Ethics Test by the Hunting Gods

[Paul K]

My wife and I take 3 to 4 deer every year off our property, preferable Does, they are our main meat source along with fish we catch ,pork and chicken. We can't tolerate beef any more. The first day of dear gun season I shot 2 nice Does by 8:00 am. Field dressed them then hung them in the garage to skin them. Went into the house to get a cup of hot tea, looked out the kitchen window and there was a very large bodied 10 pt on my feeder at 110 yards. I said, well look at that, opened up the kitchen window and then picked up my 45-70 single shot and wacked it. An hour latter my wife shot a huge Doe. Freezer filled, done for the year and felt blessed for the bounty of meat and felt darn good about it.

Paul

 

[Datchew]

Yep, I get tired of hearing of people going to the Mexican side of Laguna Madre’ shooting redheads and pintail until they physically cant shoot anymore but on the American side it’s 2 redheads and this year 3 pintail and probably going back to 1 pintail next year if not a closed season on pintail.
I get that the US has way more hunters but that duck is just as dead if it’s shot in Mexico or Texas.
Back to the original post about ethics, mine won’t let me do that even though I’ve been invited a couple of times.

Grave tactical error alert!!!!!
A forum member has brought logic and reason into the discussion of US GOV game management.

 

[farmer_john]

you need a suppressed rifle!

Or just a 3 inch crack in the window and pull back 15ft.

Grave tactical error alert!!!!!
A forum member has brought logic and reason into the discussion of US GOV game management.

Or.
Just because jamal robs a bank does it make it right for you to do it?

If we said have fun no limits. I think the duck population would go out alot faster

 

[Ridge Runner]

If we said have fun no limits. I think the duck population would go out alot faster

Not just waterfowl.

"Market hunters" decimated the waterfowl and many other game animal populations to near and to extinction.

This is why we, in the US, have:
hunting seasons
species limits
on types of weapons and ammuntion we can use,
number of shells in the firearm,
etc,
etc,

 

[farmer_john]

See here one of the ethnic things again why I don’t really like ethnic’s.

Lol. Tell us how you really feel.

 

[steve white]

When I was dove hunting this fall I saw very few and hit only a small portion of the ones I fired upon

Yesterday evening, walking the dogs in the neighborhood and suddenly there were massive flocks of dove everywhere. In December!!!

I'm standing there with 2 Labradors and no shotty. Ugh.

I barely resisted taking my old 870 wingmaster on "one more loop" around the block.
Test passed.

That's because the birds had learned to go into town for safety. I think they are pushing their luck.

 

[farmer_john]

Not just waterfowl.

"Market hunters" decimated the waterfowl and many other game animal populations to near and to extinction.

This is why we, in the US, have:
hunting seasons
species limits
on types of weapons and ammuntion we can use,
number of shells in the firearm,
etc,
etc,

Can you imagine using a 2 gauge punt gun with 1-2 lbs of shot?

 

[farmer_john]

That's because the birds had learned to go into town for safety. I think they are pushing their luck.

If it doesnt migrate is it really not ethical to take from the golf course?? I know everyones had that thought

 

[Ridge Runner]

Can you imagine using a 2 gauge punt gun with 1-2 lbs of shot?

.....Only on a 1/2" x 4' x 8' sheet of plywood full of balloons.

.....Or perhaps on a few property damaging rioters when the cops aren't around.

 

[Ridge Runner]

If it doesnt migrate is it really not ethical to take from the golf course?? I know everyones had that thought

Depends on golf course location and the golf courses' ability to aquire nuisance permits.

Here in Tennessee they are considered resident geese and a nuisance this allows us a higher bag limit in our early season. In the later seasons the geese bag limit is reduced due to migrating geese transitioning through the state.

On certain geese species at the end of the regular season the normal regulations give way to no shell limits and no bag limits.

 

[steve white]

If it doesnt migrate is it really not ethical to take from the golf course?? I know everyones had that thought

The "Metro barrels" that screw into choke tube threads were made for just that, and were welcomed by neighbors who were tired of the complications of too many geese on the fairways and in the yards. they are not true silencers, about the same level of suppression as one would find on a high powered rifle, and are somewhat unwieldy as they add another 30" to the shotgun!

The law cannot always anticipate new problems, like geese overpopulating to the extent that they uproot all the grass for 200 yds back from the banks of Hudson Bay--and have made a barren arctic desert strip for 1500 miles!!!! That's why you can use electronic calls and unplugged shotguns these days. I think there should be a rifle season for snow geese clustered 400 yds out in the fields...
Nor did anyone anticipate white tail deer coming into San Saba or towns near Ft. Hood and daily straying onto school playgrounds, or eating shrubs and laying around in the yards near houses during deer season. They have it dialed in.
Leonard Lee LaRue was invited to speak on deer management in Connecticut, but quickly found out that they did not want more deer--they wanted them eliminated from inside the town! He suggested an in-town archery season, shooting downward from elevated positions and with a curfew on people leaving their homes before 10:00 am, if possible. Folks hung deer stands on telephone poles and basketball goals, and shot between the houses. The deer learned to take it back to the forests!
Sometimes landowners get special deer reduction permits to protect their crops; sounds like a war going on when they do--and they get to shoot at night, game wardens in attendance.

If deer have learned to do all these things, then shooting one eating pumpkins in the back yard is just adjusting to new behavior patterns! If that happened to me, the backstraps would be on the grill so fast it would make your head spin.

 

[Ridge Runner]

See here one of the ethnic things again why I don’t really like ethnic’s.

I was raised that the reason for a kill was food
Not a trophy or testament to anything but the meat.
Or if a animal was doing damage to something.

Then again I don’t hunt for horns.

LOL....I just caught this......

Damn auto correct.....maybe or maybe not.

We are discussing hunting e-t-h-i-c-s.
Not hunting e-t-h-n-i-c-s. That would require another OP.

 

[Flbt]

LOL....I just caught this......

Damn auto correct.....maybe or maybe not.

We are discussing hunting e-t-h-i-c-s.
Not hunting e-t-h-n-i-c-s. That would require another OP.

Dyslexic and autocorrect
Bad combination

 

[Datchew]

That's because the birds had learned to go into town for safety. I think they are pushing their luck.

They're organized. Perhaps they're plotting against me as we speak.

 

[steve white]

I guess what I forgot to spell out above--if you think things need to be done differently, then organize and get an exemption like the town in Connecticut that had an "in-town" archery season, or the farmers who got an animal control exemption.

 

[Tgood1]

Scenario 1: absolutely the right decision
Scenario 2: boom, a solid gift there

 

[Doug Hamilton]

I dont see the backyard buck as an ethics test... I see that as a gift from the Almighty... ''

Never test or question the wisdom of the Almighty....

I'd be eating backstrap for dinner that night

If God offers you a freebee, maybe it's rude to refuse?

 

[Doug Hamilton]

Has anyone felt their hunting ethics were tested by the hunting gods?
Mine were tested twice this year:
The first one was 3 weeks ago while hunting a specific buck on our property. Two bucks were full out fighting behind my stand 15 minutes before sundown, 75 yards over the line on my neighbor's property. They broke up after their fight to go in separate directions; the larger one (the one I had been after) headed towards my property only to stop 35-40 yds still off my line. I had my safety off, and a clear broadside shot but did not shoot because I had not met my new neighbor and don't have an agreement with him regarding matters similar to this. I lowered my rifle, the buck hung out for a short time and wandered back into the brush- Test #1 Pass!

The second test was 2 evenings ago. I was starting to prepare our dinner when I caught movement in our back yard from the kitchen window. I was shocked to see walking through my yard, in the wide open most likely one of the largest bucks I had ever seen! He wandered through the yard and up to a spot where I had dumped our pumpkins from Halloween and started to paw, kick and eat at them for 10 minutes just 45 yds from the back door. At that point while he was busy with his business I would have had plenty of time for an easy shot from my back door but instead opted to watch him instead, it just didn't seem right for him to go this way. I might be a fool, but we will call it -Test #2 Pass!

Does anyone else have an incident that could be an "Ethics Test" that makes you proud of the hunter you are??

Back in the early 1990s I had enrolled in a summer class at the local community college. It was brutally.hot as I sat out on the deck working on a paper.when I heard strange noises on the side of the house. I got up to.look and there were three legal (forked horns or better) bucks picking over my wife's flowers. They stopped long enough to watch me but didn't leave. The archery season in the California A zone opened on around July 10, so I could have grabbed my bow. I was a little out of practice but a 10 yard shot? No problem. It would have been completely legal, but my problem was that the deer were half tamed by living among the houses in the development. They were used to people, kids, cars, etc. They just didn't have the whole hunter/prey relationship worked out. I went and got my 35 mm camera and telephoto lens. I got some good pictures of blacktail bucks, which are pretty hard to come by.

 

[coreydb]

I wouldn't even think about shooting anything on my neighbor's property. As for the Buck in the back yard, easy pickins, as long as it's still open season.

 

[steve white]

Ever look back and wish you could have been a rascal and dropped that buck 3 yards on the wrong side of a fence? I can still see a wide racked, short tined old gray boney buck walking toward me 3 yds to the wrong side. Right things sometimes hurt a little.