Hunting, it is true, is an American tradition -- a tradition of killing, crippling, extinction, and ecological destruction. With an arsenal of rifles, shotguns, muzzleloaders, handguns, and bows and arrows, hunters kill more than 200 million animals yearly -- crippling, orphaning, and harassing millions more.
The annual death toll in the U.S. includes 50 million mourning doves, 30 million squirrels, 28 million quail, 25 million rabbits, 20 million pheasants, 6 million ducks, 4 million deer, and thousands of geese, bears, moose, elk, antelope, swans, cougars, turkeys, wolves, foxes, coyotes, bobcats, boars, and other woodland creatures. [1]
A: When hunters talk about shooting overpopulated animals, they generally refer to white-tailed deer, representing only 2 percent of all the animals killed by hunters. Sport hunters shoot millions of mourning doves, squirrels, rabbits, and waterfowl, and thousands of predators, none of whom any wildlife biologist would claim are overpopulated or need to be hunted.
Even with deer, hunters do not search for starving animals. They either shoot animals at random, or they seek out the strongest and healthiest animals in order to bring home the biggest trophies or largest antlers. Hunters and wildlife agencies are not concerned about reducing deer herds, but rather with increasing the number of targets for hunters and the number of potential hunting license dollars. Thus, they use deer overpopulation as a smokescreen to justify their sport. The New Jersey Division of Fish, Game and Wildlife states that "the deer resource has been managed primarily for the purpose of sport hunting,"[2] and hunters readily admit, "deer hunters want more deer and more bucks, period."[3]
Hunters shoot nonnative species such as ring-necked pheasants who are hand-fed and raised in pens and then released into the wild just before hunting season. Even if the pheasants -- native to China -- survive the hunters' onslaught, they are certain to die of exposure or starvation in the nonnative environment.[4] While hunters claim they save overpopulated animals from starvation, they intentionally breed some species and let them starve to death.
A: Because they make their money primarily from the sale of hunting licenses, the major function of wildlife agencies is not to protect individual animals or biological diversity, but to propagate "game" species for hunters to shoot. State agencies build roads through our wild lands to facilitate hunter access, they pour millions into law enforcement of hunting regulations and hunter education, and they spend millions manipulating habitat by burning and clear-cutting forests to increase the food supply for "game" species such as deer. More food means a larger herd and more animals available as targets. They are out to conserve sport hunting -- not wildlife.
For example, Michigan has a "Deer Range Improvement Program" (DRIP) that earmarks $1.50 from each deer hunting license sold into a fund specifically designed to increase deer reproductivity and to maximize sport hunting opportunities. According to a 1975 newspaper report, three years after the DRIP program began, "The DNR's Wildlife Division wants to keep clear-cutting until 1.2 million acres of forest land -- more than a third of all of the state-owned forest -- have been stripped . . . the wildlife division says it is necessary because a forest managed by nature, instead of by a wildlife division, can support only a fraction of the deer herd needed to provide for half a million hunters."[5] Since that 1975 report, the number of hunters in Michigan has doubled and the state's deer herd has tripled.
It is not just deer populations that wildlife agencies are trying to increase to provide more targets for sport hunters. Arizona's management plan for game species specifically states the goal is to "increase" pronghorn antelope and bighorn sheep "populations and provide recreational opportunity to as many individuals as possible," and to "maintain or enhance" cottontail rabbit and quail "hunting opportunity in the State by improving access to existing habitat."[6]
A: Scientists, biologists, veterinarians, and people who have lived with dogs, cats, or other animals, know that mammals and birds suffer fear and pain. All of our animal cruelty laws are based on this premise, as are all of the things we teach our children about kindness to animals. The ability of animals to suffer and feel pain is an accepted fact.
According to world-renowned scientists Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan, "From all criteria available to us -- the recognizable agony in the cries of wounded animals, for example, including those who usually utter hardly a sound -- this question [Do animals suffer?] seems moot. The limbic system in the human brain, known to be responsible for much of the richness of our emotional life, is prominent throughout the mammals. The same drugs that alleviate suffering in humans mitigate the cries and other signs of pain in many other animals. It is unseemly of us, who often behave so unfeelingly toward other animals, to contend that only humans can suffer."[7]
A: In the past, hunters have helped wipe out dozens of species, such as the passenger pigeon, the Great auk, and the heath hen. They have brought a long list of others, including the bison and the grizzly bear, to the brink of extinction. In fact, when Congress passed the Endangered Species Act (ESA) in 1973, the Senate Committee on Commerce stated, "The two major causes of extinction are hunting and destruction of natural habitat."[8]
While the ESA has slowed killing of imperiled animals considerably, hunters continue to kill threatened and endangered animals every year, either for fun or for failure to identify them properly. In the last few years alone, hunters have killed gray wolves, bald eagles, grizzly bears, and even such critically endangered animals as Florida panthers. While some species of squirrels and prairie dogs are candidates for listing under the ESA, state wildlife agencies keep them under the guns of sport hunters.
A: Some state wildlife agencies set hunting seasons on bears, squirrels, mountain lions, and other animals during the crucial months when they give birth and nurse their young. When a mother forages for food or searches for prey and she is killed by a sport hunter, her orphaned babies are certain to die of starvation or predation.
A: There is nothing fair about a chase in which the hunter uses a powerful weapon from ambush and the victim has no defense except luck. Furthermore, despite the hunting community's repeated rhetoric of "hunting ethics," they have refused to end repugnant practices that go above and beyond the cruelty inherent in all sport hunting. There is clearly no "fair chase" in many of the activities sanctioned by the hunting community, such as:
A: Bowhunting is one of the cruelest forms of hunting because primitive archery equipment wounds more animals than it kills. Dozens of scientific studies indicate that bowhunting yields more than a 50 percent crippling rate.[11] For every animal dragged from the woods, at least one animal is left wounded to suffer -- either to bleed to death or to become infested with parasites and diseases.
A: A few Native cultures may still hunt to survive, but in the continental U.S. hunting is practiced primarily for sport. Several studies indicate that the average price of venison from deer shot in the woods -- after calculating the costs of firearms, ammunition, license fees, travel expenses, etc. -- is about $20.00 per pound.[12] Clearly, there are more economic ways to eat than by spending $20.00 per pound for food.
A: If it were natural to hunt, more people would participate in the activity. Every year, the number of sport hunters decreases because fewer and fewer people are interested in killing animals for sport. According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 10 percent of Americans purchased hunting licenses in 1975, 7 percent in 1991, and fewer than 6 percent in 1994. Leading researchers in hunting demographics indicate that if current social trends continue, sport hunting will be extinct by the year 2050.[13]
To fight these trends, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and over half of our state wildlife agencies sponsor youth recruitment hunts on public land -- some for children as young as 5 years old -- taking kids into the woods and teaching them to kill. Similarly, most agencies have adopted the "Becoming an Outdoors Woman (BOW)" program in an effort to entice a segment of the population that traditionally has not been welcomed by the hunting fraternity, and thus, to increase sales of hunting licenses, firearms, and even new women's lines of outdoor clothing.
A: When hunters talk about paying money for wildlife conservation, they generally refer to the "Federal Aid in Wildlife Restoration Fund," which Congress created in 1937 when it passed the Pittman-Robertson Act. The fund derives its revenues from an 11 percent excise tax on rifles, shotguns, ammunition, and archery equipment, and a 10 percent excise tax on handguns. Each year, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service collects the funds and distributes them to state wildlife agencies based on each state's geographical size and number of licensed hunters.
While hunters claim they foot the entire bill, anyone who purchases firearms or ammunition for activities such as gun collecting, target shooting, and self protection contributes to the fund. In fact, according to the National Rifle Association there are nearly 70 million gun owners in the U.S., but the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reports there are only 14 million hunters.
Sadly, while hunters account for only one-fifth or 20 percent of those contributing to the fund, they benefit from nearly every expenditure of these monies. Of the revenue collected annually, about 25 percent is spent on hunter education, with the remainder spent on administration, research projects on "game" species, and manipulating lands to provide habitat favorable to "game" species[14] -- often at the expense of nongame and threatened and endangered species.
A: Realistically, hunting will not end overnight. The overwhelming majority of animal species that are nongame species have done just fine without sport hunting. Even if hunting did end tomorrow, people who purchase firearms and ammunition for target shooting, gun collecting, or personal protection would still contribute money to the Pittman-Robertson fund. Because the money would not be tied up in hunter education and stocking "game" species, the funds could be better spent on habitat protection and true conservation programs.
While only 6 percent of Americans hunt, more than 40 percent participate in nonconsumptive wildlife recreation, such as bird watching, wildlife photography, hiking, and camping. The loss of revenues from hunting license sales could be made up from other sources, such as a tax on tents, binoculars, and other outdoor equipment. Nonconsumptive wildlife recreationists spend $14.3 billion every year on their outdoor activities: $9.4 billion for equipment, $4.4 billion on transportation, lodging, and related items, and $480 million on miscellaneous expenses.[15]
Congress may soon consider a "Wildlife Diversity Funding Initiative" which would levy a federal excise tax on nonconsumptive outdoors equipment. Such a measure would make state wildlife agencies less dependent on the dollars and the desires of sport hunters, and more receptive to the wishes of all their constituents. Missouri, for example, already has a one-tenth of 1 percent sales tax that funds the Missouri Department of Conservation. Every citizen of that state pays for wildlife management, not just the select few who use wildlife as targets.
A: Times are changing and state agencies are beginning to realize they have a growing constituency of nonhunters to whom they need to answer. Several recent studies indicate that 51 to 73 percent of Americans oppose hunting for sport or recreation.[16] You, as a resident of your state, have a voice in how wildlife is treated. Become educated on the issue of hunting, attend state wildlife meetings, and get involved in the decision making process.
You can help us stop the mayhem in the woods by becoming a member of The Fund for Animals. For more information please click here, or contact us at:
The Fund for Animals
200 West 57th Street
New York, NY 10019
Phone: (212) 246-2096
For additional reading on hunting, we suggest:
2. New Jersey Division of Fish, Game and Wildlife, An Assessment of Deer Hunting in New Jersey, 1990.
3. Kenny Darwin, "Has the DNR Mismanaged Our Deer Herd?" Michigan Hunting & Fishing, June 1993.
4. L.G. MacNamara and E.L. Kozicky, "Band returns from male ring-necked pheasants in New Jersey," Journal of Wildlife Management, 13:286-294, 1949. G.V. Burger, "Survival of ring-necked pheasants on a Wisconsin shooting preserve," Journal of Wildlife Management, 28:711-721, 1964. E. Hessler, J.R. Tester, D.B. Siniff, and M.M. Nelson, "A biotelemetry study of survival of pen-reared pheasants released in selected habitats," Journal of Wildlife Management, 34:267-274, 1970.
5. Jim Schutze, "Trees Fall in Favor of Bigger Deer Crop," Detroit Free Press, January 27, 1975.
6. Arizona Game and Fish Department, Strategic Plans for the Management of Arizona's Game Species, 1992-1996.
7. Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan, Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors: A Search for Who We Are, Random House, New York, 1992.
8. 93rd Congress, 1st Session, Senate Report No. 307, U.S. Government Printing Office, 1973.
9. G.H. Haas, "Unretrieved shooting loss of mourning doves in north-central South Carolina," Wildlife Society Bulletin, 5:123-125, 1977.
10. The following states allow bear baiting: Alaska, Idaho, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, Utah, Washington, Wisconsin, Wyoming. [Compiled by The Fund for Animals with information from state wildlife agencies.] Colorado voters banned the practice of bear baiting in 1992, and Oregon voters banned the practice in 1994. Voters in Idaho, Michigan, and Washington will have the opportunity to do the same in November 1996.
The following states allow deer baiting: Arkansas, Florida, Iowa, Kentucky, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Montana, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Wisconsin, West Virginia. [Richard Smith, "Baiting Deer," Petersen's Bowhunting, November 1993.] Petersen's reports that deer baiting was "recently made illegal" in Minnesota and Missouri.
11. Adrian Benke, The Bowhunting Alternative, B. Todd Press, San Antonio, 1989.
12. J.G. Mitchell, The Hunt, Knopf, New York, 1980. J.G. Mitchell, "Our Wily White-Tailed Deer: Elegant but Perplexing Neighbors," Smithsonian, November 1982. E. Bauer, Deer in their World, Outdoor Life, New York, 1983. Matt Cartmill, A View to a Death in the Morning: Hunting and Nature through History, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1993.
13. Mark Damian Duda, "Factors related to hunting and fishing participation in the United States," Fish and Wildlife Reference Service, 1993.
14. Department of the Interior, "State Fish and Wildlife Agencies to Share $268 Million in Excise Tax Receipts," News Release, October 19, 1995.
15. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, National Survey on Hunting, Fishing and Wildlife Associated Recreation, December 1992.
16. Michael Satchell, "Should hunting be banned?" U.S. News & World Report, February 5, 1990. John Balzar, "Creatures Great and -- Equal?" Los Angeles Times, December 25, 1993. Arizona Game and Fish Department, Wildlife 2000 Survey, Behavior Research Center, Phoenix, March 1994. David Foster, "Animal Rights Pleas Heard," Associated Press, December 2, 1995.