "I'm going hunting today." Most plan and think about hunting throughout the year with much more thought the closer the season is. Hunting involves preparation, comraderie and teamwork, outdoor skills, weapons skills, patience, understanding of anatomy to gut the animal, etc. Each is intricately related to the other. Without the kill, have you really hunted? Were your woods skills good enough? Did you plan well enough? Are you a good enough marksman? You do not know until you pull the trigger or release the arrow. You can shoot a picture and get the shot of the animal, but did you really succeed? You got a fantastic picture, maybe one that can never be replicated, but it is still just a facsimile. The hunter knows instantly whether he was successful. It is not with joy that you pull the trigger - it is a recognized part of the whole that defines the activity itself. It is difficult to explain to someone who has not been there. If you have read Platos analogy of the people in the cave you may understand the difficulty.

 

The activity is one thing, but the desire comes from deeper within even though the need is no longer there. I believe hunting is based on an innate desire in many humans just as the well fed cat will still hunt songbirds in the yard. For the most part we are long separated from the need to hunt to obtain food, but we are not so far separated from that historic need. The human mind has taken him from the forest and helped him develop weapons and materials to improve his life. We are only hundreds of years removed from the forest while we have spent millenia with the need to obtain food. Even farming has been around only a small fraction of the time humans have been alive. The longer and farther humans are removed from nature, the weaker the innate need will be and hunting will gradually fade away or become some type of novelty for the rich. - that is unless we have some catastrophic change in the world that would suddenly make hunting a need again. Hopefully the latent genetic ability will still be there if that time ever comes. (I thought a doomsday ending would be a nice touch).

 

 

 

 

[Torveaux]

Canada Geese are protected?

 

It depends upon what you mean. Are they endangered or protected due to low numbers or anything like that? No. Not even close. They are protected because they are migratory waterfowl and overhunting in one state would affect the numbers in another state (state here being both a US and international term).

 

The geese are often also protected by the fact that they congregate in populated urban and suburban areas wherein it is illegal to hunt them.

 

Personally, I think local/state governments should be reducing the flocks in those areas through selective hunting by experts. The geese could be used to help feed the homeless/hungry in those urban areas. (the 'hunting'need not be via firearm, netting them would be acceptable for this type of reduction)

 

As for the snowmobilers, their actions were adolescent at best. Such actions are part of humanity at its worst.

[kittle]

I personally am not a hunter, but my husband and son are. I will try and tell you the attraction to them. My husband (who was a city kid til he met me) enjoys the meat. He has shot 2 buck in the 13 years that we have been married. One of which I will admit is mounted and hanging on our dining room wall. We have used every dear that he shot for meat. It helps to strectch our grocery budget since the meat only dosts $15 for the permit. We process our own, I could never see the sense in paying someone to process it. It my husband wants suausage, jerky or sticks made out of it, I can do it. Now that we own 40 acres, we can get free permits.

 

My son has never went deer hunting, but he doesn't own the right gauge gun. He wants to go next year. So, he will probably get a new gun for his birthday (12th). He does enjoy squirrel hunting. And whatever he kills, I cook for him the next day. It is also a time for him and dad to spend together.

[BrentAllen]

I hunt, and I'm also a member of PETA (People Eating Tasty Animals!). I started in college, deer and duck hunting. It was in my blood all along, it just took awhile to discover it.

I've been lucky enough to have the privilege of hunting in Africa, in Namibia. Yes, the heads of the trophies are on the wall (greater kudu, oryx, spring buck, red hartebeast, zebra). The four horned trophies all made the Safari Club International record book. The hunting industry in Africa is well regulated, probably more so than here. Most countries in Africa get a huge percentage of their revenue from foreign hunters, so they have to keep the herds healthy - protect the golden goose, if you will. Taking trophies usually means taking an older animal out of the herd. Nothing wrong with that, as there are plenty of young bucks waiting in the wings to take over mating duties. Yes, it is good PC to slam "trophy hunters" these days, but most don't know what they are talking about. In some countries or states, hunting laws require the head of the animal to be taken out last - all the other meat parts must be carried out first. This is to discourage the "slob hunters" from ruining everything for the rest of us.

The oryx made our best beef taste second-rate. I would have shot 10 of them, if I could have brought the meat back. Unfortunatly, the US does not allow any meat products into the country. But don't worry - nothing is wasted in Namibia! All the meat goes to feed the local natives in that poor country. And since they have so few natural resources, they find a way to use everything.

Those here who don't hunt and don't think they have ever killed anything - how many animals lost their habitat when your subdivision was built?

Which is worse - pulling the trigger yourself, or paying a mercenary to do it for you? At least that wild animal has a chance...

As to the part about pulling the trigger and how you feel. Imagine being in a tree stand since a half hour before dawn - for the third day in a row. It's freezing cold, and you hope your shivering doesn't tip off your location. The first two days, you saw nothing, not even a squirrel. This morning, just as the light starts to bring the forest into view, you see a deer, moving like a ghost. It doesn't make a sound, and is so cautious, you are afraid you will be spotted if you blink your eyes. Your heart starts pumping so hard, you know the deer is going to hear it. The excitment builds like nothing I've experienced. The deer comes closer, moving into range, and broadside. You raise your weapon so slowly, you don't think it will ever get into position. You are still shaking, but you don't even feel the cold now. You force yourself to settle down, and make the shot. At that split second, all the days, weeks or months of work have finally paid off - you feel a huge sense of exhilaration, almost as if you just hit a game-winning grand slam in game 7 of the World Series, but different. The deer in hunted areas become so ellusive, you wonder if you will ever get a shot at one. It is much different than photo safaris in areas that aren't hunted, where you see plenty of game. Once the animal is down, I thank God for the animal and realize the real work starts now - field dressing and getting the deer to the processor. Sure, an animal dies in the hunt, but he is going to die at some point. I guess all I can really say is hunting is in my blood. Robert Ruark is much more eloquent - check out "The Old Man And The Boy" for some great reading.

[Kudu]

I hunt, and I'm also a member of PETA (People Eating Tasty Animals!).

 

Most of us who are concerned with the ethical treatment of animals make a distinction between hunting and, say, the prolonged suffering caused by forcing food down the throats of geese and ducks with a funnel for months to enlarge their livers for foie gras.

 

Years ago, our politically incorrect "Red Skins Patrol" hunted when they went on Patrol campouts almost every week. Their favorite prey was rabbit, but often they had to settle for the fried squirrel they added to the Patrol's staple "Campbell's Pork & Beans."

 

They used homemade spears for hunting, and adopted from Baden-Powell's Scouting for Boys, the Australian aborigines' method of using a piece of wood as an extension of their forearms to increase the force of their hunting spears.

 

Kudu

[OldGreyEagle]

I hope at the very least they only hunted animals in season unless of course the orginal Baden-Powell program included blatant disregard for the law

[Kudu]

I hope at the very least they only hunted animals in season unless of course the original Baden-Powell program included blatant disregard for the law

 

I suppose it depends on what you mean by "the original Baden-Powell program" :-/

 

I believe Baden-Powell once drew a sketch of himself as a boy cooking a rabbit over a small fire in the "Copse," a wooded area near his Charterhouse School. He had to learn how to make these fires smokeless, because his presence in the Copse was a blatant disregard for the school rules.

 

One pair of sketches shows him hiding from one of the school's teachers behind the bushes in the Copse, with an identical sketch of him as an adult military scout hiding from his enemy seemingly behind the very same bushes.

 

Another one of his tricks at Charterhouse was to climb a tree when the teachers got too close, because they never looked up. He reportedly used the same trick behind enemy lines as an adult. He would later credit the skills he learned from evading the school authorities as the inspiration for rewriting his military book Aids to Scouting for N.C.O.s and Men, into Scouting for Boys.

 

Another hunting connection is that the first rough outline and notes for Aids to Scouting were written in the bush while Baden-Powell was "pig-sticking," a spearing sport for which he wrote in 1889 the definitive manual, Pigsticking or Hoghunting. Baden-Powell sent the final manuscript for Aids to Scouting out to his publisher in the very last mail packet to leave Mafeking before the siege that made him famous, and made Aids to Scouting a runaway best seller.

 

Perhaps because of his fame as a hunter, B-P recognized that boys can be needlessly cruel to animals, and the sixth point of his Scout Law is "A Scout is a friend to animals".

 

Hunting is still an option in the "Backwoodsman" Proficiency Badge of the UK Baden-Powell Scouting program:

 

"2. Know how to catch and skin a rabbit, or catch and clean a fish."

 

In the UK, rabbits are fair game all year.

 

Kudu

 

 

[OldGreyEagle]

thanks for the update on game laws in England, but I was addressing the Red Skins Patrol wont to cook rabbits.