Re: Sunday hunting - a different perspective

Doug Couchman (atakdoug@csonline.net)
Tue, 02 Mar 1999 12:19:07 -0500 

Please allow a Pennsylvanian to offer a couple of points regarding 
Sunday hunting.  They pertain to comments made by others; I won't
quote the previous posts, because those following the debate should
remember them.


1. Permitting Sunday hunting will not substantially lower the deer
population.

Here in Pennsylvania, well over half of the harvest during buck season
is taken on opening day; last year I believe it approached 80%.
That's opening day of a two-week (twelve days) season.  Is there any
reason to believe the statistics are much different in Maryland?  And
is there any reason to believe that tacking on one more day would make
a difference that all those other intervening days couldn't make?

The way to increase the deer harvest is to issue more second-kill
permits, or perhaps to permit hunting methods that are otherwise
outlawed.  A drastic reduction could be achieved by issuing two
permits to every hunter and allowing spotlighting and baiting, but we
know that won't happen.  Why?  Because the hunting community doesn't
want a reduction in the herd.  Here, anyway, supplemental permits are
issued with an eye toward maintaining the herd.  If you want less deer
pressure, then you need to lobby for a smaller herd, not a seventh day
of hunting; if you convinced the appropriate authorities that the herd
should be smaller, they would have no problem lowering deer numbers in
a year or two.



2. Deer hunting is not very dangerous or otherwise problematic to
birders.

The person or people who made this point have obviously never tried to
bird in real deer country.  I can't offer statistics on this one, only
the unsupported opinion, which I'm sure could be confirmed by many
others, that on hunting days a birder just can't feel safe in good
hunting territory.  And although the problem is worse on land open to
hunting, it's not entirely so limited.  I live on 75 acres of
prominently posted land that happens to support a lot of deer.  Last
opening day I found no fewer than seven hunters on this land.  I
certainly hope this experience was unusual, but it cannot be unique.
Hunters get excited.  They hunt where they shouldn't, they fire
without noticing or even thinking about what's behind their target.
They are required by law (in PA, anyway) to wear blaze orange, and
every year some of them are shot anyway.  How safe should a birder,
dressed in dull colors and moving ever so slowly along brushy edges at
dawn or dusk, feel when he knows hunters are about?

Any suggestion that hunting is safer than other activities, say
driving on the freeways, is utterly disingenuous.  The world does fine
with the hunting ban; like it or not, Sunday driving is a part of our
culture and our economy that is not going away.  The questions are
entirely separate; society is not consistent in such matters.



3. A lot of birders do dislike hunting per se.

We often hear from broad-minded birders, sometimes ex-hunters
themselves, arguing that the two activities are not necessarily at
odds.  Maybe not, all things considered, but it's silly not to
recognize that a lot of birders disagree with you.  The point should
not be that birders don't dislike hunters, but that even to the extent
they do, the time is not ripe to focus on that part of the equation.
When the day comes that we have a reasonable chance to ban hunting
completely, then those who believe it is a barbarous vestige of a
long-dead era can raise their voices; for now, the practical arguments
about safety are a lot more politically palatable.



Doug Couchman
Cooperstown, PA
atakdoug@csonline.net