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breamfisher
Posts: 14,124 Senior Member
African Driven Hunt Protested
breamfisher
Posts: 14,124 Senior Member
This could fall into a few different forums in my mind.
Protesters in South Africa have protested a driven hunt, where "drivers" or "beaters" are used to scare animals and cause them to move into the hunter's firing line.
I know folks in some areas of the US do driven hunts: I think Michigan is one area where they traditionally do this? Anyway, it's interesting to me, because hunters are protesting it because it's "unsporting" while to others it's just what they do. Kinda demonstrates that what's ethical can be determined both personally and culturally. I know in some areas here in FL we use dogs to drive the deer to the hunter, and it's considered ethical. In other areas that sort of thing will get you shot/skinned. Likewise if we had a deer drive here, you'd get looked at weird. Some places don't have problems with deer bait stations, others you're regarded as slightly lower than a communist if you do that.
Kinda helps illustrate what I've said for a while: ethics are a personal thing. Dependent as much on culture and location as anything else.
http://www.grindtv.com/wildlife/driven-hunt-in-south-africa-stirs-more-hunting-controversy/#Mw8zhXCcm0B4H07o.97
Protesters in South Africa have protested a driven hunt, where "drivers" or "beaters" are used to scare animals and cause them to move into the hunter's firing line.
I know folks in some areas of the US do driven hunts: I think Michigan is one area where they traditionally do this? Anyway, it's interesting to me, because hunters are protesting it because it's "unsporting" while to others it's just what they do. Kinda demonstrates that what's ethical can be determined both personally and culturally. I know in some areas here in FL we use dogs to drive the deer to the hunter, and it's considered ethical. In other areas that sort of thing will get you shot/skinned. Likewise if we had a deer drive here, you'd get looked at weird. Some places don't have problems with deer bait stations, others you're regarded as slightly lower than a communist if you do that.
Kinda helps illustrate what I've said for a while: ethics are a personal thing. Dependent as much on culture and location as anything else.
http://www.grindtv.com/wildlife/driven-hunt-in-south-africa-stirs-more-hunting-controversy/#Mw8zhXCcm0B4H07o.97
Meh.
Replies
Words of wisdom from Big Chief: Flush twice, it's a long way to the Mess Hall
I'd rather have my sister work in a whorehouse than own another Taurus!
This last group is the one that government originally tried to control, and the other two groups didn't complain much, because they despised this type just as much as the animal lovers. But, government being government, they soon wanted to control every aspect of hunting, and politicians discovered that they could appeal to large numbers of city dwellers by lumping all hunters into the same category. Soon, they figured out how to create statistics, by pretending that they knew how many animals of a specific kind were in existence. They sold this to the public by demonstrating some easy successes, where it was actually possible, and ignoring the failures where it was completely impossible. Their samplings became hard science in the eyes of the intellectual elites, and over time, were embraced by cat and dog lovers everywhere.
Once this funny joke was sold to the public at large, it then became a simple matter of creating the necessary facts to outrage animal lovers of every stripe, and convince them that hunters killed more animals than starvation and disease. So, then, the framework was in place, whereby they could make hunting rules based on the percentage of animals that could be "harvested," without danger of wiping out the species. Even then, most hunters willingly obeyed the laws, because most hunters are law-abiding people, and they too wanted the various game species to survive.
Fast-forward to now, when hunting laws are decided upon by non-hunters who were raised on the infallibility of government statistics. Some species are still declining in numbers, and some have burst out of control. There are less hunters than ever before, yet the numbers still fluctuate dramatically. Hunting, like most other rights and privileges, are governed by bureaucrats who receive statistics provided by government sponsored scientists who know the answers ahead of time, and where to collect the data to prove them.
Honestly, I don't know what the best way would be to regulate hunting, or even whether it is necessary. I just personally believe that the current system is governed too much by politics, and that the science is too contrived.
-Mikhail Kalashnikov
I get and approve of the whole "fair chase" mindset, but drive hunting is how humans got where we are. No, it isn't usually necessary for survival anymore, but anyone calling it "unethical" would do well to study anthropology and their own hypocrisy issues. They owe their ability to drive that Prius to people who did everything it took to survive.
"Nothing is safe from stupid." - Zee
It's legal in some counties in East Texas in the Big Thicket. If not, hardly any deer would be killed until their numbers were so high that a portion of their population was forced out of the thicket. By then many would begin to die from disease.
Son that's somebody with nothing to do with his time but keep me in trouble with mom.
And all that low brush would make conventional hunting methods pretty unproductive. Drivers/beaters to flush out the game was probably the only viable choice. The hunt was sanctioned by the government, so it was legal.
Was it ethical? There are hunting methods that meet the needs of the local area. I don't know Texas well, but have been there to quite a few areas. Hunting at game feeders in some places is the only way you'll see any game in that thick brush. And the forests in East Texas make normal hunting methods unproductive. In FL, dogs are used to run deer as well as hogs, and hunting from swamp buggies is done for both. If you've never hunted either place, you have no idea of the problems.
In TN bears and hogs are mostly hunted with dogs to drive them to the hunter or tree the bear. Dogs bay the hogs so the hunter can run to the dogs and kill the hog. Only way you'll generally see a black bear outside a campground in the mountains is to push them with dogs. Baiting isn't legal and just sitting up a stand in a likely place is a good way to read 'War and Peace' undisturbed. Bears and hogs like laurel thickets in the TN mountains, and if you have never tried to crawl through one then you have no idea of the problems hunting hogs and bears in the mountains of TN in the wildlife management areas.
Hunting methods vary from state to state, and areas within a state, due to the terrain and cover in the area. Dismissing methods as unethical is close minded when the person hasn't actually seen first hand the reasons for the methods.
And like Big Slug said, our ancestors had no problem using fire and the terrain to drive large groups of animals to their death. Judging our small high fenced areas to the huge fenced areas in South Africa is a mental trap.
― Douglas Adams
I hear that from a lot of people that have zero experience with high fence game ranches. I have been blessed with being able to participate on a cull hunt on one of the biggest game ranches in Texas. Even in that situation, it was not a "given" that I wouuld find one of the cull does. One of my best fiends worked on that ranch as a guide, and had lots of stories of unsucessful hunts. A high fenced 200 acre lot can hide a LOTof deer, and the deer are really good at hiding.
The high fence is more about keeping the good genes in, and the bad genes out than making it easy for some rich slob to waddle out and shoot a monster deer.
-Mikhail Kalashnikov
Bear? I finally got to experience that. When I was up there, it was bait only for the first five days. After that, you can use dogs. When I went to the bear hunting clinic put on by the Michigan DNR, those were the only two options even remotely considered-- bait and dogs. The clinic was presented by state biologists and conservation officers. Stalking and waiting along a trail hoping one would show up were not even considered, and after experiencing a Michigan bear hunt first hand, would be a fool's errand.
If anyone wants to say that hunting over bait or with dogs is unethical, they should strongly reconsider. And if anyone wants to say I didn't "hunt" or work for my bear can go piss up a rope. I will go into more detail on bait and dog hunting later (with photos). I am a bit too involved in butchering my bear at the moment to write it all up.
4 does broke cover near me and I shot one with buckshot. My first deer.
I agree that high fence hunting ain't easy........depending on the size of the place. The places I cull at are HUGE!!!! But, they are also broken up into "sections", which are large in their own right. Larger than any plot of private land I ever grew up hunting on.
Then..........there are "Game Ranches". That are stocked and shot on a revolving basis. Density so high......there is no underbrush. Walk around until you see the animal you want........shoot.........pat yourself on the back......take pics.........and post your "success" on a handgun hunting forum because you are just......that......good.
No thanks. That ain't for me. Others can have at it.
:tooth:
The last type you mentioned Zee, were the kind I was referring to. High fences and minimal acreage. There is an Elk farm/ranch in Idaho along the border with Wyoming that always has escapees. A tree falls on the fence...etc. No matter how well you fence animals in, they'll always be ones that escape. In the case of the Elk, they polluted the wild gene pool. Game farms are just plain wrong. Easy hunt or hard, they're the reason for all the CWD all around the country.
One of those times I was still hunting when a dog ran by with its nose to the ground. About a minute later, here comes a guy carrying a shotgun trying his best to keep up. Needless to say, we didn't stop and chat. Also, in that county, at that time, hunting with dogs was illegal. I opted not to mention that to him. After all, he was carrying a shotgun.
I hunted that area for several years, and never saw a single deer, even though sign was plentiful. I do remember walking down an abandoned logging road once when a big, black cow ran out of a small copse of brush. It was about 20 yards away when it ran, and I doubt I would have seen it if it had not moved. I remember thinking to myself that if I couldn't even see a cow hidden in the brush, how in the heck did I expect to see a deer.
I've done most of my hunting in fairly open country, and seeing an animal further away than I like to shoot is not uncommon. If I have learned anything in my years, it's that you need to adapt your hunting method to the terrain. That's about as ethical as I know to be.
Gun control laws make about as much sense as taking ex-lax to cure a cough.