You know the thought of hunters advocating for other hunters rights to be taken away because they don’t hunt the same way is one of the key reasons we are just a few generations from hunting being a thing of the past. Like it or not we live in a society of instant gratification, this now includes “hunting”. Sure the majority of us that grew up hunting the hard way where you froze in a pair of hand me down camo army pants and brown jersey cotton gloves to kill a 40” 4point despise this when it comes to hunting.
But to advocate rights of another hunter to be taken away helps none of us. As far as new hunter recruitment sure most of those here with children will raise our children as best we can to love the outdoors appreciate our hunting traditions. But what about those who loose interest before the hook is ever set? We as parents have to compete with YouTube, travel ball, academics, and any number of other activities. With that being said if high fence hunting can help increase hunter numbers any or slow the loss then we have to consider that in our stands. If you don’t condone it then don’t participate it’s simple, but look at dog hunting and the number of hunters lost when it was out lawed in large portions of the state. Sure, it made the still hunting better but when you look at total hunter numbers it was a loss. Again some won’t care as they hated those who had illiterate dogs but there will come a time when the tree hugging millennials will out number us old curmudgeons and we might wish we would had a few more of those instant gratification seeking hunters on our side to fight for places like Bankhead to not become “wild” spaces with no human impact especially evil hurtful hunting.
While on that subject and because I saw it mentioned previously I also agree that anyone illegally transporting deer across state lines now that we know what we do about CWD should suffer finacial ruin as well as prison time. This includes state agencies which we can’t ignore as several state agencies have contributed to the spread of CWD in this manner.
Last edited by Shotts; 02/20/19 09:56 AM.
