~ Blue Jays ~
Posted on 11/26/2006 11:05:49 AM PST by SJackson
Back in 2002 when chronic wasting disease was discovered among deer in Wisconsin, a deafening clatter arose. It was the public wailing and blubbering by grown men over the tragedy of deer hunting being endangered.
I remember thinking at the time that being wiped out by a deadly brain disease couldn't be any picnic in the woods for the deer either.
Besides, there was something twisted about expressing concern for the health of Wisconsin's deer population out of a fear there might not be enough around for hunters to blow away at Thanksgiving time. Well, the good news is the deer herd this year is estimated to be among the largest in modern history, nearly 1.7 million animals.
So you may wonder why hunters aren't tossing their blaze-orange caps into the air, firing off their guns and shouting: "We won! We won! Hunting is saved!"
AP Photo/Daily Herald, Butch McCartney Hunters register their deer at the Sunset Country Store in Easton, Wis., on Nov. 18. Because, clearly, the deer are the ones who are winning.
The deer are surviving their health crisis and thriving. Deer hunters, not so much.
To the state Department of Natural Resources, Wisconsin's ever-growing deer population turns out to be very bad news indeed.
That's because the DNR spent more than $32 million on a scorched-earth policy to attempt to eliminate every living deer in areas where chronic wasting disease was found.
And, guess what? The number of deer in those areas has actually increased from 26.4 deer per square mile to 38.3 deer.
Golly, when we entrust wildlife management in this state to a pack of yahoos who go up north to drink beer, play poker and talk about women's body parts, how could we possibly go wrong?
The truth is the herds in the woods that have been thinning recently are those once thundering herds of hunters.
Not very long ago, outdoor writers would routinely refer to more than 750,000 hunters taking to the woods every year. This season, right up until opening day there was a real question of whether licenses would even crack 600,000.
That was what was behind the spectacularly dumb idea in the Legislature earlier this year to attempt to lower the hunting age in the state from 12 to 8 years old.
As hunters saw their ranks and potentially their political power diminishing in the state, they were desperate to do anything to try to swell their numbers. That included sending 8-year-olds scampering into the woods with high-powered, deadly weapons as big as they were.
Such idiotic ideas, which also included the vote by hunters in favor of a hunting season for shooting kitty cats, have only further estranged those in Wisconsin who are a little further evolved from their more embarrassing cousins.
What hunters never appear to realize is that their real opponents in this state aren't radical, tree-hugging PETA members. They are conservative, suburban and exurban families who don't want to have to paint "KID" on their children before sending them outside.
As farmland and other vast, open areas of the state are sold off to real estate developers, it doesn't just reduce the old hunting grounds. The human tolerance for free-fire zones is also greatly reduced.
The caricature of a blaze-orange-clad galoot crashing through the brush firing away at anything that moves is funny until he ends up in somebody's kitchen.
The handwriting has been on the wall for some time. Back in 2004, a study by the Wisconsin Conservation Congress and other pro-hunting groups found that for every 100 hunters who stopped hunting because they stopped breathing, developed crippling arthritis of the trigger finger, etc. only 53 new hunters replaced them.
These kids today! All they want to do is sit around playing video games where they pretend to blow away their little friends. But can you get one of them to get up off that couch to go out to really kill something? No way.
At the rate we are losing hunters, it's just a matter of time before we have to worry about extinction. And do you hear anybody expressing concern over the loss of this valuable species?
Who is going to keep alive the rich cultural traditions of deer hunters? It's hard enough to remember the rules of some of those drinking games the next day.
It's obvious the DNR can no longer count on deer hunters to lay waste to deer in the blood bath numbers of old. State officials are already talking about alternative measures.
If you thought deer hunting stirred controversy around the state, wait until the DNR starts strafing Wisconsin from helicopters or hiring professional killers who look like Jack Palance.
It might even be enough to make us miss guys named Clem swarming through the woods hell-bent on practicing recreational animal decimation. But maybe not.
he's BTDT, got the t-shirt too... ;)
A nice clean shot is better. Who'd want to eat meat that is all bloody? Yuk! May as well just pick up the road kill.
It might even be enough to make us miss guys named Clem swarming through the woods hell-bent on practicing recreational animal decimation. But maybe not.
Why not just fly in a tribe or two of "indigenous pipples" from the Amazon rain forest? Everyone knows it's perfectly all right for "indigenous pipples" to kill and eat animals. I'm not sure why, but I think it's because liberals consider them not fully evolved, and therefore still animals themselves.
That's the "enlightenment" for you; it makes a punching-bag out of its own inherited religious traditions but creams in the pants at the thought of little brown people performing human sacrifice to appease the spirits.
~ Blue Jays ~
what a libtard,a six year Peta member could have written the article
Better than sitting at a cocktail party, speaking in effeminate voices, sipping wine and discussing how evil Republicans are.
Yes, my party was hassled last Monday. They insisted that we open our gun cases and demonstrate our weapons were empty even though we said we were done hunting. The one ranger looked like Garrison Keillor, with hemmoroids.
And adding to your post the flagrant fascism of the Conservation dept., USDA and Humane Society and we're ALL screwed!
Funny how when it comes to Chronic Wasting they never mention the fact it is caused by eating forage that has succomed to months and months of drought conditions, nothing to do with hunting.
At the time the CWD 'crisis' was discovered WI had suffered years of horrid drought much like TX OK and KS recently.
Thats gonna leave a mark!
Yes, but when I told the deer to get out of the car, he refused. Well naturally I had to hit him.
I'd be curious what you base that on. It's been dry (anecdoatal) the last 2 or 3 years, but the "crisis" predated that by a year or three. The draught connection isn't one I've been aware of.
Funny you should infer that. Joel wrote for the Milwaukee Urinal in the early 70s doing music reviews on the Green Sheet. Same tone.
Later, I saw an article where he's the fearless leader of the local gay rights movement, honored for using his writing to advance gay causes. He despises Christians even more than hunters.
And someone who has hit both a deer and a wild turkey in their car!
In most areas of the country we now have an over population of whitetail deer. The easiest way to control this problem, and it is a problem, is to allow hunters more than their normal quota of animals in hunting season.
I used to go deer hunting with my boss, but I got tired of having to be the one to carry the decoys.
There. That sounds much more accurate of what is really going on in Wisconsin!
Only thing dying out faster than the hunters is panty waist white liberals.
I think Chronic Wasting Disease is something liberal writers must have had in college.
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