The cost of getting a helicopter in the air with a paid sharpshooter is massive. Truly massive. You can rent a helicopter for $5000 per hour, and I won't even guess what you would have to pay a trained sharpshooter from a security contractor company. And you're going to have to have a LOT of helicopters with a LOT of paid snipers operating to cover all the rural area of Texas (Texas alone is three times the area of the UK). Helicopter hunting also doesn't work for hogs in underbrush or under tree cover, where a lot of feral hogs are found. So all that expense is for a less-efficient operation. The cost of having private citizens hunt is free. I cannot fathom why there is such opposition to saving tens of millions of taxpayer dollars by having people the same job for free by calling it recreation.
I don't like commercial fishing and don't eat fish. Does that mean I'm allowed to say I don't like the idea of this show either? I'm not going to use it to paint a generalisation of the American populace, but it is kind of sad. That said, I'd have to see an eipsode to decide how much I didn't like it. If it mostly focuses on the fieldcraft invovled in tracking and setting up the kill then I'd give it more of a pass since even I find that stuff interesting. If the show revolves around the killing itself then I have more of an objection to it.
The elk heads on display at the local Elk's Lodge don't surprise me any more than European car companies trying to one-up each other as to who has the finest leather upholstery. You know that a Jaaaaaaaag's fine leather seats are flayed animal, right? Six of one, half-dozen of the other.
Here ya go. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZrFIcWzSEo"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZrFIcWzSEo[/ame] Now I'd be very surprised if someting similar to that couldn't be done in Texas. Not everywhere perhaps. Not to an extent to fully tackle the problem perhaps. But that to me is how you control a feral population of animals.
Explain to me what you gain by doing it that way instead of this way that compensates for the MASSIVE taxpayer expenditure. You think it should be done by helicopter by paid employees instead of by volunteers on foot with rifles. Why? Tell me what the objective benefit is. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GigpxLNbgeg"]Hogs Wild - Fighting the Feral Pig Problem - Texas Parks and Wildlife [Official] - YouTube[/ame]
I dunno...maybe end up with a population of humans on this planet that don't rejoice at the death and suffering of animals? That'd be quite a nice thing to work towards I think. That's certainly what I aim for.
You don't have to be a redneck you know. It's not set in stone. You could sort of, you know, change the way you do things and not put dead animals on the wall? Just a thought.
In all seriousness, do you own anything made of leather? Leather shoes, leather belt, leather jacket, leather upholstery on your sofa or your car, leather straps on your backpack? Congratulations, you are using dead animal for decoration and you're the pot calling the kettle black.
I dunno, let me submit it to the board, they'll get you a decision later this week. Honestly, I'm more interested in the bottom line of ecosystem function. More dead boars is better in my opinion.
I'm not making fun of rednecks. I'm making fun of the concept that anyone's upbringing defines them for all time and cannot be questioned. "Why do you do "X"?" "Because I am a "Y". That's not an answer is it? I've got a leather belt and some leather shoes. Well done. I am exactly the same as someone with a moosehead on their living room wall. You got me there. Carry on enjoying killing stuff. I got nothing.
You'd rather we have a population who is takes advantage of the killing and doensn't think about it or pay attention to what it is or how it's done, as long as "a professional" is doing it and they don't have to get their hands dirty? That concerns me more than the do-it-yourselfers in the age of drone strikes and such. Find me ten people who hunt regularly and ten people who live in a major city who have never touched a rifle or a shotgun, and I'm pretty certain the ten hunters will have on average more concern over animal abuses in slaughterhouses and agribusiness than the ten people who are horrified at the thought of beheading and gutting a trout themselves. Animals that are hunted have FAR better lives and better deaths than agribusiness animals, and saving a portion of the animal as decoration instead of throwing it in a landfill doesn't change that. Comments like this sound petty and spiteful, and completely ignore all the objective arguments that have been made in this thread that don't line up with your gut-reaction aversion to private citizens hunting hogs.
I don't have a gut reaction to private citizens hunting hogs. I have a gut reaction to people that enjoy killing animals. They ain't my kind of people. I don't understand that mentality. I don't get that drive. That enjoyment. I feel it's beneath where we are and where we could be ethically. There's two issues here. The practical job of controlling hogs. Which I've agreed is needed. I agree there are benefits to the private citizen way of doing it (cost, man power, coverage etc). Although I feel a more professional approach would add to that effectiveness (and would be more efficient in the long run). Saying helicopters are expensive doesn't dissuade me that such an approach in the more open areas of texas would work. And then finding entertainment value in that. I can begrudingly accept the utility of one without having to accept the other naturally follows or not find it distasteful.
Helicopter hunting is actually a really inefficient method of controlling hogs, even setting aside the massive cost. The roar of the helicopter chases them off. Unlike goats, which are slow and run as a herd in a straight line, hogs are very fast and dart and weave. Helicopter hunting (which is done by private companies already in Texas for people who want the experience) quickly devolves into chasing a single hog. It's an incredibly inefficient method of controlling feral pigs. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swLYyEkgNmA"]Beatty Group - Cedar Ridge Aviation Helicopter Hog Hunting Client Video 6 - YouTube[/ame] Much better to have more people, each of whom creep up close to them on foot and take out a half-dozen before they even realize what's going on. The people who hunt hogs by helicopter do it for the adrenaline rush, not because it's more efficient. Because it's not. As said before, if it's gotta be done, I'd rather that people enjoy the work than hate the work. This is true for anything, whether it be surgeons, lawyers, cops, or hunters.
Foxes can be killed as vermin because they are. Simple as that. There's some talk about them eating chickens, but that's not actually what they do. In a hen house a fox will kill chickens, as many as it can, not to drag off and eat. My family used to keep chickens - one night a fox got in, next morning two dozen dead chickens. So yes, foxes are vicious vermin. Actually it's completely missing other opportunities. For example you could set up subsidies or other forms of encouragement for butcher business who will dress wild hogs for hunters once they've been hunted. Your shopping trip to Walmart could become popping out to kill a few hogs, getting them butchered and having bacon every day. There's other ways than broadcasting and celebrating the cull. People revelling in killing is, to my mind, not a good sign. We can actually. I even support hunting - and have plans to go boar hunting in France next year. I think the cultural rift comes over the attitude towards it - promotion of killing as a good rather than necessary thing. Actually since you put forwards the argument, could you find these ten people? A larger sample size would offer more evidence though. You've assigned a strawman position here. There's not been an aversion to private citizens hunting hogs stated - the aversion is to making a television show dedicated to revelling in the culling of animals for popular entertainment. So, to clarify: - hunting, no problem (though obviously this depends on methods, prey, etc) - filming hunting, and broadcasting it as light entertainment so that people can enjoy the slaughter in as dispassionate a way as possible without taking responsibility themselves (possibly to the point of faking it to get better footage), somewhat distasteful
Surely if the fox was left to come back and deal with the dead chickens in their own time they'd bury some and cache them for later? They aren't killing them for a laugh or because they are wanton killers. They are killing them because you've quite handily collected them all in one area for them and their instincts means they should kill as much as they can while they can, because tomorrow there might not be anything to kill at all. That's what wild foxes do when large populations of birds fledge at once. They kill as many as they can and cache what they kill. I'm not a fan of the designation vermin. Some animals are a problem when we live near them. But vermin seems harsh. I've had to get rid of rats living under my shed but I still really wouldn't call them vermin.
Yes, it probably would, but that doesn't particularly help. I do understand that it's natural on the part of the foxes - that doesn't make it any less destructive. On the vermin front, it's an accurate term: http://www.thefreedictionary.com/vermin ver·min(vûrmn) n. pl. vermin 1. Various small animals or insects, such as rats or cockroaches, that are destructive, annoying, or injurious to health. 2. Animals that prey on game, such as foxes or weasels. 3. a. A person considered loathsome or highly offensive. b. Such people considered as a group.
Heres one example of hog hunts. These are nuisance hogs. Have fun girl. [ame="www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdWgT9f17zI"]Winchester's Deadly Passion: Texas Hogs - YouTube[/ame]
And here is one of the American Hoggers [ame="www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nSy70xrE60"]Tom Walker from American Hoggers shoots wild boar with AR 15 and drops it with one shot. - YouTube[/ame]
