Treehugger view of hunting?

[Aitrus]

I recently took my hunting safety course on my way to being able to legally hunt in the province of Ontario.

One of the remarkable things of this course was the disdain for so-called "tree huggers". This was obviously a pejorative term used to describe anyone who is against hunting, but I was curious about how many self-professed tree huggers would in fact fit the bill of being against hunting.

My stance has always been that unless someone is a vegetarian or vegan, they have no grounds whatsoever on which to criticize hunting.

Those who don't eat meat but dislike or disapprove of hunting no doubt do so for animal cruelty or animal welfare reasons. This I can understand, but is there really any difference between hunting and buying burgers at a restaurant or grocery store? I personally feel (and its a reason I want to hunt) that its morally irresponsible to be willing to eat meat without being willing to kill an animal for food.

I was a vegetarian for 2 years, so I have some experience and knowledge on the subject here.

Now perhaps the most interesting thing to me is how much common ground your average hunter shares with your average environmentalists. Hunting associations are all about protecting natural habitat and ensuring there are sustainable populations of game. I suppose its the conservationist link.

What do others think about hunting - and about the link between environmentalists and hunters (or perhaps "conservationists"?). I know when I wasn't eating meat I had a lot more respect for those who would eat it but were willing to hunt, than those who were blissfully ignorant of conditions in factory farms etc.

[tw0k1ngs]

I pesonally don't see how anyone can classify murder as a game or sport... Perhaps I miss the point of hunting. The problem I have with it is human arrogance, beleiving we are better than other creatures. It certainly doesnt help that the bible concurs, leading millions to agree.

[keoni]

We hunt deer. I'm a tree hugger.
I prefer deer meat to cow meat. We monitor the deer population on our land and we only hunt on our land.
With limited woodlands, deer will overpopulate quickly, leading to starvation and disease and infringing on crops and gardens. We've all but eliminated their natural predators. Hunting is a necessity.
What will happen to humans when we've overpopulated the planet?

[stevejust]

What will happen to humans when we've overpopulated the planet?

this?

[keoni]

What will happen to humans when we've overpopulated the planet?

this?

Wonderful. Mad deer disease. And it's spreading across the Northern Midwest into Canada.
I hadn't heard of this. Thank you for the link.

[kaytee101]

My best friend is a hunter...i am what he likes to call a hippy.

up until this day he can not grasp why i do not support hunting.

Here's why:

he says "hunters do a lot to preserve land....they provide a lot of financial backing....etc etc etc" and so starts a conversation as to why treehuggers and hunters are more alike than we think.....but it takes a look beyond the land preservation to see why each side holds such a rivalring opinion of the other.

you see in parts its true: hunting and game associations DO do alot to protect fish and game...however....if hunting did not exist, do you think they would still do all they could to preserve these lands?? do you think they would buy the permits that protect the animals that they then turn around and hunt?? do you think they would give a hoot about preservation or conservation simply because they are living creatures on this planet and NOT because it keeps their source of sporting flourishing each season?? this i doubt.

Dont get me wrong...i understand that there is a difference between sport hunting and actually eating what you kill. However, you do not NEED to hunt to survive...therefore it is a "sport" for you just like many many many of a human's daily activities.

which brings me to my next point:

we, as a human race did something to this planet. One day we decided that we were no longer going to hunt. we decided we were going to raise crops and cattle...we were going to lock up food and put a price tag on it. Which is "fine" but in the midst of that being "fine" we must remember that BECAUSE we CHOSE to make that cultural change, we should no longer be allowed to use the planets resources in a hunting and gathering sort of way. We are doing more damage than good to this planet through the agricultural/livestock movement. It's my personal belief that of we decide to destroy the planet this way, we should not be allowed to use it as the source that we once did.

Now, don't get me wrong...im not saying we should all go back to hunting (there is no way that today's species are ready for it....especially the human species). Im just saying we need to do things a little differently around here if we want to continue to hunt.

You see hunters and tree huggers will never see eye to eye, and that is precisely why i feel the way i do about hunting. Until hunters stop driving their gas guzzling four wheel drive vehicles....i will not support hunting. Until we ALL come together and take the time to fix "mother nature" i will not support hunting. Don't get me wrong....i have nothing personal against hunters....but i just wish that some would stop excusing what they do for some other stupid mistake we've made in the first place. I mean, don't you think that instead of controlling the deer population by killing them off (a reason i hear for hunting very often), we should maybe restore the large carnivore population we ALSO killed off so that nature can once again be in balance??


i dunno....just some thoughts from a tree hugger

[MissyWombat]

I think hunting is a lot more honest than blithely buying meat at a supermarket where it comes all sanitised and processed. I also think that there is a lot less wastage potentially.
So if you are a meat eater, I have minimal issues with hunting. Those who just eat what they hunt really get my admiration because those kind of levels of meat consumption is bound to be much more sustainable.
I'm a vegetarian but if you are going to be an omnivore, you could do a lot worse than feed yourself using hunting.

[incubus_of_habit]

Hunters and Treehuggers both tend to like having large tracts of unspoiled wilderness. If we were smart, we'd realize we're more often on the same team than not.

As for hunting, there's nothing necessarily anti-green about it, unless maybe you are still using the lead bird shot...or poaching.

A hunter is simply a red-state environmentalist. ;o)

[gogreener]

You might like to read the last section of The Omnivore's Dilemma - Michael Pollan decides that he ought to try hunting and gathering his own food, to see what it's like. He also tried working on a sustainable farm, including slaughtering a chicken, and followed the industrial agriculture system from feedlot to McDonalds.

He used the product of his hunting and gathering efforts to feed the people who taught him, and decides that every so often he might do it again, to remember the realities of what we eat. We get lazy when food is easily available around the corner in vast quantities, when our meat comes already skinned and portioned and sanitised.

But hunting isn't really done here in Australia. I always associate hunting with Americans in orange jackets and trucker hats (like Uncle Jimbo on South Park) hunting for sport rather than food; or with fox hunts in the UK by upper-class-twits.

[keoni]

There are families that hunt deer for food solely as a means to survive, without hunting they'd starve. Believe it or not, in the US Midwest there are people living in deeply impoverished conditions in small towns and remote locations.
Several years ago on a country road, the car in front of me hit a deer and the pickup truck behind me pulled up and the man put the deer in the bed of his truck for butchering.
People hunt squirrels for food too.
I find it crazy that people go out of their way to kill squid for calamari.

[Aitrus]

Lots of interesting replies.

I would note that here in Ontario it is ILLEGAL to not eat whatever you kill while hunting. There is no such thing as simple "sport hunting". I suppose technically you could kill the animal, take it home and throw it out - but even that if caught is illegal (how they'd catch you is another question altogether). But you cannot simply shoot something and leave it in the woods, and honestly I don't know of any hunters who kill just for antlers or pelts - its a waste of resources to not use the meat as well.

As for the murder argument - is it murder when a wolf kills a deer? What do you believe makes it wrong for humans to kill for food when you can see it anywhere you look in nature? The idea that we are "above" nature is one of the things that gets us into many of these environmental problems in the first place.

As for any concerns about cruelty or suffering, we also have regulations in place on what ammunition is legal for which types of game - to prevent someone using "wounding" type ammo. It is also illegal to abandon a hunt once you've hit an animal - as long as there is a visible blood trail to follow. I'd imagine you could find a lot more inhumane/cruel treatment by looking at industrial farms than hunting!

The deer overpopulation issue is a salient one as well - and while we COULD technically restore predator populations, that makes the wilderness much less safe for humans in general. It is an alternative, no question, but I wouldn't say it has enough significant advantages over a lower predator population paired with seasonal hunting.

And finally, as someone pointed out about rural populations - its the same in Canada's northern communities. In remote places it is much easier and cheaper to hunt local game than to fly in chicken mcnuggets from the south. This really is part of surviving in the far north.

I would be curious to know as well the land use intensity of various game animals compared to domesticated farm animals like cows or chickens. Deer , ducks, geese, moose, etc exist with no human upkeep or intervention - compared to cattle that require pasture land that cant be used for much else.

[JiltedCitizen]

Kaytee your friend is right. They are more similar than you want to admit. You obviously DO have a problem with hunters, it's apparent by your post. What difference does the motivation make to want to protect something? It doesn't really. There are efforts to bring back the predators. It's just that some larger ones occupy much of the space they used to live.

[ValkyrjaGaia]

I would have to agree with the Treehugger that references all the land that hunting/fishing preserves. Whether it's chaps, flies, or ammo, a tax on hunting supplies from authorized retailers goes to the purchase of public land preserves. (One more reason to hate gun shows--those hunter's aren't doing their part). Now I'm a vegan and wouldn't dream of eating the stuff, but the massive white-tailed deer population problem in my area (resulting from urban sprawl driving out pumas and coyotes) can be solved by sterilization, poision, traps, or hunting...and hunting's the most humane, cost- efficient way.

As for bringing back the large predators of the last ice age--the ruckus over wolf re-introduction is huge and continues, and those are shy animals. Nobody really wants the lion-related fatality rates some African nations experience. Unless we move out, the large-scale predators, or even our own native ones, can't move in.

As much as I loathe fox-hunting, I have to also understand that it is the fox-hunting associations that preserve the hedgerows, imporantly refuges for biological diversity. Reliying on individaul farmers has proved disasterous as it is only those with really vested interests who will consistently get out and work for their conservation.

[kaytee101]

Don't worry JiltedCitizen, if i had a problem with hunters I wouldn't have accepted my job at the Depart. of Fish and Game....and I would be lecturing my friend every time he hunted (which i definitely don't), and I wouldn't have done his family respect by joining them in the dinner that they brought home (wild turkey) from their day of hunting. As I said i have nothing PERSONAL against them. It's just not an activity i would choose to support (I won't hunt, and i won't raise my family to either).

What people choose to do with their free time is their choice. The poster asked for a viewpoint that might explain why the two sides won't see eye to eye, (given if one side is not vegan or vegetarian) and I gave him one.

And the only reason I spoke out against the good reasons or excusable reasonings behind hunting is because its not necessarily the only way to fix the problem--though it may be the cheapest or the most convenient or least complicated. But we all know that even when facing other environmental issues that the cheapest most convenient or easiest way is not always going to end up being the best or the only way, right??

People wonder why hunters and treehuggers will never see eye to eye and i believe the reason is obvious. A hunter chooses to restore and conserve land in order to keep using its resources, while a treehugger would still want to restore land that offers no resources at all. I know its different reasonings, and I understand that both are valid reasons for conservation, however the motivations are what keep the two sides butting heads all the time.

my personal viewpoint is as i stated, I dont have anything personal against hunting, but if it continues I'd like to see a little more motivation from fish and game societies to protect ALL parts of this earth (not just the parts they use), especially since they bother to take directly from her. I respect those who live fully sustainably off the land (I would like to even see EVENTUALLY humans going back to a time when we did NEED to hunt....i just said i didnt want it to be a complete 180 tomorrow--rifles in the hands of every family in the world is something the human race isnt prepared for), however i feel those who take part in that life style need to show the earth respect, and be thankful for what they DO receive from the earth....which is something i don't really get from most hunters. Most hunters have the "its just a -insert certain animal here-." and assume that this world is here for their consumption. I mean how many hunters do you think would take the time to limit themselves in how much they take if there were no financial penalties or jail time for taking too much??

[keoni]

"Most hunters have the "its just a -insert certain animal here-." and assume that this world is here for their consumption."

I think that is a valid point, but it applies to almost every living person, whether they hunt or not.