Support For Hunting on the Decline…..Why? What Can We Do?

[HawRiverArcher]

If food prices continue to rise, the rubric through which we are having this conversation will be entirely reconfigured.

When COVID hit in 2019-20 and the price of beef also skyrocketed I saw a lot of new hunters in the woods and the bow shop asking for advice and tips. Well beef prices have never gone back down but most of those new hunters gave it up after the first season. Apparently many people like the idea of being food independent but the reality is somewhat less appealing. Quite a few of my neighbors bought chickens and started gardens back then too, they lasted about as long as the hunting did.

Sadly the majority of people even Americans will eat crickets and chemicals if it means they get to keep on sitting on the couch playing their games, watching porn, and buying crap they don't need to mask the dissatisfaction with meaningless lives. The powers that be know most people better than they know themselves. Many will also give up their public land and parks, wildlife and scenery if someone promises them a life of ease and comfort. This is the future.

 

[SNIPERBBB]

think you're positing that you have to be all-or-nothing ideologically here. I would argue, as I have, that preservation is sometimes right for some properties. Obviously, we have to impact our environment. But I would say that it's reasonable to designate some percentage (amount negotiable) as off-limits to most of 1 species' activities to try and ensure the continuance of others.

Absolutely not if you really read what I said. Preservation is you can't even look at the place. I don't have problems letting some areas as reserves/preserves. There are just too many of them currently right now.

 

[boyne bowhunter]

I'm certainly not psychic enough to make any reliable predictions but there is one other possibility for the hunting future that I've not seen mentioned here. I can see the possibility that hunting slowly transitions from a big woods pursuit into more of an urban hunting setting as the we further further expand out human footprint. Even the anti-hunters start to change their tune about the "cute little deer" in the backyard once they start eating their carefully landscaped begonias or they've had their third car/deer collision of the year.

We're actually seeing this currently in the more populated southern half of Michigan's lower peninsula. Due to lack of public hunting access and some trophy hunting influences, the current hunting pressure is not enough to keep the herd in check. People who live there are demanding the DNR find a way to limit the herd. For this reason the DNR has expanded doe tags and seasons, and setup some specific urban hunting seasons. I can see this becoming more and more prevalent as the years go by.

This is incorrect. Large old growth forests are diverse ecosystems. But you andI havent ever seen that. We've shifted our baseline so that "old growth" means "just past pioneer stage." This line of thinking, that we "have to" cut timber for the good of the forest, is very convenient to timber companies and a half truth at best. I'm not against thinning and burning, and efforts to eliminate forest fires (largely to save human property) were/are misguided. But that doesn't mean that all forests must be logged for their own good.

I feel that here in Michigan, and I think this is likely across the country, the public land timber is seen as a "Cash Crop" and is being harvested more for financial reasons that conservation reasons. I have seen several parcels that have been clearcut twice now in my hunting lifetime (i.e. 50years). This time frame is barely enough to get any reasonable hardwood regrowth from the poplars that spring up after the cutting.

I believe the primary reasons for this is that the State Foresters are given, like any other worker in the rest of working corporate America, specific productivity goals for how much money should be generated from their area of coverage. Also, like any other productivity goals in corporate America, those goals increase every year. The logic is: If the goal was met then the bar was set too low and needs to be increased the following year. Conversely if the goal wasn't met then the shortcoming needs to be made up the following year.

The issue is that these goals must be met with the same or lesser acreage each year and eventually you run out of "new" stuff to cut. We are seeing vast acres of land being reduced to stubbled fields that will take 50+years to regenerate. I know the time frame first hand, I've witnessed it personally.

 

[HawRiverArcher]

I'm certainly not psychic enough to make any reliable predictions but there is one other possibility for the hunting future that I've not seen mentioned here. I can see the possibility that hunting slowly transitions from a big woods pursuit into more of an urban hunting setting as the we further further expand out human footprint. Even the anti-hunters start to change their tune about the "cute little deer" in the backyard once they start eating their carefully landscaped begonias or they've had their third car/deer collision of the year.

We're actually seeing this currently in the more populated southern half of Michigan's lower peninsula. Due to lack of public hunting access and some trophy hunting influences, the current hunting pressure is not enough to keep the herd in check. People who live there are demanding the DNR find a way to limit the herd. For this reason the DNR has expanded doe tags and seasons, and setup some specific urban hunting seasons. I can see this becoming more and more prevalent as the years go by.

I feel that here in Michigan, and I think this is likely across the country, the public land timber is seen as a "Cash Crop" and is being harvested more for financial reasons that conservation reasons. I have seen several parcels that have been clearcut twice now in my hunting lifetime (i.e. 50years). This time frame is barely enough to get any reasonable hardwood regrowth from the poplars that spring up after the cutting.

I believe the primary reasons for this is that the State Foresters are given, like any other worker in the rest of working corporate America, specific productivity goals for how much money should be generated from their area of coverage. Also, like any other productivity goals in corporate America, those goals increase every year. The logic is: If the goal was met then the bar was set too low and needs to be increased the following year. Conversely if the goal wasn't met then the shortcoming needs to be made up the following year.

The issue is that these goals must be met with the same or lesser acreage each year and eventually you run out of "new" stuff to cut. We are seeing vast acres of land being reduced to stubbled fields that will take 50+years to regenerate. I know the time frame first hand, I've witnessed it personally.

WRC has increased doe tag limits and also put forth an urban archery season from January 15th to February 15th here in NC for many of the reasons you mention, from increased property garden damage to car collisions. However so few property owners and municipalities are willing to allow hunters of any kind to partake let alone bowhunters that they're discussing just canceling urban archery next year and having fish and game cull the herds instead. Even with a doe limit of 4 and WRC practically begging hunters to kill does most hunters will target only bucks and most landowners forbid hunting of any kind. The end result is not good for the overall health of the deer population and the excessive amount of deer destroy the habitat with over grazing of anything edible. Not to mention the booming coyote population that is now destroying livestock. It's all connected.

 

[boyne bowhunter]

WRC has increased doe tag limits and also put forth an urban archery season from January 15th to February 15th here in NC for many of the reasons you mention, from increased property garden damage to car collisions. However so few property owners and municipalities are willing to allow hunters of any kind to partake let alone bowhunters that they're discussing just canceling urban archery next year and having fish and game cull the herds instead. Even with a doe limit of 4 and WRC practically begging hunters to kill does most hunters will target only bucks and most landowners forbid hunting of any kind. The end result is not good for the overall health of the deer population and the excessive amount of deer destroy the habitat with over grazing of anything edible. Not to mention the booming coyote population that is now destroying livestock. It's all connected.

Same issues are occurring here but I think as deer populations continue to increase there's a possibility that urban property owners will begin to welcome hunters to try to check the population.

 

[Swamp Fox__On The Run]

I think there are three separate issues that are getting conflated in this thread.

- Conservation issues - Will we or future generations have land and access to hunt in the future?
- Recruiting future hunters - Will there be people who want to hunt in the future?
- Public opinion of hunting - What do non-hunters think of our lifestyle?

While these issues are related they are not necessarily the same. Conservation issues and the recruitment of hunters are important and have a big impact on the future of hunting but, the article the OP is discussing is whether the (mostly) non-hunting public thinks favorably of hunting. IMO this is the most immediate threat to hunting. While the other two issues will decide if our kids and grandkids have an opportunity to hunt, how the non-hunting public views hunting has the ability to decide if the people typing in this thread will continue to have the ability to hunt. If the current rate of decline of 5% every 3-4 years continues, in approximately 8 years the split will be 50/50. When 50% of the public doesn't approve of hunting you will start to see ballot initiatives in some states to ban hunting altogether.

We will never recruit enough people into the fold to have a meaningful impact to this number. The best we can do is change the image the non-hunting public has of us. We need non-hunters to view us as stewards of the resource and and an overall positive to the environment and health of the animals we are hunting. Unfortunately, that's not the image I see when consuming much of the hunting related media content that's out there right now.

Bingo...

Also: Winner, winner -- chicken dinner.

 

[SNIPERBBB]

I think you're positing that you have to be all-or-nothing ideologically here. I would argue, as I have, that preservation is sometimes right for some properties. Obviously, we have to impact our environment. But I would say that it's reasonable to designate some percentage (amount negotiable) as off-limits to most of 1 species' activities to try and ensure the continuance of others.


Hunting leases are great, but by and large a far cry from federal preserves and wilderness areas. You only consider deer in your statements, which are a game animal (consumable resource with agreed upon monetary value) and not others. This is the crux of my issue with saying I'm a conservationist and not those other things.


This is incorrect. Large old growth forests are diverse ecosystems. But you andI havent ever seen that. We've shifted our baseline so that "old growth" means "just past pioneer stage." This line of thinking, that we "have to" cut timber for the good of the forest, is very convenient to timber companies and a half truth at best. I'm not against thinning and burning, and efforts to eliminate forest fires (largely to save human property) were/are misguided. But that doesn't mean that all forests must be logged for their own good.

Large tracts of it are barren wastelands as far as wildlife is concerned. Shawnee State Forest here is a great example of this. Especially for bigger fauna that can legallly harvested. There's almost no understory outside of MFR. It's getting broken up a bit now with some clear cutting. Most flora and fauna flourish on edge habitat. Few species as do well in pure forest, ag, etc. There's just more energy for the system available on the edges. Wayne national Forest is about as bad here, the terrains just doesn't allow for logging or development of any here.b

 

[Swamp Fox__On The Run]

@HawRiverArcher:


I am not surprised they're thinking about going in a different direction to add to or scrap urban archery. The concept never really got any traction that I could tell.

As a dedicated, devoted bowhunter (bow-only for a long time) I know that I have zero interest in urban archery. I can think of only a few people who would put up with it even if Bullwinkle were hiding behind every swingset, and I'm not real sure their primary motivation wouldn't be just to flex and virtue signal to the rest of us rednecks anyway.

Ain't nobody got time for dat.

If the game commission could come up with a way to convince suburban and ex-urban landowners to open up their 20 to 150 acre properties to controlled hunting, though, then we might be getting somewhere.

 

[Jammintree]

Same issues are occurring here but I think as deer populations continue to increase there's a possibility that urban property owners will begin to welcome hunters to try to check the population.

The unfortunate trend seems to be that by the time the general public realizes that deer in their region are overpopulated it’s nearly impossible to do anything reasonable about it.

Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard are prime examples of this. The public thwarted efforts to manage deer populations when biologists first started calling for hunter intervention. Now deer density averages 50 - 85 deer per square mile. These are densely populated islands with minimal places suitable for hunting deer.

 

[HawRiverArcher]

@HawRiverArcher:


I am not surprised they're thinking about going in a different direction to add to or scrap urban archery. The concept never really got any traction that I could tell.

As a dedicated, devoted bowhunter (bow-only for a long time) I know that I have zero interest in urban archery. I can think of only a few people who would put up with it even if Bullwinkle were hiding behind every swingset, and I'm not real sure their primary motivation wouldn't be just to flex and virtue signal to the rest of us rednecks anyway.

Ain't nobody got time for dat.

If the game commission could come up with a way to convince suburban and ex-urban landowners to open up their 20 to 150 acre properties to controlled hunting, though, then we might be getting somewhere.

Right now you must have at least 5 acres of continuous land to apply for eligibility for urban archery and your municipality must also participate in the program. There are a lot of 10--40 acre properties inside city limits here sheltering large deer population as developers have torn up the old farms for housing.

I'm interested because there are some real monsters and a ton of does living on small urban tracks as habitat has shrunk and pushed them into smaller parcels closer to town. I currently hunt a small 20 acre farm that's split into two tracts, a 6 acre plot and another 14 acre mostly wooded plot. Three years ago there were few deer there but two subdivisions later and now it's crowded with them and I've been asked to come in and thin out the does eating up all the owners hay. The deer are moving into the suburbs because they have few other options.

I hunt the deer where they live not where I wish they did. Here in central NC they're taking over the burbs and I appreciate the opportunity to go after them instead of having to drive 3 hours west or east to the good public land. I'd much rather be in the woods away from civilization, but this is the future if development continues unchecked here where I'm at.

 

[HawRiverArcher]

The unfortunate trend seems to be that by the time the general public realizes that deer in their region are overpopulated it’s nearly impossible to do anything reasonable about it.

Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard are prime examples of this. The public thwarted efforts to manage deer populations when biologists first started calling for hunter intervention. Now deer density averages 50 - 85 deer per square mile. These are densely populated islands with minimal places suitable for hunting deer.

Yes indeed. The same folks saying hunting is evil are also screaming the loudest about deer destroying their gardens and yards and demanding the state do something about it. That is until someone suggests allowing hunting, then they "just love all those beautiful deer."

I love them too and I'd rather not watch them die slow from starvation or disease because the shrinking habitat can't support the numbers.

In the 1980s when I first picked up a bow, the deer in NC were like ghosts. This state has been VERY successful at bringing back the population we now have the largest herds since pre-colonial times they think. When someone says it's deer season here they aren't talking about hunting anymore but insurance and auto body repair time.

 

[washxc]

Nutter, agreed on the tremendous ecosystem value of old growth forests. Here's my issue with preservationist attitudes, and it may get to the core of one of the biggest issues that I see coming from anti-hunting attitudes. I see people saying "leave nature alone", "leave those animals alone, nature will take care of them", "nature doesn't need humans, leave them alone!", it's a super common theme among anti's. The problem is that it insinuates that humans are NOT part of nature, that we are somehow apart from nature. The reality is that humans ARE part of nature, and have co-evolved with other species since the dawn of humanity. We are, and always have been, the apex predator. And we have ALWAYS managed the landscape. But here's the real kicker, historical management of the landscape by humans have had positive impacts on ecosystems. There are so many examples of synergies between human management and ecosystem health. Lyla June has a great TED talk on this subject from the Native American perspective and the thriving ecosystems of the time. She doesn't mention that native americans pulled wolf puppies from their dens to thin their numbers when they got too high for ungulate populations to thrive, but that is historical reality.

As the number of humans on the planet has grown, so too has our far reaching impact on every single square inch of earth's surface. There is literally no patch of earth that has not been effected directly or indirectly by human beings. And as part of nature, not apart, there has never been a greater need for humans to play a role in managing the landscape in positive ways.

The impacts can be global or local. Just yesterday on my way home from work I was passing through a town (no hunting) and saw a road killed deer on the side of the road (impact #1). It was broad daylight and as I approached I saw a red fox coming towards the carcass with little trepidation. He was covered in mange (impact #2), apparently hungry enough to approach a road with traffic in the daylight. I can't imagine he had a comfortable winter.

We have a role to play in the ecosystem, now more than ever. We are part of nature, not apart, and we cannot abdicate our responsibility to the land. And, as noted above, our impact can be positive.

 

[Jammintree]

Regarding the recent comments above:

I absolutely love deer, and I suspect many of us do. So how can we communicate the depth and breadth of that love to the non-hunter? (For a minute let’s just forget about the Anti-hunter, it’s quite possible they won’t reconsider their prejudice.) My step kids have asked me repeatedly: if you love deer so much, how are you able to kill them? It’s a good question, that I have no trouble answering. But what about you- if someone asked you this question earnestly, how would you answer?

 

[BTaylor]

I think you're positing that you have to be all-or-nothing ideologically here. I would argue, as I have, that preservation is sometimes right for some properties. Obviously, we have to impact our environment. But I would say that it's reasonable to designate some percentage (amount negotiable) as off-limits to most of 1 species' activities to try and ensure the continuance of others.


Hunting leases are great, but by and large a far cry from federal preserves and wilderness areas. You only consider deer in your statements, which are a game animal (consumable resource with agreed upon monetary value) and not others. This is the crux of my issue with saying I'm a conservationist and not those other things.


This is incorrect. Large old growth forests are diverse ecosystems. But you andI havent ever seen that. We've shifted our baseline so that "old growth" means "just past pioneer stage." This line of thinking, that we "have to" cut timber for the good of the forest, is very convenient to timber companies and a half truth at best. I'm not against thinning and burning, and efforts to eliminate forest fires (largely to save human property) were/are misguided. But that doesn't mean that all forests must be logged for their own good.

I dont completely disagree with your points on some measure of preservation but my perception of the issue and your points are that it fails to consider aggregate loss of acreage at this point in time due to human development. We have a some what fixed amount of public land either state or federal that is available to be managed for maximum wildlife benefit. To benefit the greatest amount of wildlife, it needs to be successionaly managed. We no longer have the ecosystem diversity that previously existed. There just arent many glade areas or eastern savannah areas or grasslands left. At best we can only encourage privately held grounds to diversify their management whether that be commercial timber or ag ground. If private landholders dont engage, then we only have our public lands to attempt to provide the best habitat possible for the greatest number critters possible which means in all likelihood some critters are gonna be losers. If we dont want to completely wreck what we have, we are going to need to incorporate big changes to commercial timber, Ag, Ranching, and Urban redevelopment. We need to significantly slow the outward expansion of human development and better utilize out of use urban areas for human occupation, we need to see significant changes in farming practices as well as timber land management. We need better management of our public lands. There are some areas that are pretty well managed but there are lots that get little to no management. The regenerative farmers group is making a dent, the guys at native habitat in your neck of the woods are making a dent, some of the NGO's are making a dent but the efforts are all fragmented to the point significant national level change across the broad spectrum of areas is unlikely. The best I can surmise is that the elusive common ground is not the land or hunting/fishing or trapping or management, its a paradigm shift from a me/now attitude to mindset that puts the highest value on the generations to come. Figure out how to drive that shift and I think you can get buy in from both sides of the aisle. I am just not sure it is possible with how widely the sides have spread with their me first, right now priorities.

 

[HawRiverArcher]

To answer the OP's original question about declining support for hunting. I think it's the result of a very successful and thorough campaign not from the left or tree-huggers as some might label them but by those who despise self-reliance and food independence. It's the same people who would tell us that eating meat and raising our own gardens is destroying the environment. I doubt it really has much to do with environmental protection as it does simple control. There's a long rabbit hole to fall into and I haven't put my tin-foil hat on yet this morning. However I find it interesting that at the same time as governments are soft pushing the 15 minute city and meat alternatives on us all, they're also telling us that foods that make us strong and vigorous (some might say resistant) are also bad for the planet? The fact that the push away from meat consumption has also gone hand in hand with declining testosterone in the west in an interesting if not related event. In the end, getting rid of hunting is not about restoring nature to some pristine state but about keeping certain independently minded individuals from pursuing and taking advantage of their sources of food and nutrition free of government or corporate control, choose your evil overlord in this instance.

Now I'm all for preserving nature and limiting development. However I'm not naive enough to think that we can't restore the planet to some imaginary pre-human state. Human beings are of nature, from nature, and part of it. When we try to live apart from it is when we start getting into trouble. We have existed in our current state as a species for hundreds of thousands of years if not millions. Its also only recently that we became agrarian and shyed away from being predators predominantly. We are historically as important to the eco-system as wolves and bears are/were in a predatory sense. It's only that our industrialization of hunting has allowed us to far out pace nature's ability to regenerate prey species. To say humans shouldn't hunt is to deny what made us humans in the first place. Yet that's exactly what some people in power want us to do, deny our humanity and accept a future of living in steel and concrete filing cabinets detached from the natural world which by the way will still be preserved but only for a wealthy few to enjoy at enormous expense. I'm all for conservation but I'd like someone to explain to me exactly who we're conserving it for if our own children will not be allowed to enjoy it or use it?

 

[HawRiverArcher]

Regarding the recent comments above:

I absolutely love deer, and I suspect many of us do. So how can we communicate the depth and breadth of that love to the non-hunter? (For a minute let’s just forget about the Anti-hunter, it’s quite possible they won’t reconsider their prejudice.) My step kids have asked me repeatedly: if you love deer so much, how are you able to kill them? It’s a good question, that I have no trouble answering. But what about you- if someone asked you this question earnestly, how would you answer?

I'm able to kill them because I'd rather take responsibility for my own food procurement rather than handing it off to some anonymous entity. By killing my own meat I understand first hand that in nature something has to cease existing to sustain me. Whether it's killing meat or harvesting plants. That's how nature works. It's a mature realistic appreciation of the truth of existence.

By meeting the animal on its own ground in its terms to hunt it, I'm respecting it, and it's life. I'm also ending it quickly. Very few animals in nature die of old age and none comfortably surrounded by their friends and family.

 

[Jammintree]

I dont completely disagree with your points on some measure of preservation but my perception of the issue and your points are that it fails to consider aggregate loss of acreage at this point in time due to human development. We have a some what fixed amount of public land either state or federal that is available to be managed for maximum wildlife benefit. To benefit the greatest amount of wildlife, it needs to be successionaly managed. We no longer have the ecosystem diversity that previously existed. There just arent many glade areas or eastern savannah areas or grasslands left. At best we can only encourage privately held grounds to diversify their management whether that be commercial timber or ag ground. If private landholders dont engage, then we only have our public lands to attempt to provide the best habitat possible for the greatest number critters possible which means in all likelihood some critters are gonna be losers. If we dont want to completely wreck what we have, we are going to need to incorporate big changes to commercial timber, Ag, Ranching, and Urban redevelopment. We need to significantly slow the outward expansion of human development and better utilize out of use urban areas for human occupation, we need to see significant changes in farming practices as well as timber land management. We need better management of our public lands. There are some areas that are pretty well managed but there are lots that get little to no management. The regenerative farmers group is making a dent, the guys at native habitat in your neck of the woods are making a dent, some of the NGO's are making a dent but the efforts are all fragmented to the point significant national level change across the broad spectrum of areas is unlikely. The best I can surmise is that the elusive common ground is not the land or hunting/fishing or trapping or management, its a paradigm shift from a me/now attitude to mindset that puts the highest value on the generations to come. Figure out how to drive that shift and I think you can get buy in from both sides of the aisle. I am just not sure it is possible with how widely the sides have spread with their me first, right now priorities.

Great points. But to even consider this strategy the US would need to develop a long term plan for development and land use. This kind of foresight has not been our forte. The influence of corporate profit interests lobbying government has always overshadowed the process of holistic planning and management.

Anyone interested in exploring this concept with greater depth should check out this book called: Moby-****.

 

[BTaylor]

Regarding the recent comments above:

I absolutely love deer, and I suspect many of us do. So how can we communicate the depth and breadth of that love to the non-hunter? (For a minute let’s just forget about the Anti-hunter, it’s quite possible they won’t reconsider their prejudice.) My step kids have asked me repeatedly: if you love deer so much, how are you able to kill them? It’s a good question, that I have no trouble answering. But what about you- if someone asked you this question earnestly, how would you answer?

Ask them if they like to eat first. Then ask what would they do if tomorrow there were no grocery stores or restaurants. My family eats wild game almost exclusively and because of that it is extremely important to me that the source of my food is valued and managed. That requires restraint on the number of animals removed from the herd each year but also requires removing some animals so they dont become over populated. It also requires a commitment to managing the land resource so the food resources thrives. When you walk outside, everything below you, around you and above you plays a role in the circle of life. Neglect any part and other parts suffer, I dont want to suffer.

 

[BTaylor]

Great points. But to even consider this strategy the US would need to develop a long term plan for development and land use. This kind of foresight has not been our forte. The influence of corporate profit interests lobbying government has always overshadowed the process of holistic planning and management.

Anyone interested in exploring this concept with greater depth should check out this book called: Moby-****.

Exactly why I said I cant, at this point, see a useful or productive way forward towards that type goal. That's why it is important for the fragmented efforts to keep dinking and dunking until somebody way smarter than me comes up with a viable plan.

 

[Jammintree]

Exactly why I said I cant, at this point, see a useful or productive way forward towards that type goal. That's why it is important for the fragmented efforts to keep dinking and dunking until somebody way smarter than me comes up with a viable plan.

Unfortunately that ship has sailed. We handed over the keys a long time ago.

Yet another reason why so many of us hunt. It’s one small way to have a direct and nearly unadulterated relationship with nature - or whatever you’d personally like to call the whole of the universe.