re: Can somebody explain to me how hunters love animals?

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I forgot about dove hunting...

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We breed em you guys kill em, no dove hunting here.

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son of arlo

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And right on cue! Why wouldn't the deer just move to the next forest area if they had already eaten up the ENTIRE area like you say? I would think they were smarter than that

So is the difference between hunters and other animal lovers, like PETA, that hunters view animals as animals, and PETA types view animals like people?

So hunters view animals as creatures who serve a purpose, whereas PETA-types give animals human-like emotions and view them like people?

Is that somewhat correct?

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was watching Duck Dynasty the other day, Phil talked about how he loves ducks and was always interested in ducks.

At football practice when he was in college, he would see ducks flying overhead and mention how pretty they are. Then the coach would yell at him.

Then he hunts them, kills them, and eats them.


This is in stark contrast to other animal lovers who want to coddle animals and think killing innocent animals is wrong. They'd see innocent little ducks and couldn't imagine killing one.

So how is it logical for a hunter to love animals yet kill them at the same time?

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Sorry for the holy wall of text batman.

serious answer from a hunter.

first and foremost, hunting thins the herd in a good way. Deer, turkey, and most recently quail were in a bad way of overpopulation which nearly killed the species due to sparsity of resources. Hunting makes less of the herd which makes the competition for said resources easier on the animals.

In terms of a lot of places in TX it also helps with Deer and Hogs as a nuisance. An area near my local lake (about 60 miles north of Austin) is completely overrun with deer and they won't allow for shooting in the city limits and around the lake. there are tons of wrecks out there because the things are as common as squirrels. Hunting would put pressure on them to retreat to less densely populated areas and cause less wrecks as well as damage to yards and gardens.

Also consider this, I live on deer meat instead of hamburger meet probably about 6-8 months of the year depending on how my season went. Which was more humane? A life of a deer spent out in the woods living how it was meant or the life of a cow, raised on the farm for a year, sold to auction, living in a slaughter house being fed manmade chemicals to beef it up for eating before being shot in the head?

And a final point, Animal lovers (the vegan PETA anti-hunting leather protesting types, not your I own 4 cats) will probably never experience animals in the wild. I personally get a minimal surplus of satisfaction on a hunt where i harvest an animal vs. a hunt where I go back empty handed. Sitting in a blind not shooting anything may seem like a waste of time, but some of the coolest moments of my life were watching 2 does play out in the field just out of shooting range. Just getting to see a wild animal do it's thing uninhibited by man is amazing to me. Going duck hunting and seeing the sun come up over the lake as I can start seeing ducks take off of the water and land just thisfar away from a shotgun blast is a thing of beauty. My kids and I love to go look at ducks in the ponds or springs near us just to watch them. Not to say "hey that would be cool to shoot," but wow, watch this beautiful creature.

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some of the coolest moments of my life were watching 2 does play out in the field just ou That kind of stuff doesn't "humanize" them in any way? If they came closer, it's easy to shoot and kill them?

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In some ways. I won't shoot a doe if it's with its baby and I won't shoot a deer in the rut if it's chasing a female (who wants to die horny?)

Why is that deer more humanized than a cow getting a pop to the head or a chicken getting it's head pulled off? Did they have a less important life than the deer? Did your fram raised catfish have more of a personality than the one I caught and fried?

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That kind of stuff doesn't "humanize" them in any way? If they came closer, it's easy to shoot and kill them?

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What's your point here? Why should we humanize an animal? They aren't humans.

Doesn't dismiss that they are living things. But humans have killed and eaten animals for a very long time. When you eat a hamburger you are essentially killing an animal.

They all serve a purpose, and most are beautiful creatures.

They're tasty. Hunters invest more time, money and research into extending the populations and preservation of wildlife for all to enjoy. The "coddlers" usually do nothing but complain about people that hunt, and contribute nothing to conservation practices, or even take the time to understand how proper conservation or harvesting affects the health of a species.

My sister lives in a gated development(a very big one) in Arkansas and the deer population spikes when hunting season starts as they jump the fences to avoid the hunters. Taking a walk after dark when that occurs the eyes of deer are like headlights in the woods and they are everywhere.

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So how is it logical for a hunter to love animals yet kill them at the same time?

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Hunters do not love the animals. For them to say so is kind of ridiculous. They love the act of killing the animals. I'm not going to call it a "sport" because it's not when you kill a poor defenseless animal. That being said, although I personally think it's disgusting, hunters do serve a VERY important part in conservation. Hunters are some of most ardent conservationists on the planet and no doubt have helped some species from going extinct. (even though the reason they have is kind of fricked up)

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The average deer hunter probably spends $2-5k per season chasing whitetail deer all for roughly 200 lbs of meat assuming they kill 3 deer averaging a very generous 200 lbs each. So it is obviously about much more than food for i would say 99% of hunters

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Not only that, the fees from licenses, special taxes on certain equipment and other donations to wildlife conservation FAR outweighs the money spent by "coddlers" to preserve wildlife.