Tis The Poaching Season
 

http://www.wildfreshness.com/brian/archives/Moose.jpg
Damn! That's a lot o' moose burgers.

On the evening of Sunday, September 17th, a local hunter reported the presence of a possible hunting camp in the northeast corner of the park, where hunting is prohibited. The park pilot conducted an overflight of the area, located the camp, and observed a moose kill site approximately two miles inside the park boundary. Aerial observations suggested that the hunters had illegally used ATV’s to access the area. Three rangers flew to the site by helicopter early on Monday morning and apprehended two hunters – 54 year-old Delmar Neeley of Anderson, Alaska, and 22 year-old Robert Maxfield of Nenana, Alaska. The rangers seized a 43-inch bull moose (43 inches is the measurement of the maximum width between the bull's antlers) along with weapons and other evidence. To prevent further resource damage, one of the hunters’ two ATV’s was sling-loaded to a point outside the park boundary. Activation of the hunters’ own GPS receiver at the kill site showed that they were well inside the park. Misdemeanor Lacey Act and other charges against the two are pending

Further proof that people frequently suck and will do anything they think they can get away with.

I'll bet the price per pound for this moose meat and rack is going to be a bit lofty.

Moose Meat
 

Well, take the cost of the overflights (fuel, pay hours), the cost of hauling out that ATV, the cost of loading up that moose flesh, and the cost of processing the criminals, and you have some filet mingnon prices fer shur.:neutral:

Alaska is usually pretty good with getting extra salmon out to the poor people, of which there are many in the state, but I don't know to what stomachs, if any, that moose meat will find its way.

I don't know about you, spode, but I just don't get big game hunting. I get it if you are a paleo-Indian, but not if your are some modern-day middle-class dude. I can hardly stomach those hunting shows on ESPN and OLN.:mad:

Good thing they are not in Africa... or is it?

I've never killed anything but putting a mangled possum out of its misery, but I don't mind hunting, if the meat is eaten. In fact, I've considered taking up hunting, so I can feed the family after the end of civilization as we know it. That would be next, I think.;)

PS: Delmar?!

It is a good skill to have.

Meat Matters
 

I don't know. We've spent thousands of years domesticating animals so we don't "have" to hunt. We've already killed off thousands of species of plants and animals, so why kill more? Ironically, we killed the most important ones, the ones that prey on the megafauna, so now we have rampant deer herds getting malnourished because of their population explosion.

How bout if you just hunt skinny, malnourished deer in the suburbs for now? Or at least wait until the apocalypse.:neutral:

I used to know a lot of people that would go hunting (legally) and eat the meat for the rest of the year. It would save them money because they weren't the most prosperous people. I think I kind of agree that if it is eaten and used it is fine. Not just killed to put a head on a wall.

I agree that trophy hunting is nothing more than exhibitionism without pulling out your cock. Hunting for food is 100% reasonable, IMHO.

Meaty Issue
 

It's certainly not a cut and dry situation (is that a animal-skinning metaphor?).

Most unprosperous people here in the ATL are obese, but there aren't always a lot of McDs in the rural areas, so I can see huntin and freezin the meat.:neutral:

This reminds me of an e-mail my friend in Oregon sent me last winter. It's a good read (she's a greenie/crunchy in a Red/Rual area):

Eastern Oregon, circa early winter 2006:
Last night I attended a town meeting sponsored by the ailing timber/agriculture industries. I was the only person there who hadn't lived here at least 5 years. I also had the only car in the parking lot with a ski rack (instead of a trailer hitch, for my snowmobiles) and 4 cylinders instead of 8. (Oh, yeah -- there are no compact parking spaces anywhere in John Day.)

Anyway .... most folks showed up because it's also the annual Road Kill Chili Feed -- and they weren't kidding. There was one chili dubbed "Mile marker 149." But the one that stopped me cold was ... Bobcat Chili. And they may not have been kidding. The elderly lady across the table from me said she'd eaten cougar before and didn't like it so she wasn't touching the bobcat.

My boss goes bobcat hunting on weekends. He calls it "out looking for kitty cats." He said the "interesting" thing about bobcats is that when they get caught in a leghold trap, "they just lay down, they don't try to get away." Oregon has outlawed hunting for mountain lions with dogs because it was deemed unsportsmanlike, but you can still set traps for bobcats.

My coworker (there are only 3 of us in winter) announced he had twins the other day and he meant baby cows. On his weekends, for fun, he does team roping. Next month is when the big ranches will run their herds through town -- I'm not sure where to (their imminent deaths?) but it should be another valued cultural experience. Bring your cameras and pull up a stump in front of Otis' Barber Shop.

Anyway, at last night's meeting, Bill Clinton got lots of laughs, and the buzzwords were "manage" and "treat." These translate to "cut" and "kill," depending on whether they were talking about forests or wolves. As in "How many acres did we treat in 1993?" or "Idaho gets to manage wolves; why can't Oregon?"

At one point, a guy held up the 1907 USFS handbook and said "Why can't we go back to this?" (Ah, maybe because there are no big trees left, and that's what that book was all about?)

I saw a man wearing a shirt with an elk head embroidered above his heart. Women wore sweatshirts with chipmunks and bird feeders and white picket fences imprinted.

One audience member said, "We need to load all the environmentalists on a bomber and drop them on Iraq."

They blamed Portland and Eugene (but not Corvallis, home of the timber-industry-sponsored OSU School of Forestry) for all the economic problems east of the Cascades. "How do we get urban America to care about rural America?" one guy said, then added that it was "a silly prescription" to be told not to cut within 300 feet of a stream. (Ah, let's see -- maybe urban America will care about rural America when rural America cares about rural America?) Oh, yeah, and this guy is the chief forester for the USFS here. For the past 22 years.

As for my job, it's going great, truly, as long as no one asks me on a weekend hunting or logging excursion. Work has provided some terrific out-of-town trips to meet with other staff in the region, which is absolutely gorgeous to drive through this time of year. It's like motoring through a national park -- and, well, part of it is, the John Day Fossil Beds Nat'l Monument. The rest of it is giant ranch holdings or private timberlands, with some USFS and BLM lands tossed in here and there, so you don't see many settlements and even fewer people (but lots of cows). It was wonderful last week because the snow is so deep it's concealed all the fences, so I could imagine taking off from the road and cross-country skiing. My biggest challenge here is how to ski with fences.

On one of our work trips we took the scenic route so my boss could look for elk, which he is able to track by their hoofprints in snow by the roadside, which he was doing while he drove us through a snowstorm at 50 mph -- and he was not using the 4WD in our pickup -- to attend a .... driving safety class. Taught by a guy from England. A guy who drives on the left is teaching all Oregon state employees how to be safe drivers.

At the class, the instructor asked for examples of distractions while in a car. "A good-looking guy," one woman said. "A pretty woman," a guy said. "A big ol' elk up on a hillside," said another.

Fred, meanwhile, is holed up in Eugene, where he's mopping up after a major flood through our garage. Well, someone has to stay in Eugene and defend our right to eat tofu and commute by bike.

I leave tomorrow for my first of two weeks training at the police academy, where I will be issued a citation book and a fat leather-bound notebook that, my boss says, I'll be told not to tear any pages out of because that looks bad if I'm asked for details while on the witness stand. I can't wait for the chance to testify against all these hostile museum-goers.

Marti

We've been subsistence hunting for a pretty long time now. In Alaska, it's still the rule rather than the exception. I'm sure they would rather hunt than pay half their food budget for meat. They would rather eat game than hormone ridden, mad cows? Sounds good to me.

The Federal Government has grabbed 2/3 of Alaska for parks, Preserves, Wilderness Areas, National Forests, Scenic Areas and what not.
They're lucky they're not like Nevada at 91%.

Those guys know the rules and if they didn't know they were on park land, it's because they didn't bother to check their GPS and a map. It's not necessary to hunt the park because Alaska is knee deep in moose. That said, a lot of the native Alaskans have trouble understanding why they can shoot a moose here but not over there. It all looks the same for many, many miles.
They'll pay a heavy price for that moose and not get to eat it. Plus they, and their friends at the bar, will have a little bigger resentment for the Feds.


Marti sounds like she finds the natives very entertaining. Fine, as long as she keeps in mind, they are the natives. She is the tofu eating tourist in those parts. And the government bureaucrats don't understand why the people have no respect for them. :rolleyes:

A well kept secret among the Green community is that hunters are environmentalist and the ones with the deepest pockets when it comes to paying for pristine land, so when a State and a Green org. go head to head the Green goes to the local Duck, Moose, Deer, etc, hunters orgs for the jack for the land and for long term contracts and terms for the management of the land. The hunters, in turn, keep quiet about where the money came from.
This has been going on for hundreds of years. There are more white tailed deer in the US now than there were when Columbus landed... we need hunters for population control. Land owners and the States cannot do it.
Not only is there nothing wrong with culling, it has to be done.
Also, it is better for you &, IMO, tastes a hell of a lot better.
If you eat meat, wear leather, use glue, have it in your car or anywhere else, something dies... it does not matter what.
End of story.

Poachers, on the other-hand are criminals and need to be treated as such, at all times. They are discharging firearms... the crime needs to be treated with the weight of that in mind.
In Africa they are shot on sight.
I do not think it needs to be that steep, but very steep.
On our ranch, if they did not drop their weapons as soon as we told them to we did shoot at them. Poachers tend to shoot instead of giving-up.
They are scum that destroy the breeding cycles of animals, they care nothing for the environment.

The last time they tried a controlled hunt near me, PETA members were trying to throw themselves between the deer and the hunters. Luckily, the hunters have better shot discipline than the PETA members.

The whole idea of PETA is so backwards it is truly insane & I do think that animals have a soul and deserve as much dignity as can be given.

I have a vegan, PETA-like coworker who drives me nuts with his illogic. He will eat veggies from factory farms and see no connection between his American way of life and the habitat that was destroyed to allow him to enjoy it. He thinks he's "better" than we meat eaters. He's really weird, too. One time while driving with him for work he saw a squirrel way up the road and literally started yelling "Slow down! Slow down!" Well, if you know squirrels, the best way to avoid squishing them is to maintain your speed and trajectory because they always do that hesitate dance; if you slow down suddenly you can end up squishing them. But this guy spent the whole rest of the trip sulking because I did not slow down (the squirrel was fine, BTW). And now he always tells the story like I was some evil, callous animal hater. What a jerk! Besides, I can identify most any bird or animal I ever see and he can't tell the difference between a Cooper's Hawk and a Red Tail.

Yes. Cull the deer. They graze on median strips now. Evolution in our own lifetime.

PETA is a hyporitical organization that needs to get it's priorities straight. I could really get on a soapbox about PETA.

Ask a PETA if they go to the movies... celluloid is made from animals. Cars have lots of animal products... there are many questions that will shut them up. Corp. vegetable farms kill MANY animals.
PETA, kills many pets, more than all the humane societies combined in it's home state.
Lot of good stuff on YouTube... PETA sucks, it is anti-human and, in the long run, anti-animal. It is nihilist.

Yup, and they fund a group called the ALA, Animal Liberation Front, splinter group of the Earth Liberation Front, which the FBI named one of the most dangerous domestic terrorist groups.

Plus, they're against using any drugs tested on animals... Yet their president is diabetic and uses insulin which, OMG tests on animals. Hypocrites.

Not only tests on animals, but is often processed from animal sources, usually sheep, I think.

There is now a synthetic insulin product, but I don't know how effective it is. One of my (meat eating) friends is on it, but she is such a brittle diabetic it's hard to tell whether it's working well.

I know someone who was forced to switch after using the critter based insulin for 30 years. It's not going well, in that almost a year later they haven't been able to tune in her right dosage. :(

PETA gets pwned.

I am a vegetarian, but I have little to no problem with other people eating meat. I do have a problem with hunting if the meat isnt eaten, but it's simply my choice to not eat meat, and I'm not gonna tell anyone else not to. I may say I think its simply better not to, and I will admit that I have no factual information saying why I think it's better, but I just do, and so it is. I dont eat it, but I could not care less if other people so.

If you can eat healthy without meat and it works for you, why not. I like meat and am intollerant when it comes to wheat so I'm sorta limited.

I think hunting is great. Any and all forms. I used to think trophy hunting was stupid, but I'm gonna throw in with them just because I can't stand animal rights activism.

It started with Bambi, didn't it? The whole notion of talking baby animals with big bulbous eyes being chased by M A N? Thanks, Walt. Now those people have kids who have been raised to think that everything with a nervous system is a human being (or possibly better than human).

That deer? It's meat. It doesn't love its "children", think about its future, or wish upon a frigging star. It knows nothing but stimuli and response, and has no concept of anything outside of eating, breeding, and running away from things. It lives to be grilled and consumed with a nice green salad and glass of zinfandel. If it has larger than average antlers, those antlers will be displayed on my wall -- not because of my feelings about my penis, but because I like the way it (edit: the rack, not my dick) looks and like to tell the story of the hunt to anyone who asks about it.

I have the utmost respect for wildlife, but under no circumstances will I stop eating it.

I disagree with you about the way animals feel about their young. I have spent an enormous amount of time with deer in the wild and have see their behavior. They are caring loving parents, just like cows & especially pigs... this point has nothing to do with eating them.

I have no problem with vegetarians like you, Ibram, who do it because they personally want to. I do have a problem with PETA-level vegans who verbally attack me and call me a cannibal just because I don't mind a hamburger now and then. (I made a rather eventful foray on the peta2 message boards... before my account was deleted because *le gasp* I'm not vegan.)

sometimes they are.

how do you know?

:lol: figures

I used to spend a lot of time on a kayak building message board. We didn't like it when people would visit our board and talk about how to buy plastic kayaks or try to talk about other stuff. The point of the board was to discuss how to best make kayaks.

A specialized board is perfectly justified in banning or moderating a member who is off-topic.

Last time I checked, peta was about animal rights. I'm all for animal rights... maybe not to their extreme, but I still am. I don't think makeup should be tested on animals, I'm against wearing fur, and I think hunting should be for sustenance only. I still eat meat, though, because I believe humans are biologically omnivores, and since I don't have the means to go out and hunt my own food, I have to rely on store-bought meat. So sue me. I wasn't off topic, I was just not a vegetarian. I wasn't off topic, I was just there for other aspects of animal rights besides veganism.

If we eat meat, why not wear the fur, if you wear leather, why not the fur... makes no sense.

I believe animals should be afforded some rights, too...well, er, uh, except for that first one in this thread:
http://www.cellar.org/showthread.php...770#post267770

I think if you look closely at PETA, they admit that they are against eating meat. They are just going for the "easier" targets now, like animal testing and wearing fur. If they conquer those issues, they may focus on meat later.

You weren't with their program, and they didn't want you. I'm not a fan of censorship, but I think they have a right to keep their forum focused on a limited area of discussion. I don't like PETA, by the way, so don't think I am defending them because I'm a supporter.

Welcome to the Cellar. By the way, you can talk about anything here without getting banned. (Within the limits of the rules you read when you signed up.)

I think the idea with fur is that the meat isn't eaten. The animal is raised and killed just for its fur. It's wasteful. Leather is different. The meat is used and so is the skin. That's a positive.

I'm opposed to wearing fur just because of the crass consumerism involved. It's the same reason I'm against Hummers. But I'm not going to ban either.

I believe that they are nurturing and protecting their young, but not that they have an emotional response to them. I think we project our own experiences onto the animals. The idea of "feelings" is wholly human -- come to think of it, not every human seems to have the ability to feel, either.

House cats are a prime example. Whenever a cat comes up and rubs its eyebrow gland thingys on you, it's not giving you kissy-wissies. It's marking you so some other cat doesn't come along and take you away. Oh well. If it makes people happy, let em think otherwise.

Eyebrow gland thingys and kissy wissies. Wow, I'm erudite.

Yeah... This was in my pre-hatred of Peta days. It's not the only reason I hate them, not like I was emotionally scarred or anything. I just think they'd make better progress if, instead of banning everyone who doesn't agree with them on every single little poin, they worked together towards what they did agree on, and maybe try to subtly convert me in the process. Not that it'd work, just that it'd prolly be better for their image.

Ok, you're on a kayak, and you're building message boards? Wow! Can't you do that at home? You had me going, there. Eats, shoot, and leaves.

Every carnivore that PETA saves becomes a threat to prey animals. This is unconscionable! Kill predators before they kill helpless prey!

Emotional response is a method by which instinct operates. Feelings are instinct. Logic is where we kick the asses of the rest of the animals. Even the dumbest human can outthink the smartest chimp, while there are animals that mourn their dead children more than some humans.

Guillemot?

PETA says no meat, no leather, no fur....no pets....simply naysayers.

Other, more rational, people don't eat meat but don't have a problem with leather, because they realize you eat meat and the leather is a byproduct.

The anti-fur thing, is because fur animals are usually raised for fur alone and not a byproduct of the food supply. They don't like the idea of raising an animal simply for it's hide, but I doubt the rest is wasted. It probably goes into dog food or fertilizer.

I have no problem will snuffing the minks...nasty beasties they are.:guinea:

I should clarify my previously stated position to say that I also have no objection to displaying as a trophy any amusing parts of a creature that one has killed and eaten. They aren't using it anymore.

Pure trophy killing is not on my list of favorite, things, though.

The meat is not eaten by humans, it is eaten.
My father's Hummer gets better mileage than his Ford F-150 did and my neighbors Bronco now does, as well as all classes of Explorer, the full sized Nissan truck and almost all other full-sized trucks and SUVs...The H1 has been phazed out and now there is only the H2 and 3.
What, exactly, is your problem with them?
PETA, is also against milk, eggs, honey and all similar forms of animal "enslavement".

I'd never known, until recently, just how hard bees have to work to make honey--it does look kinda mean when someone goes in and swipes it right out from under them.

Oh well. :yum:

You should see what-all goes into a pair of jeans.:eek:

Your right, we should. Everyone take off your jeans. :blush:

Yeah, that was the board I spent a lot of time at, but I built a CLC plywood kayak.

I thought I was pretty clear about that. "Crass consumerism."

All the vehicles you mention are ones I'm not fond of. They are all wasteful. Although the trucks do have a utilitarian purpose and I don't oppose them when they are used that way. Most people don't need SUVs. When virtually all of your driving is done on paved surfaces, why would you need an SUV? I'm not going to support a ban on any of those vehicles, but that doesn't mean I have to like them. They are dangerous to the other vehicles on the road because they have so much more mass, they block visibility, they use more oil than my car, and people buy them mostly for intangible reasons that relate to status and feelings, and have nothing to do with needs.

Now glatt, don't meddle in other people's sex lives. :haha:

Your roads are a lot better than mine man. One of the reasons I went truck this time was that I was dead tired of having my teeth rattled and getting bent rims from potholes.

Of course running low-profile tires and gas shocks/struts to feel more sporty was part of the problem. But what're ya gonna do?

SUVs and trucks are very popular, so you don't make many friends when you complain about them. Part of the problem is that most people get their egos all wrapped up in their cars. A car is a statement, so if I say I don't like your car, it's like saying I don't like you. Which is, of course, untrue. I probably also have my ego wrapped up in my car, but for different reasons.

I hadn't thought about potholes. I can see that as a reason to lean towards getting an SUV, since they have a higher clearance and beefier suspension. But I imagine the wheels of an SUV take the same beating that the wheels of a car take, all things being equal.

The bottom line is I wouldn't support taking SUVs away from people, or banning them. I just don't care for them. I wish there were fewer of them on the road.

It is not up to you do decide that for people, now is it?
If someone is into buying and restoring antiques, going fishing on the weekends or camping, can you define "need" for the type of vehicle they should buy. In my father's case, our family is in the citrus industry. A puny little car does not quite cut it in sugar-sand, fit men our size, have a place for my wheelchair.
"Most people" means what when it comes to doing what about what when it comes to the vehicles you are talking about? Be specific, practical and realistic and perhaps people will listen.
Sounds to me, more often than not, "environmentalists" are about status... most hunters I know are more environmentally sound in practice than the hippies that use that term.

I don't think he's saying that it is.
I see driving gas guzzlers as supportive of a pretty screwed up part of our national life. I do own and use a pickup in addition to my Echo. If we bore the cost at the pump of our enormous military subsidy of oil, I think folks would make different choices and would drag the Big Three kicking and screaming into a more responsible reality. As it is, we pay the subsidy through our income taxes and our children's income taxes, separating us from the reality of our decisions.

You just need to run with a better class of hippies.

I'm just sayin.

Nonsense, people send the Big 3 messages with their wallet, not with mobs, even metaphorically. :cool:

I'm pretty sure that's what I just said.

True, but they are basing that message on the price of gasoline they see at the pump. The price of gasoline at the pump is not the cost of gasoline. It doesn't include the $100 Billion a year we spend in Iraq to keep teh oil flowing. (Nevermind that it isn't working.) If the price at the pump was the true cost of the gasoline, they might send a different message with their wallets.

Just before your rant... riiiiiiiiht.

Big three? Gee... let's see what Nissan is selling lots of now.... hmmmmmm.
Trucks and SUVs are about choice and lifestyle. That you can afford two cars to burn fuel and hold twice the oil for one person is great, but not, exactly, saving the planet.
Soon they will be using alternative fuels and all this will be moot, have fun ranting.

Two two car solution is my dream G. Now that I have the truck I see how great it is to have one. But I also want something economical. The best answer, it seems to me, is to buy a smallish sedan and also a 10-year-old truck. Drive the car 2/3rds of the time, the truck when conditions are less than ideal and/or things need hauling.

The two car solution is my dream as well. Small car for 98% of our driving, and some sort of large passenger van that has removable seats for hauling stuff or lots of people.

You can only drive one at a time, so you aren't doing any more damage by having two.

basically what glatt said. If we had the wallet hit at the pump instead of in our income taxes or our children's income taxes vehicles would change.

rkzenrage- I'm not making an environmental argument. I'm saying, I'm tired of subsidizing other peoples vehicle/fuel choices. Between the tax $ cost and the body count in Iraq, you'd think glatt would get an amen on this. As long as we separate the cost at the pump from the real tax burden nobody is going to ask the automakers for a different rig.

I've been trying to find a way around it but at this point, loading firewood in my Echo seems counter-productive.

I don't buy it.
1. How is anything were doing in Iraq helping the oil to flow?
2. Our international escapades seem to be completely disconnected from anything the populace, say, do or feel.

Are you telling me if we didn't import oil we wouldn't be the world cop? I don't think that's remotely true. :headshake