Hunting, shooting and fishing poll

[Sportsman]

I think I have. If what you did there was for food, keep the birds in nice big pens and then humanely kill them when you want to eat them. Nothing wrong with that. Keeping them captive, feeding them up and then releasing them so you can shoot them and get a little thrill when the head snaps back - that's not right.

 

The roads are littered with pheasants at the moment. Not exactly the most cunning creatures are they?

 

Not exactly how it is done and shows a degree of misunderstanding.

When very young the pheasant is indeed a stupid creature, having probably been hatched in an incubator, It will sleep on the ground and be easy prey for foxes and other ground dwelling predators. For this reason the young pheasants are kept in large pens for their own protection

Once they are large enough to roost in trees then they are released into the surrounding countryside. There are no restraints and nothing to stop them from flying away onto someone elses land, so feeding and shelter points are set up, along with the keeper controlling predators in an attempt to make our little bit of countryside more attractive to the birds than the bit next door.

It also means conserving woodland, hedgerows, ponds and ditches, most of which only exist because the shoot either pays for them or pays the farmer to retain them. Most of the countryside as it appears today only exists because of the sporting rights having a value.

By the time we start shooting (in our case late November) the birds have been living wild and have minimal contact with humans for some time. They are not released just before shooting although this is a common fallacy.

As for emmatwo's remark about the satisfaction of a good clean kill, I know exactly what she is talking about. It is much the same as the float sliding away or the quiver tip pulling round. The culmination of sometimes months of planning and work.

Edited October 15, 2008 by Sportsman

[Guest tigger]

I think I have. If what you did there was for food, keep the birds in nice big pens and then humanely kill them when you want to eat them. Nothing wrong with that. Keeping them captive, feeding them up and then releasing them so you can shoot them and get a little thrill when the head snaps back - that's not right.

 

The roads are littered with pheasants at the moment. Not exactly the most cunning creatures are they?

 

 

So Anderoo it's ok for the EA to release fish for you to catch and release or kill (your choice) but not for the shooting society to release birds ? At the end of the day many of the birds released never get shot and go on to breed and occupy other areas of the countryside where they never get shot at and give people something nice to look at as well as feeding birds of Prey etc etc. A shoot is the best nature reserve you can get as even the naturalist Mr Bellamy went on about in one of his programes.

[gozzer]

So Anderoo it's ok for the EA to release fish for you to catch and release or kill (your choice) but not for the shooting society to release birds ? At the end of the day many of the birds released never get shot and go on to breed and occupy other areas of the countryside where they never get shot at and give people something nice to look at as well as feeding birds of Prey etc etc. A shoot is the best nature reserve you can get as even the naturalist Mr Bellamy went on about in one of his programes.

 

You beat me to it with that one Tigger.

 

There is little difference in the two. Fish are bred at 'farms', grown on in stock ponds, and then released so anglers can catch them.

One of the differences is, that anglers insist on regular restocking, regardless of existing numbers, or the effect on the environment.

 

John.

[Anderoo]

So Anderoo it's ok for the EA to release fish for you to catch and release or kill (your choice) but not for the shooting society to release birds ?

 

No, I didn't say that. Again, completely different scenarios with only the most tenuous connection.

 

Sportsman, thanks for that clarification. I think my point still stands though.

[gozzer]

No, I didn't say that. Again, completely different scenarios with only the most tenuous connection.

 

Could you please expand on that Andrew?

 

Because I fail to see much difference, other than the species and the end result.

 

 

John.

Edited October 15, 2008 by gozzer

[Guest Rabbit]

I took a life once, it was the life of a fine 10 point Red Deer stag. He was not a sick animal, nor was he injured, he was just deemed to be 'surplus to requirement'. I dropped him from about 80 yds with an Lee Enfield .303 with a tele sight. I got a perfect clean shot (unusual for me, but at age 14 my eyes were much better than they are now) and I enjoyed every minute of it. I was chuffed to bits when it was slung over the back of a garron and brought in off the hill, with me leading the horse by the halter.

 

I'm sorry but I have little time for those who are willing to purchase some nice pork chops from the supermarket, in there little polystyrene packets, but would not have the stomach to hang a pig up by the back legs and cut its throat.

 

What in image you paint Cory, one of Cory of the Glen I suppose. I too have fired a 303 but only at an image of a German on the firing range, how the other half......

So you have no time for those who do not kill for their meat, never heard so much toss in all my life even on here.

There are strict regulations regarding the slaughter of livestock, not the brutal way you describe, well not for non hallah market anyway. Of course most people do not wish to know all the detail, they are perhaps just reassured that the animals are reared and slaughtered in a way that does not cause them too much distress. You could hardly justify in branding such folk as hypocritical you do not shoot eight point Stags or butcher pigs..

[Anderoo]

Could you please expand on that Andrew?

 

Because I fail to see much difference, other than the species and the end result.

 

 

John.

 

Sure. Firstly, I need to know in what circumstances the EA are releasing fish. If it's to prop up stocks because of, say, an outbreak of pollution, then absolutely, no problem. Rivers need fish. If it's to fill up a lake just so that people can catch them, then no, I don't agree with that. I don't think you would either. It also depends on the species of fish. Putting carp or catfish deliberately into a river purely for anglers is selfish and stupid. Overstocking a lake for the same purpose ditto.

 

If fish are released into an environment where they're effectively wild, and they're in a suitable and appropriate environment for them as a species, then that's different. Angling then becomes what it should be, a complex jigsaw puzzle requiring thought and experience.

 

Same with shooting. Shooting a wild deer because the numbers need to be controlled, and then having plenty of free-range venison, is obviously fine. Releasing birds like pheasants which, let's be honest, aren't exactly sharp, just so they can be shot and killed for fun, takes some defending, and I haven't heard anything yet which has made me reconsider my opinion.

 

The vital difference between the two remains - one is killing for fun, the other is not, and if I thought that angling 'tortured' fish then I wouldn't do that either.

[Guest Rabbit]

So tell me this Rabbit, are you a vegan? Do you eat meat? If you eat meat, but would not be willing to kill your own your just a hypocrite in my book.

 

Do you really think that foxes have benefited due to this ban? If so please post some EVIDENCE to support your claim, because I remain to be convinced.

 

I don't see what football has to do with it, but since you bring the subject up, your English football would not be what it was without all the foreign players that your clubs have.

 

See my last reply to Cory as a reply to your first silly response. I am not a veggie vegan or a tree hugger...sorry, just an ordinary bloke.

 

EVIDENCE do me a favour, more foxes live, celebrate that, nature has a way of balancing things.

 

Footy comment was tongue in cheek..but foreign players pah....send 'em back and give the Football clubs a sense of identity with the community by playing local talent.

 

Off to work npw Bye Bye!!

[corydoras]

What in image you paint Cory, one of Cory of the Glen I suppose. I too have fired a 303 but only at an image of a German on the firing range, how the other half......

So you have no time for those who do not kill for their meat, never heard so much toss in all my life even on here.

There are strict regulations regarding the slaughter of livestock, not the brutal way you describe, well not for non hallah market anyway. Of course most people do not wish to know all the detail, they are perhaps just reassured that the animals are reared and slaughtered in a way that does not cause them too much distress. You could hardly justify in branding such folk as hypocritical you do not shoot eight point Stags or butcher pigs..

The only difference between the way that halal meat is killed and the way that your supermarket meat is killed is that it supermarket meat is stunned before it's hung up by the back legs and has its throat cut.

 

When I was a boy one was legally able to kill one's own pig. It ways always a big day at our place. My mum and my gran would boil vast quantities of hot water to plot the pig. My grandfather would busy himself sharpening knifes. Once we were ready to kill the pig swift blow between the eyes with a ball pien hammer would render the pig unconscious. Then it would be hung up by it back legs to the rafters. My granddad would cut its throat, being careful not to spill too much blood (black pudding, don't ya know). Once the pig was dead and bled it would be plotted and butchered.

 

I kinda like the sound of Cory of the Glen if I ever get a peerage I might use that. Lord Corydoras, Thane of Balquhidder.

 

See my last reply to Cory as a reply to your first silly response. I am not a veggie vegan or a tree hugger...sorry, just an ordinary bloke.

 

EVIDENCE do me a favour, more foxes live, celebrate that, nature has a way of balancing things.

 

Footy comment was tongue in cheek..but foreign players pah....send 'em back and give the Football clubs a sense of identity with the community by playing local talent.

 

Off to work npw Bye Bye!!

Evidence is useful stuff if you are trying to convince the sceptical that ones point of view is valid, essential if you want me to SHARE your point of view.

[Sportsman]

S

EVIDENCE do me a favour, more foxes live, celebrate that, nature has a way of balancing things.

 

Off to work npw Bye Bye!!

 

 

Again, demonstrating your inability to read posts, or possibly to understand them.

 

I will try to explain, and I will write slowly, OK?

 

When a hunt with a pack of hounds hunted over an area of ground then it would be in their interest to have some foxes on that ground.

They would try to dissuade the keepers and farmers from killing the foxes and would encourage (pay) the farmers to keep certain types of habitat that suited foxes.

 

When the hunt disappeared then so did the reason for the farmer and keeper not to kill the foxes so they did, with anything they had to hand.

They poisoned them (along with anything else that took the bait)

They shot them (sometimes wounding them and leaving them to die in agony, or maybe just starve to death).

They snared and trapped them, leaving them sometimes for longer than they should in the snare or trap.

 

Upshot of all of this anti-fox activity FEWER FOXES.

 

did you get that ?

 

It's a bit like removing all of the pike anglers and leaving just match fishermen to whom the pike is vermin.

Do you think that would benefit pike stocks?