Explaining hunting to non-hunters

[Curmudgeon]

Thanks everyone for staying on-topic.

 

As I said earlier, the meat argument is one of many. For birds the time-spent-for-food cost-benefit equation may not be as good as deer but that is not the point. Just because my family can feed 7 or 8 families in one weekend of the southern zone doesn't mean many of the same crew don't spend days in the Dacks chasing ghosts.

 

Beyond meat, the conservation argument is valid with some but many non/anti-hunters don't buy it. I have heard it called "self serving". The birding community worked quite hard to get a Pittman-Robertson type program in place for bird related stuff - binoculars, scopes, feeders etc.? They don't like that much of the money for conservation only comes from hunters. They feel they lack influence since they are not contributing in the same way. That effort failed.

 

Another argument that resounds with people who like wildlife and plants is overpopulation. This is not a concern about deer starving. I'm not sure how strong an argument that is since many of those deer starve because they can't move. It is also sounds to some like "I chose to kill it because I was concerned it might die". The overpopulation concern I'm talking about is the destruction of habitat. This should be obvious to anyone with a most basic understanding of the plants. Note - unlike our native plants - most of our invasives are not palatable to deer. That is why they are so invasive Also, many bird species depend on the understory. An understory that requires native plants for shelter and food - berries/seeds and insects that eat natives but not invasives.

 

Beyond deer, the explosion in snow geese numbers has them destroying their nesting habitat in the north. They have benefited from agriculture. When they destroy the vegetation of the tundra, they affect a host of species.  The sedentary geese (those that nest in NY) are another problem. They don't belong here. Historically, Canada Geese only nested in Canada. They directly impact the lives of golfers everywhere. They foul lakes and ponds.

 

Elmo - I liked your long post but I'm going pick nits. Calculating the amount of land required for vegetarianism is complicated. It would require converting all the land used to raise grain for livestock feed to food for humans. Feeding grain to cattle is terribly inefficient. It also requires large amounts of water - an increasingly scarce resource in some areas.

 

An aside - Feeding grass to ungulates is much preferable to grain, resulting in meat that is much healthier (Omega 3 vs. Omega 6 fats). "Grass fed" is all the rage but the buyer needs to beware. It needs to be done right or you will be eating meat that resembles shoe leather. Any animal that was just grazed is not going to be good eating. Grass fed meat - when it is done well - is as good as grain fed. The animals need to be finished on premium pasture.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited June 12, 2015 by Curmudgeon

[phade]

Grass fed beef...had it a few times and can't say I like it. Again as you noted the prep is different and probably not done as correctly due to unfamiliarity.

[scolopaxmatt]

I dont know about that. The average buck yields 50 pounds of meat, and that is if your shot is perfect, a little off and subtract ten pounds. We kill a lot of snow geese and Canada geese, but even the mourning doves add up. 

 

Regarding  the pheasant, grouse and woodcock we get many meals each year. 

 

50 pounds!?  I would have thought more than that.  Having never taken a deer I wouldn't know, but those are some big mammals. 

 

Geese certainly go a long way and a mixed freezer of game birds keeps me away from the supermarket as well, at least until the meat runs out.  But I surely wouldn't like to have to rely solely on my shooting for foodstuffs.

[Elmo]

I think people need to realize when discussing hunting to no-hunting, your goal isn't necessarily about telling them why you really hunt but rather convincing them the values and benefits of hunting. Fine you don't hunt for meat...but they don't need to know that right away.

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[mike rossi]

50 pounds!?  I would have thought more than that.  Having never taken a deer I wouldn't know, but those are some big mammals. 

 

Geese certainly go a long way and a mixed freezer of game birds keeps me away from the supermarket as well, at least until the meat runs out.  But I surely wouldn't like to have to rely solely on my shooting for foodstuffs.

 

We are getting off topic here, but geese aside, we (me and my wife) get well over 50 pounds of mallard, wood duck, pheasant, grouse, and woodcock. Our worst year on doves was around 100, and that alone would yield about 11 pounds of meat. Last month, one jake turkey, plucked and dressed whole, including the wings and legs, fed me and my wife for a week. 

[growalot]

OK so my last post...was partially written by the Kindle... But  Think you can get what I meant.

[mike rossi]

If I am to be honest, I have to say that if you have a plate of venison on the table along side of a plate of greasy, drippy beef homburgs, I'll grab the burger everytime. So I don't hunt for the meat. Sure, I eat what I kill, but that is not the reason that I go out and freeze myself for hours on stand. When I am interested in meat, I head out to my favorite restaurant or supermarket, not to a tree stand.

 

You will change your mind when I take you duck hunting. Bello is coming with us, he wants to try out his new crossbow. 

[Five Seasons]

That's where I disagree. I find that justifying it with meat hunting opens the door and lowers their defense and then they become more willing to learn more about hunting. You can win a lot over this way. Those who still oppose it even after the meat hunting argument,...well, they're a lost cause and you'll never win those over.

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The first response out of my mouth is almost always "I eat everything I hunt". The discussion becomes much less argumentative from then on. Now I have nothing against predator hunting or trapping. I just don't do it myself. So MY arguments and discussion around hunting is heavily weighted on the meat argument.

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[Uncle Nicky]

I think people need to realize when discussing hunting to no-hunting, your goal isn't necessarily about telling them why you really hunt but rather convincing them the values and benefits of hunting. Fine you don't hunt for meat...but they don't need to know that right away.

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Just my experience...but most of the corporate types & suburbanites I live near always seem to have this mental image that we are sadists, who enjoy killing everything we see to satisfy a blood-lust, almost as if hunting is a real-life shoot-em-up video game. Every time I get a little stress at work, I'll get some some snide comment like "Leave Uncle Nicky alone, he owns guns" or something to that effect. When I explain to them that the time I spend in the woods does not have to necessarily involve killing something or even bringing meat home, I see the gears start to spin in their head, as if the stereotype isn't really true after all...

[Curmudgeon]

Thinking more about Mike's post on photographing turtles, photography and bird watching are hunting without the killing and eating. I've found a very high percentage of hawk counters to be hunters, or former hunters. These people spend a full day on a mountain counting whatever raptors fly by. Often that mean none since the activity is very weather dependent. A full day outside waiting for something that never came. Sometimes it's freezing cold. Sound familiar?

 

Bird banders are certainly hunters. I've spent time in a blind with raptor trappers. It's hunting. You see the bird. Is it coming to the bait? Why doesn't it come down out of that tree? Does it sense something different? The real trap - not the mock-up - is in place. It's at the bait. Why won't it move into position for a shot? Why won't it look away from the net launcher? Sound familiar?

 

The primal need is still being filled.

[Doc]

Thinking more about Mike's post on photographing turtles, photography and bird watching are hunting without the killing and eating. I've found a very high percentage of hawk counters to be hunters, or former hunters. These people spend a full day on a mountain counting whatever raptors fly by. Often that mean none since the activity is very weather dependent. A full day outside waiting for something that never came. Sometimes it's freezing cold. Sound familiar?

 

Bird banders are certainly hunters. I've spent time in a blind with raptor trappers. It's hunting. You see the bird. Is it coming to the bait? Why doesn't it come down out of that tree? Does it sense something different? The real trap - not the mock-up - is in place. It's at the bait. Why won't it move into position for a shot? Why won't it look away from the net launcher? Sound familiar?

 

The primal need is still being filled.

That is hunting with all the tactics, strategy, and challenge and all the other aspects of hunting except the killing and eating. And I'm sure it results in all the same emotions and satisfactions of hunting, when things go right, and the same levels of disappointments when things go bad. No food motives at all. It is a good indicator that there is a lot more to this hunting stuff than simply food gathering.

[mike rossi]

Whether conservation volunteers or students, once arrived at the point they can see hunting is exciting for reasons other than some so-called blood lust then what?

 

You do not automatically have a hunter. Some will say "I can do all that without killing".

 

First of all it is not possible or desirable for EVERYONE to hunt, but the goal is to get the public majority to accept hunting without necessarily participating in it. 

 

I would settle for an agreement that the claim hunting is easy, or blood lust is false.... I would also point out the excitement the non hunter felt has been inferred by anti hunting organizations as a trait in common with serial killers. I would ask if they consider themselves to have the same tendencies as serial killers because of the excitement they felt....

 

However, if I could get more than the above agreement, I might try this..... I would ask (not assume) if they celebrate Thanksgiving with a meat dish. I would suggest that for just ONE meal they harvest their own wild game for the next Thanksgiving. Yes, go through it all to get a hunting license and all else and obtain Thanksgiving meat from hunting. Make it clear you do not necessarily mean go out on the morning of the holiday and obtain meat that very day as the story goes... But start legal hunting anytime before the day for meat. 

 

You can suggest that the person would be proving his own meat for just ONE day - what could be wrong with that? In other words, if you already eat meat, especially on Thanksgiving, why not provide your own just ONE time? 

 

[Curmudgeon]

If there is anyone on this site who has not read The Omnivores Dilemma, I urge them to do so.

 

Literally, the omnivores dilemma is - what am I going to eat? The author learns to hunt to provide himself with a meal he acquired by himself - without shopping.

[EspressoBuzz]

If there is anyone on this site who has not read The Omnivores Dilemma, I urge them to do so.

 

Literally, the omnivores dilemma is - what am I going to eat? The author learns to hunt to provide himself with a meal he acquired by himself - without shopping.

 

I was just about to suggest that book and his follow up book "Cooked" which delves a little deeper into the anthropological reasons we treat food like we do.

 

The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals Hardcover, In Defense of Food, Cooked, all by Michael Pollan

 

[nyantler]

I believe the main difference between a hunter and a photographer would be that the hunter plays an active role in conservation... not just in his contributions through the purchasing of his license, but in other things such as upkeep of habitat, population control, etc. Hunting may not be for everyone but hunting builds an awareness of wildlife that can be missed by other ways of enjoying wildlife. Not to mention... I enjoy can enjoy both hunting and photographing wildlife... double the fun. I think it's like the old adage, " If I have to explain... you wouldn't understand."

[Elmo]

Omnivores Dilemma is a great book. Another good one is "A Mindful Carnivore: A Vegetarians Hunt For Sustenance" by Tovar Cerulli. Is a vegetarians account on trying to become self sustaining and discovering that he couldn't entirely avoid killing animals while growing his own food so he eventually became a hunter.

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[b79holmes]

"Mr. Outdoor Writer, isn't it wrong to kill things?".

 

 

 

I prefer "Conservation does not mean 'nothing ever dies' ".  It is how the planet works.

 

Now before you get all "Molon Labe" on me, I find a more low key logical comment much better than a more inflamatory one.  Vegans may not like my statement either but they can't argue with Mother Nature.  "Humans are a part of the enviroment and not separate from it or looking at it from the outside" and you can now wrap them up in a bow.

 

Bill

[Curmudgeon]

 

 "Humans are a part of the enviroment and not separate from it or looking at it from the outside"

 

Yes. How else could it be? I've had arguments with urban anti-hunters who think that food comes from the grocery store.

 

[mike rossi]

Yes. How else could it be? I've had arguments with urban anti-hunters who think that food comes from the grocery store.

 

 

Heads up on that one though.... The rebuttal is evolving fast. The antis response to the food argument is that some cultures eat dogs, cats, and even other humans..... You tube can be the hunter's friend or enemy and there are many videos that do not bode well for us showing people outside the US eating live crustaceans and other cultural customs that are a hard sell.... 

[Curmudgeon]

Heads up on that one though.... The rebuttal is evolving fast. The antis response to the food argument is that some cultures eat dogs, cats, and even other humans..... You tube can be the hunter's friend or enemy and there are many videos that do not bode well for us showing people outside the US eating live crustaceans and other cultural customs that are a hard sell.... 

 

Right - someone can believe that eating horses is anathema but they sold it in stores when my parents were young. My father's family ate it during the war. Cultural habits change.

 

Beyond the cultural differences, my pet peeve is people who have no clue that agriculture has impacts, huge impacts. While living in a city lowers your individual impact on the environment, cities are sinks for the environmental services/impacts of the rural world. Anyone who thinks they have no responsibility for those impacts, is no better than the meat eater who thinks they have no responsibility for the death of an animal because the steak came wrapped in plastic.

 

Even vegetarians have responsibility. Do they eat palm oil? Is their food grown on almost sterile lava flows in green houses heated with geothermal energy as in Iceland? Not that the Icelanders have a clean conscious........................

 

I'm extra curmudgeonly this morning. Sorry.

[LI OUTDOORSMAN]

I like to hunt...I like to eat what I kill...But I really like to hunt whether I'm eating it or skinning it and saving the pelt..I dont tresspass or poach and never forced anyone to hunt with me against their will..I like to hunt with all types of implements..guns,bows,crossbows,,etc...I like hunting alone and also with my family and friends.Do I REALLY HAVE to explain why I hunt to anyone?

Did Mike Tyson have to explain why he wanted to be a fighter?. does anybody ask Michael Jordan why he played basketball?..Why do some guys really like golf?..My dad plays golf...I have many good friends that golf..I dont see the appeall...but I dont try to stop them or ask them why they like it....

I guess I get a certain thrill from being in the outdoors and chasing game that I really cant and really dont feel the need to explain..

 

[Curmudgeon]

You don't need to explain anything to anyone. However, I think you are naive if you believe what others think does not affect you. Hunter numbers are dropping. Therefore, we are losing political power.

 

Anti-hunters have significant influence with legislators - especially in urban areas. This can ultimately affect our ability to do what we want - whether that is enjoying a pastime, providing food for our family, managing over-populations of deer/geese/whatever.  Anti-hunters apparently see recreational hunting as a primitive pleasure for blood thirsty atavists. Hunting is at risk from organizations such as HSUS. If not all hunting - since deer numbers are out of control in some areas - then certain types of hunting.

 

The other activities you mentioned are competitive sports between willing participants with roughly equal tools. The argument, the analogy, doesn't work. An anti-hunter would easily see the power imbalance between someone with a high powered rifle and an "innocent animal".

[Five Seasons]

 

Did Mike Tyson have to explain why he wanted to be a fighter?.

 

no, just why he pushed woman down the stairs

[EspressoBuzz]

Of the many things I believe is harming hunting or hunting's image are modern American food companies and industrial farm practices. Food companies sell you an image of the perfect farm on the box but have nothing near that in reality. The uniform blandness of industrially raised proteins combined with the lost of heritage varieties of fruits and vegetables is damaging our health, the environment and creating a generation that does not make the connection between the land and sea and and our food supply. All these things combine to lessen the appreciation of wild foraged food, hunted or gathered. Obviously this is more prevalent in the cities than in the countryside but even in small town America you can find many who only know of a rabbit or guinea pig as a pet and not the domesticated food source it was and is still today. Mushroom hunters don't mind when people politely refuse an offering of wild gathered mushrooms (out of fear the gatherer did not know his stuff) since it means more for us! But we all know that look and hear that voice inside us saying "you don't know what your missing".

 

Hunting will mean something different to everyone, but at it's most basic level hunting is a way to connect with something primal and not quite explainable in all of us.

[mike rossi]

Right - someone can believe that eating horses is anathema but they sold it in stores when my parents were young. My father's family ate it during the war. Cultural habits change.

 

Beyond the cultural differences, my pet peeve is people who have no clue that agriculture has impacts, huge impacts. While living in a city lowers your individual impact on the environment, cities are sinks for the environmental services/impacts of the rural world. Anyone who thinks they have no responsibility for those impacts, is no better than the meat eater who thinks they have no responsibility for the death of an animal because the steak came wrapped in plastic.

 

Even vegetarians have responsibility. Do they eat palm oil? Is their food grown on almost sterile lava flows in green houses heated with geothermal energy as in Iceland? Not that the Icelanders have a clean conscious........................

 

I'm extra curmudgeonly this morning. Sorry.

 

You have to look at the ongoing drought right now. Native wildlife will persist with natural or even aggravated drought cycles. This resource is protein out there drought or not. Everything we grow or raise consumes water.... Its like back to basics. May not be enough native wildlife to feed the county - cause we ourselves are overpopulated, but the concept holds.... Plus, it takes less water to raise a pound of beef protein than veggie protein.. A lot of wholes in the veggie argument. Even the carbon argument they make is far from dead on....