bobcat hunting

[Feanor]

Feanor, I didn't read your posts before responding to MNHNTR's classic "yew sitee boys jest dont understand" post.

I think we're on the same page here. If you want to spend your time hunting predators, that's fine, just admit you do it because it is a lifestyle that you enjoy, and stop trying to convince yourself that you're saving Bambi by getting rid of the big bad bear/wolf/coyote/bobcat. We have cultivated a large population of deer/ducks/etc because there is a lot of money to be made and because we enjoy the sport.

You pretty much have it nailed as to predator hunting, which BTW I'm very good at, however I think we need to be very very careful. I'm open to a wolf season, but for christs sake, 24 hours a day, and "four months long!" We have a wildlife biologist at the UW who said it best, this isn't intended as management, its intended as revenge!

Anybody who sings the the "we're doing nature a favor" song, is either hopelessly deluded, or tossing the little wife a bone on their way out the gate.

 

[HGUNHNTR]

If it were truly doing nature a favor, we should target invasive species to be hunted to extinction. Leave the wolves, coyotes and bobcats and eliminate the Chinese ringneck pheasant. Surely groups like pheasants forever could get behind that, they are afterall invasive. There are a lot of organizations dedicated to the conservation of prey animals (turkeys, deer, elk, quail, ducks all the ones that put money in someones pocket), why not predators?

 

[Art Eatman]

I don't see a "one size fits all" in the predator-hunting deal. For some, it's a necessity, to protect their bank balance. Doesn't matter if the predator is after livestock or crops.

For me, not being in the ranching bidness, it's my judgement about what critters in what amount are on my land, since I like to eat quail. Since I'm not greedy and am willing to share, I try for control of varmint numbers rather than any sort of effort at eradication. Heck, I like to see the occasional bobcat or listen to the yodel dogs sing.

I don't know about "balance" around Tucson, but the parents of that coyote-killed little child on the edge of that city would likely figure that the only good coyote is a dead one.

IOW, different strokes for different folks.

 

[Feanor]

I don't see a "one size fits all" in the predator-hunting deal. For some, it's a necessity, to protect their bank balance. Doesn't matter if the predator is after livestock or crops.

For me, not being in the ranching bidness, it's my judgement about what critters in what amount are on my land, since I like to eat quail. Since I'm not greedy and am willing to share, I try for control of varmint numbers rather than any sort of effort at eradication. Heck, I like to see the occasional bobcat or listen to the yodel dogs sing.

I don't know about "balance" around Tucson, but the parents of that coyote-killed little child on the edge of that city would likely figure that the only good coyote is a dead one.

IOW, different strokes for different folks.

I think that this is an important distinction, what is needed with coyotes is not necessarily whats required with bobcats, which are far less numerous. Coyotes have exploded due to a number of factors, the absence of their natural enemy, the wolf, an eclectic, and irresponsible system of agricultural development, and their natural ability to adapt to man and his settlements being a few of them.

You want to hear of an exploding population problem? Black bear numbers in Wisconsin, have soared beyond anyone's wildest imaginings, maybe more than forty thousand of them! Easily the largest population in the lower forty eight. Our population of bears has become so large that they are expanding their range into highly improbable areas of the midwest, even showing up in Iowa, where black bear have been extirpated for well over one hundred years.

Black bear are responsible for more human death in just the last twenty-five years, then all coyotes and gray wolves combined, in documented US history!