Climbers and Guns....? Hunting this fall?

Eric wrote:

"I guess if management is BS in Washington, it logically follows that it is BS everywhere, so I will confidently post this non-sequitur on the internet"

There are hundreds of deer killed by cars in the Methow Valley here in WA each year, and yet there aren't enough to even fill a quarter of the tags sold.  Keep telling yourself that you're hunting for the greater good, not because you like to kill things.  Maybe it will be true someday.

Idaho Bob wrote: Both my father and grandfather were avid hunters.  For me, however, I do not get any type of satisfaction from killing  living creatures.  Yes, I've had to in a few situations, such as the rattlesnake that had a den in our front yard.  For those who just have to shoot guns, I wonder if something like small bore target shooting (on a competitive basis) could provide their "gun fix". 

I find it interesting that people equate hunting and shooting. These are two very different activities that use the same tools. Many hunters that I know do not enjoy shooting, and aren't particularly good marksmen. Many hunters enjoy hunting for the entire process, not just pulling the trigger or releasing the arrow. 

For me, I am a shooter who occasionally duck hunts (interesting note: when the birds are flying, you do alot of shooting!). I eat the birds I kill, and make dog treats out of the birds that I don't want to eat (coots...). I much prefer the fast paced competitive environments of USPSA and Multigun.

s.price wrote: The ignorance and sweeping generalizations about why some of us hunt are thick in this thread.

;)

s.price wrote: The ignorance and sweeping generalizations about why some of us hunt are thick in this thread.

The ignorance and sweeping generalizations about why some of us do anything that we do are thick on this website!

Idaho Bob wrote: Both my father and grandfather were avid hunters.  For me, however, I do not get any type of satisfaction from killing  living creatures.  Yes, I've had to in a few situations, such as the rattlesnake that had a den in our front yard.  For those who just have to shoot guns, I wonder if something like small bore target shooting (on a competitive basis) could provide their "gun fix". 

rattlesnakes don't have "dens" they are not a digging species, and are rarely fossorial. They occasionally rest in holes dug by other animals and during the winter, communal brumation occurs. 

so did you murder an innocent sleeping animal, or an animal hiding from predators? just curious. 

Kyle Elliott wrote:

 

so did you murder an innocent sleeping animal, or an animal hiding from predators? just curious. 

Exactly.  Hunting is murder.  Plain and simple.  You are trying to end a life.  Sounds like murder to me.

Cornelius Sale wrote:

Exactly.  Hunting is murder.  Plain and simple.  You are trying to end a life.  Sounds like murder to me.

sure. a big difference here is there is a management system in place for game animals. rattlesnakes do not benefit from such. there are also wanton waste laws that punish those that do not make use of meat and items from a game animal. 

Always wanted to try rattlesnacks lol rattlesnakes....? Anyone have experience ? Is it good?

Cornelius Sale wrote:

Exactly.  Hunting is murder.  Plain and simple.  You are trying to end a life.  Sounds like murder to me.

Actually, "murder" is people killing people......

Killing livestock or wild game for food is "dinner"

Unless you are really really hungry on a mountain and decide to become a cannibal. Then it is also dinner. 

I hunt and climb.  An elk will feed my family for about 8 months.  I have an elk and a deer tag for this fall. I love almost everything outdoors.

Joel higgins wrote: Always wanted to try rattlesnacks lol rattlesnakes....? Anyone have experience ? Is it good?

not bad. bird-like and flaky like whitefish. lots of bones. very little meat. 

It always amazes me that the mountains, valleys, forests and rivers of Europe contain very little game.  There aren't many herds of Stag roaming the hills or trout jumping in the streams and if there are they reside on private reserves.  Where did they all go? Why haven't they facilitated their return?  Here in the US we have very healthy populations of fish and game, of which a vast majority never gets harvested.  We owe this in large part to hunters and fishermen. Here in my backyard we have gone from having zero Desert Big Horns in the Vermilion Cliffs to hundreds in a couple of decades which was funded by license sales, raffles and donations from pro hunting groups such as the AZ Big Horn Sheep Society.  Not to far from these sheep on the Kiabab roams the largest free range Bison heard in North America. This herd shares the plateau with one of the most healthy populations of mule deer on the planet.  All of these critters are overseen by the AZ Game and Fish Dept. and a very large group of environmentally aware hunters and outdoors men/women.         

I have nothing against hunting, but you are gravely mistaken about Europe. The problem with Europe is that there is very little wilderness left, but what there is has plenty of large fauna. 

John Barritt wrote:

Actually, "murder" is people killing people......

Killing livestock or wild game for food is "dinner"

Murder is the unlawful premeditated killing of one human being by another.

the schmuck wrote: I have nothing against hunting, but you are gravely mistaken about Europe. The problem with Europe is that there is very little wilderness left, but what there is has plenty of large fauna. 

I might be mistaken but "gravely mistaken" are words better used for Donald Trump or half priced gas station sushi.  What I said about Europe was not meant as a diss but more as an observation and to point out the differences in priority,... heaven knows America could learn many things from Europe about environmentalism. I know it isn't scientific but all I have to go on is my own experience of traveling the the continent and from what I have heard from others..  There were no people fishing the shores of the rivers and lakes....... absolutely beautiful water and nobody casting on it.  I went by vast meadows and thickets and scrub and I didn't see a single "plenty of large fauna" on my entire trip. I was blown away by it because habitat like that in America would have been loaded with "plenty of large fauna".   And if you think that you have to have wilderness to have large fauna, take a look at New Jersey's and New York's whitetail deer and black bear population.  This is an honest question; Are there any public land big game hunts in Europe?  

Yes, bison in Poland, wild boar in Germany/France, bear in Romania...the list goes on. My aunt's neighbor was butchering a deer the last time I visited, and when I was a kid I fished with my dad all the time. All I am saying is that I would not attribute the abundance of game in the US to hunting, but to large swaths of undeveloped wilderness. Again, nothing wrong with hunting. 

the schmuck wrote: Yes, bison in Poland, wild boar in Germany/France, bear in Romania...the list goes on. My aunt's neighbor was butchering a deer the last time I visited, and when I was a kid I fished with my dad all the time. All I am saying is that I would not attribute the abundance of game in the US to hunting, but to large swaths of undeveloped wilderness. Again, nothing wrong with hunting. 

schmuck is correct. When I lived in Southwest Germany, Stuttgart, I went fishing all the time. The large rivers like the Danube, even though it is pretty small in western Germany, were pretty polluted and one didn't fish that. Smaller streams did have Trout and Catfish and Carp. The Lakes all had Northern Pike. In the forest by my home I would occasionally scare a deer or boar while walking. So to say there is no game is incorrect.  The western states, when you really think about it, are almost uninhabited. I point out places like Nebraska, Kansas, Utah, Montana, Idaho.... shoot all of it except for urban cities/suburbs.     

I understand what both of you guys are saying and I agree with you on the importance of wilderness.  From what you have written, I may be guilty of ignorance when it comes to fishing and hunting opportunities in Europe but the main reason for bringing it all up in the first place was to point out the significance of game management and how different it seems to be on the two continents.  Like I said, we had a gigantic swath of wilderness here in the Vermilion Cliffs that was devoid of Desert bighorn sheep and it was hunters who brought them back.  And I would imaging that the east coast of the US is fairly similar to Europe in that there is very little wilderness yet there were 124,000 people who went hunting last year in New Jersey alone.  I wouldn't call that state a bastion of wilderness. Below is a Wikipedia excerpt about the effects an avid hunter, Teddy Roosevelt had on the deer population here on my hometown  mountain, The Kaibab. This article is a little off topic in that Predator-Prey relationships and habitat holding capacity and not current game management strategies, are more the point but I thought it would be interesting reading nonetheless, for those that have come this far down the thread.  

Kaibab Deer

At the beginning of the 20th century, the Kaibab Plateau was witness to an interesting experiment in what some might call population engineering. The plateau's pre-1905 population of mule deer was estimated to be around 4,000. This number was never confirmed by any kind of count or survey, and has become an accepted number mainly because no other estimate is available. The average carrying capacity of the land was unknown, in part because this concept was not widely used by naturalists at the time. Years later, Aldo Leopold famously estimated that the capacity had been about 30,000 deer.

The idea in 1906 was simply to protect and expand the herd, so on November 28, President Theodore Roosevelt created the Grand Canyon National Game Preserve. Overgrazing by herds of sheep, cattle, and horses had taken place on the plateau since the 1880s. During that time, many predators were also killed by ranchers and bounty hunters. By the time Roosevelt established the game preserve, ranchers had moved most domestic livestock elsewhere. The primary change brought by the creation of the game preserve was to ban deer hunting. Government efforts, led by the United States Forest Service, began to protect the deer's numbers by killing off their natural predators once again; to this end, between 1907 and 1939, 816 mountain lions, 20 wolves, 7388 coyotes and over 500 bobcats were reportedly killed.[4]
The deer population experienced a great increase in numbers during the early decades of the 20th century. One estimate put the population as high as 100,000 deer inhabiting the range in 1924. Again, there was no systematic survey to support this estimate, which may have been exaggerated to twice the actual number. Shortly after that time, however, the deer population did begin to decline from over-browsing. By the mid-1920s, many deer were starving to death.
After a heated legal dispute between the federal government and the state of Arizona, hunting was once more permitted, to reduce the deer's numbers. Hunters were able to kill only a small fraction of the starving deer. The range itself was damaged, and its carrying capacity was greatly reduced. Once ecologists began to study the area and reflect on the changes that had occurred there, they began to use the Kaibab deer as a simple lesson about how the removal of the deer's natural predators, which had been done in the interest of preserving the deer population, had allowed the deer to over-reproduce, and quickly overwhelm the plateau's resources. Some ecologists suggested that the situation highlighted the importance of keeping a population in balance with its environment's carrying capacity.
Significance of the Kaibab Deer[edit]

The more meaningful lesson of the Kaibab suggests that human efforts to protect wildlife and preserve wild areas must be balanced with ecological complexity and social priorities that are difficult to predict. Changes take place, sometimes rapidly, but their effects linger for decades. Today, the Arizona Game Commission manages the area, controlling the numbers of deer as well as predators, and issues hunting permits to keep the deer in balance with the range.

Although the story of the Kaibab deer rose to fame in the 1920s due to their sudden increase and decrease in population, the story can also be used to demonstrate the way in which scientific studies and ideas about history can help educate current students. The first interpretation of the deer story as demonstrated in textbooks was that predator control had destroyed the deer’s population growth. It was thought that initially the high number of deer predators were obtruding the growth of the deer’s population, therefore rules were put in place in order to minimize the predator population and allow the deer to increase their population size. However, as scientific studies continued, ecologist Greame Caughley suggested that predator control alone could not have caused the Kaibab irruption, but rather factors like climate, grazing by other animals, and preservation policies actually had more significant impacts on the deer [5]
Caughley’s opinion led to confusion by teachers and scientists over what to include and teach in ecology and biology classes, therefore this story stopped being used as an example of prey and predator population dynamics. This is important to the development of scientific studies because it shows that events—-like the Kaibab deer controversy—-do not have a definitive start and beginning but include other opinions and approaches which teachers use to showcase the richness of controversy.
The Kaibab deer controversy has revolutionized the way science is taught in textbooks, and the way students question ecology and biology. In addition, students now learn that human intervention can lead to big repercussions regarding specific animal’s population and development in certain regions.
     

Interesting topic, though it is old (sorry for bumping). First of all, thanks for sharing your photos and experience. I'm pretty new to hunting, and I'm currently looking for a good shotgun score for deer hunting. Of course, I've surfed the Internet and read the reviews. According to one site, Simmons Prohunter riflescope seems to be the best choice. It has a unique true zero windage system, and the design is well thought out. Also, it can be adjusted to any weapon you use. Though there are also cons: the scope comes with no mounting rings, and the power knob can be hard to turn. That's why I have doubts. Can you help me? Does anyone use such a scope? Thanks in advance.