Spare me the self-righteous claptrap. And the UK's foxes, unlike Texas's feral hogs, aren't a serious threat to the economy and domestic food production.
Jamie and Gordon have done stuff. Might not be the best TV in the world but I think it didn't do a bad job overall.
Whereas we are just a bunch of ignorant rednecks right? Maybe we are just from different societies. In the southern US, hunting and fishing are as much a part of the culture as cornbread and black eyed peas.
Personally I'm not against hunting as long as you get out there and kill it yourself and it has some practical purpose. I spent my youth around horses and birds of prey though, not bad for a city lad.
I can't look at a picture with a bunch of dogs and post anything serious either. I refrained from simply posting "I love dogs." because it didn't contribute to anything. After the point sunk in, that's all that could process. That or getting my ghillie suit ready because I see some of them thar redcoats a'comin'.
You know hunting with dogs has been banned for years, right? Because it was barbaric. Yeah, cos foxes are the vegans of the animal kingdom, they'd never consider eating, oh I don't know, chickens, for example.
This Hoggers show is about the killing of animals. It is drawing people in based on bloodlust. Fishing shows are not, plus, Fish don't feel pain http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/9797948/Fish-cannot-feel-pain-say-scientists.html
Yeah we banned hunting with dogs. That picture is either a trail hunt (no killing involved), an old picture or a hunt breaking the law. And when we make a UK TV show glorifying fox hunting it might be an accurate comparison. I mean cultural differences aside the most worrying thing to point out about the show isn't that it might be slightly set up or scripted. If you're surprised that TV of any sort is scripted and contrived then you need to get out more.
I don't think they do but I'd be surprised if it's for the reasons you are thinking. What is rightly a very important event for you folks isn't much more than an historical blip for a lot of us.
Oh, well if they eat chickens, by all means, eliminate one of your few remaining wild creatures. Fishing still kills animals last time I checked. The science for whether fish can or cannot feel pain is still unsettled - it's also a mistake to characterize as diverse a group as fish based on one survey of nociceptors in one fish. http://www.aps.uoguelph.ca/~rmoccia/RDM articles/Fish Welfare -Chandroo, Duncan, Moccia 2004.pdf "Teleost fish are considered to have marked differences in some aspects of brain structure and organization as compared to tetrapods, yet they simultaneously demonstrate functional similarities and a level of cognitive development suggestive of sentience. Anatomical, pharmacological and behavioural data suggest that affective states of pain, fear and stress are likely to be experienced by fish in similar ways as in tetrapods. This implies that fish have the capacity to suffer, and that welfare consideration for farmed fish should take these states into account." Ha, you play a silly game for man children (Lizardmen here).
For the record...I don't like shows that glorify killing fish either. Can we just stop with glorifying the killing of anything? Yeah? We're past that. Sometimes killing is necessary but let's not throw a party after eh?
Fox hunting is still legal. Who cares whether "with dogs" is legal or not, fox hunting is legal. You're still allowed to shoot foxes with a rifle as "vermin." Who cares whether dogs are involved. It doesn't matter to the fox hit by a round of 5.56. The photograph was taken from this piece published in the Telegraph, which glorifies hunting just as much as any reality TV show does: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/countryside/9765963/Tally-ho-Let-the-hunt-remind-us-who-we-are.html
If you want something done for free, make people think it's fun. This is how Tom Sawyer got other kids to paint a fence for him, and it still works today. According to Texas A&M researchers, 1.7 million feral hogs need to be killed annually to hold the population in check. You can either convince private citizens to do it for free, or you can pay government employees to do it. If a government employee located and killed five hogs in a single work day and was paid $20/hour to do so, you're paying $32/hog. That would be a cost of over $50 million annually to harvest hogs, just for Texas alone. I'd rather that people considered hog-hunting a recreation and that that $50 million of tax dollars was put into infrastructure and public services.
I think they need to get reserve units out there to get them. Training in stalking, pursuit, concealment, and marksmanship. You would have the cost of rounds and maybe rations for the day, but the efficiency of doing this would probably far exceed civilian involvement and would help to train reserve units. You could also do extremely realistic medical training. Pig is shot but you didn't kill it, keep it alive as long as you can with your standard medical kit. (Although this would be practical for the military, I could see a lot of people having problems with the second part)
