Article About How "Hunters" Are Against Lead Bullets

[buck460XVR]

There is scientific evidence to support this.

There is a paucity of scientific data that shows wide scale mortality or declining populations of scavenger species in the United States due to lead poisoning, specifically related to hunting.
So some people are concerned about a wide scale lead scare and subsequent ban, which will greatly impact far more than 20 eagles in Wisconsin, and especially since it’s not known how big an effect is really present.
These people are sometimes labeled as ignorant or scared of science or environmentalist haters.

I for one don't think of most of them as that, just folks that are hesitant to change. I have always been a firm believer in the idea if it's not broke, don't fix it. I see many folks hesitant to leave their lead/cup and core bullets as such, especially when it comes down to the cost per projectile. While not so much for factory ammo, for us reloaders, the cost increase can be quite substantial. Add to that some of the shortcomings of early steel shot usage, and I certainly understand the apprehension. Is 20 Eagles dying each year in Wisconsin a big deal? Probably not to some deer hunter in Kansas. To Eagle watchers along the Mississippi River here in Wisconsin, probably. Easier to ignore something that you can't relate to. As you state, there is scientific evidence to support there is an issue. I help teach hunter safety. Each year we have a Warden and a Wildlife Biologist come and talk to our students. Last few years, the issue of lead and the risk of lead poisoning has been discussed by both. Neither of these has an anti-hunting agenda. Just the opposite. Both are afraid of the consequences of losing any more hunters and the license fees they pay. This is already an issue with the loss of waterfowlers and the 50% decrease in duck stamps(both state and federal) sold last year as opposed to 1970. I'm sure lack of interest, lack of good hunting areas, high cost of steel shotshells along with interest in other fall recreation(such as bowhunting) have all helped the decline. In the 60s, when I first started to bow hunt, archers accounted for less than 2% of the annual buck harvest. Last year it was 30%. Number of licensed bow archery hunters went from 85,000 to over 300,000 in the same time. Gun deer license sales dropped again this year, even tho total kill numbers and success rates(at least in my area) was up. Biggest decline is probably based on not having access to good hunting and the fear of CWD. Folks are afraid that increasing the cost of ammo may also contribute to that decline. Hopefully ammo/bullet manufacturers will take the fear of loosing customers due to cost in consideration when pricing non-toxic ammo.

 

[Ironicaintit]

do the studies even try to determine whether or not any lead found within the GI tract of an animal was, in fact, the cause of death?

some statisticians may include erroneous data, if it furthers their cause. maybe not even intentionally. If an eagle is found dead, cause unknown, but has bits of lead in their system, that could be included in the data, even if it werent remotely related to the death (age, disease). this could be even more prominent in cases where the carcass has been laying around for a while before they're found.
I love facts. but when a clear agenda is present, excuse me for being cynical about the standards and goals of those compiling the data.

 

[Deanimator]

Folks are afraid that increasing the cost of ammo may also contribute to that decline. Hopefully ammo/bullet manufacturers will take the fear of loosing customers due to cost in consideration when pricing non-toxic ammo.

I'm a bullseye pistol shooter.

1. None of the indoor pistol ranges which I use has a population of bald eagles.
2. I'm unaware of any "non-toxic" 148gr. .38 Special wadcutters. My Giles .38 Special M1911 REQUIRES 148gr. wadcutters. NOTHING else will work.
3. Banning/pricing handgun shooters out of the activity is considered a feature, not a bug.

 

[buck460XVR]

do the studies even try to determine whether or not any lead found within the GI tract of an animal was, in fact, the cause of death?

In many of the cases I see/read/hear about, there are the classic symptoms of lead poisoning, extremely high levels of lead in the blood and lead particles found in the gut/crop/gizzard of the bird/animal. Seems that would be more than "remotely related to the death". Many times when I shoot an animal, I jokingly tell folks it died of lead poisoning. This is not what the experts are doing. They are doing dissections and autopsies along with blood analysis. Their margin for error on cause of death is pretty small, these folks don;t have an agenda. Now others with an agenda may askew those results and filter them to give only the side the want to display, but the results are what they are. I've studied many documents over the years about studies of lead poisoning and wildlife. Many of them available directly from my state's DNR website. Again, this is someone who does not want to promote any decrease in hunting, but just the opposite.

 

[JN01]

3. Any solution proposed will cause harm to hunters and hunting related industries and likely to shooters and shooting related industries. Therefore, it's important not to just handwave about the level of harm done to animals and the environment. There needs to be a balance struck, and that can't happen until there's a genuine attempt to quantify the harm on both sides of the equation.

If the premise is that science shows that lead bullets are harming non-target animals, then let's really use science to prove or disprove the premise and to quantify the harm so it can be balanced against the harm caused by the solution rather than just implementing feelgood policies to provide the illusion of constructive activity.

You hit the nail on the head. It is interesting to compare the alarm over potential lead hazards vs the seeming lack of concern over the large number of birds killed by wind turbines- apparently the bird deaths are an acceptable price for "green" energy.

 

[Texas10mm]

Sorry, never meant to infer anyone in particular was a "sucky" shot. My experience in waterfowl hunting is where I came up with my statement about "sky-blasting" vs steel shot.One of the reasons I gave up waterfowl hunting was trying to compete with those other folks on the lake who figured shooting first was the only sure way to get their limit. Not only did they flare birds by shooting at them out of legitimate range, but then scared any ensuing birds by chasing cripples around.

It's a proven fact that steel shot patterns do not "blow out", but are indeed, much tighter than lead. Steel stays rounded, thus shooting straighter. Impossible to read anything about lead vs steel without this fact being confirmed. Again, the problem when steel first came out was eveyone had their favorite long piped "goose gun" with a full choke. I know, I was one of them. Steel, especially the larger shot, did not do well going thru a full choke tube. Many folks talked about steel shooting "donuts"...a pattern with a hole in the middle. While I never patterned that on a patterning board personally, I did quickly realized that a modified with steel patterned about like my full choke did with lead. With the improvement with regular lead shotshells, I learned that a modified choke works better than full on most pheasants too. That wasn't the case back in the 60s/70s before buffererd shot and full wad cups.

This talk about steel shot is all moot tho, since we are talking about(and the linked article) involves the use of non-lead monolithic bullets, that do not exhibit any of the claimed problems that steel shot has. Non-toxic expanding bullets designed for medium/large/dangerous game has been shown to be just as accurate and have equal terminal performance as it's lead counterpart. In the instance of dangerous game, even better. Seems the biggest reluctance to use them is cost and the "cache" of cup and core/solid lead many folks have. Most of us will not be faced with mandatory use of non-toxic single projectiles in the immediate future. I feel what I am doing, transitioning over to the use of non-toxic bullets for use on deer, while still using my cup and core/solid lead for practice and recreational shooting is one way to start. My theory is that if everyone did this. most of us will not face what those in Korneyforney are facing, the complete ban of lead/cup and core type projectiles. While I have seen Eagles on dead deer carcasses feeding, I have yet to see one digging thru my shooting berm. This is what the linked article(thus what this thread is about) is really about. The use of non-toxic projectiles for hunting, eliminating most of the chance of ingesting lead when feeding on animals shot with firearms. This includes humans as well as scavengers.

My duck gun was a 24" IC barrel. Remember our kill zone was 21 measured yards from the blind. One thing I learned when selling hunting supplies is most people can't estimate range worth a plugged nickel. We had flight of pintails mounted across the store from the gun counter. They were 21 yards from the gun counter. 90% of the guys who guessed said they were 45-50 yards away. This with those mounted ducks sitting right above the heads of other customers. Put those ducks out in the open and they would guess even further out. We had an outdoor event one summer. We hung three mounted ducks from a wire. The contest was to guess the distance to those ducks from three points marked on the ground. The distances were 17 yards, 26 yards and 35 yards. No one even came close. The average guess for the 35 yard ducks was 60 yards.

I'd take people out to our blind sometimes. They all wanted to know why the decoy pattern was so far away, 21 yards to the kill zone.

The steel shot technology of the mid '80's was very poor.

 

[Texas10mm]

You hit the nail on the head. It is interesting to compare the alarm over potential lead hazards vs the seeming lack of concern over the large number of birds killed by wind turbines- apparently the bird deaths are an acceptable price for "green" energy.

If you're drilling for oil and your waste pond kills a duck you're screwed. It can cost tens of thousands of dollars. Yet the wind turbine down the road is exempt from all regulations regarding bird deaths. Thousands of raptors die every year due to wind turbines.

Don't even get me started on the stupidity of non-constant generation sources. Most "greenies" don't understand that ALL wind power is backed up by fossil fuel plants which are running at load capacity to prevent sags in the voltage.

 

[Ohen Cepel]

This may well be the first time I have used the ignore option on this website. However, the arrogant veterinarian who has no answers while assuming we're not able to understand the issue just won it.

 

[George P]

Lead isn't the culprit, chemicals flowing into the water shed and lakes, rivers and streams are worse. Years ago, DU objected to a one year test of non-lead shot requested by the Fed wildlife grous so they could establish a baseline. They fought and now we have non-tox mandated and have had it so for over 30 years. If they hadn't ticked off the feds, it might have never come to pass. Same for condors in CA; farm chemicals cause more issues than anything else.

 

[Fine Figure of a Man]

If you're drilling for oil and your waste pond kills a duck you're screwed. It can cost tens of thousands of dollars. Yet the wind turbine down the road is exempt from all regulations regarding bird deaths. Thousands of raptors die every year due to wind turbines.

Don't even get me started on the stupidity of non-constant generation sources. Most "greenies" don't understand that ALL wind power is backed up by fossil fuel plants which are running at load capacity to prevent sags in the voltage.

I share your frustration. I suppose we'll be accused of drifting of topic but it's really all part of the same "green" package.

 

[George P]

If you're drilling for oil and your waste pond kills a duck you're screwed. It can cost tens of thousands of dollars. Yet the wind turbine down the road is exempt from all regulations regarding bird deaths. Thousands of raptors die every year due to wind turbines.

Don't even get me started on the stupidity of non-constant generation sources. Most "greenies" don't understand that ALL wind power is backed up by fossil fuel plants which are running at load capacity to prevent sags in the voltage.

Those turbines near Tracy, CA are one of the largest killers of migratory birds there are. - it IS funny watching the pro-wind force fight the Pro-wildlife groups (all hardcore leftists) over something like this.

While ALWAYS filled with the best of intentions, "greenies" act like the Fed thinking one big universal solution is the answer - when it fails, they want to double down......

It was interesting how liberal/socialists leaning NZ handles this: Non-tox is ONLY required when hunting waterfowl with 200 yards of a water location, so if you were hunting in the middle of a cornfield, lead is still OK

 

[JTHunter]

You hit the nail on the head. It is interesting to compare the alarm over potential lead hazards vs the seeming lack of concern over the large number of birds killed by wind turbines- apparently the bird deaths are an acceptable price for "green" energy.

It isn't just the wind turbines that are killing birds of all kinds. Solar furnaces, the kind that use mirrors to focus the sun on a central tower, have such a problem with all kinds of birds flying into the light beam near the focal point at the tower have come to be known as "smokers". The birds are literally "cooked" on the wing to the point their feathers are charred and they drop dead. These deaths include many endangered birds, esp. songbirds, yet little has been done to correct the problem.

 

[cheygriz]

We all need to stop this bickering and come together as one to stand up to the enviro-wackos that want to destroy our sport, our economy and our way of life. Those folks are our bitter enemies.

 

[entropy]

It's a proven fact that steel shot patterns do not "blow out", but are indeed, much tighter than lead.

Not the ones I patterned. I patterned everything available at the time (shortly after steel shot came out @ late 70's), and they all blew out and had holes in them at 40 yards. They were equal to a 40 yard pattern of our handload #5 lead at 20 yards out of an Imporved Modified choke. (Full choke opened up for steel)

Most of us will not be faced with mandatory use of non-toxic single projectiles in the immediate future. I feel what I am doing, transitioning over to the use of non-toxic bullets for use on deer, while still using my cup and core/solid lead for practice and recreational shooting is one way to start. My theory is that if everyone did this. most of us will not face what those in Korneyforney are facing, the complete ban of lead/cup and core type projectiles. While I have seen Eagles on dead deer carcasses feeding, I have yet to see one digging thru my shooting berm. This is what the linked article(thus what this thread is about) is really about. The use of non-toxic projectiles for hunting, eliminating most of the chance of ingesting lead when feeding on animals shot with firearms. This includes humans as well as scavengers.

I agree there; Sadly there has been no effective (cost and performance) replacement for lead shot for Clays games yet. Yes, Steel is not very good there either.

 

[George P]

It isn't just the wind turbines that are killing birds of all kinds. Solar furnaces, the kind that use mirrors to focus the sun on a central tower, have such a problem with all kinds of birds flying into the light beam near the focal point at the tower have come to be known as "smokers". The birds are literally "cooked" on the wing to the point their feathers are charred and they drop dead. These deaths include many endangered birds, esp. songbirds, yet little has been done to correct the problem.

Nothing like killing species THEY put on the list with their ideas to save the wildlife and the planet

 

[ThomasT]

I don't see it as anti-gun or anti-hunting, only anti-lead for hunting purposes. This is not new, but something every DNR/F&G department in the country is advocating. Here in Wisconsin, we lose about 20 Bald Eagles a year due to confirmed lead poisoning. These birds are not shot, nor have they ingested the lead naturally. They got it from scavenging gut piles during and after the gun deer season.

Around here the gut piles are ate overnight by coyotes, There is nothing left for eagles or buzzards or anything else to eat except maybe ants. And of all the deer I have shot only 3 bullets have been stopped by deer and one elk. All the rest the bullets made a complete pass through. So I'm not buying it.

Lead posining would be a slow death. Most animals when they get sick will hole up somewhere private and die. So how do they find all these dead eagles to test?

 

[JSH1]

You're not showing me a mechanism by which significant numbers of animals are ingesting significant numbers of rifle and pistol bullets. AGAIN, where are animals finding LOTS of carcasses with LEAD BULLETS in them? Knob Creek? Where are they coming from? .450 Maxims?

The scavengers are not eating whole bullets. They are eating small bullet fragments either in game that was shot but not recovered or gut piles left in the field. See below for any x-ray of a deer that has been shot with a lead bullet.



It isn't just scavengers eating lead, it is also the people eating meat that was harvested with lead bullets. See below for lead fragments in processed venison.

 

[Deanimator]

Around here the gut piles are ate overnight by coyotes, There is nothing left for eagles or buzzards or anything else to eat except maybe ants.

I've seen the same thing in rural Missouri. Anything the coyotes can reach, they take.

 

[Deanimator]

The scavengers are not eating whole bullets. They are eating small bullet fragments either in game that was shot but not recovered or gut piles left in the field. See below for any x-ray of a deer that has been shot with a lead bullet.

View attachment 813384

And what KIND of "lead bullets"? Hard cast? Swaged? JSPs? JHPs?

It isn't just scavengers eating lead, it is also the people eating meat that was harvested with lead bullets. See below for lead fragments in processed venison.

View attachment 813385

Unless hunters are leaving huge mounds of unharvested game, the obvious solution is to require hunters to bury or otherwise dispose of gut piles.

But of course that wouldn't harm bullseye handgun competitors, and where's the fun in that?

The ultimate (and frequently stated) goal is to cripple and then eliminate gun culture.

 

[JSH1]

And what KIND of "lead bullets"? Hard cast? Swaged? JSPs? JHPs?

I don't know that bullet was used in that particular deer in the x-ray. If you watch the video embedded on page 1 of this thread you will see a Nosler Partition bullet lose 40% of it's weight after being shot into water jugs. That is a bullet specifically designed for hunting big game.

But of course that wouldn't harm bullseye handgun competitors, and where's the fun in that?

Banning lead bullets for hunting has nothing to do with bullseye handgun competitors. However, I will never convince you of that because you believe:

The ultimate (and frequently stated) goal is to cripple and then eliminate gun culture.

 

[Deanimator]

Banning lead bullets for hunting has nothing to do with bullseye handgun competitors.

But they aren't going to be banned JUST for hunting, ARE they?

Banning "semi-automatic weapons" ONLY meant AR-15s and AK-47s... UNTIL it meant handguns.

Nobody wanted to repeal the 2nd Amendment... until they started saying so.

 

[Deanimator]

1. What is the ONLY justification for owning a gun recognized by anti-gunners? Hunting.
2. What shooting activity (despite a burning hatred for working class hunters by cultural Marxists) are they afraid to attack DIRECTLY? Hunting.
3. What INDIRECT method could they use to discourage hunting? Artificially inflated costs.
4. If increased fees would be too much of a finger in the eye to Democrat hunters, what other method could they use to discourage hunting? Artificially grossly inflate the cost of ammunition.
5. If arbitrarily increased taxes on ammunition would be seen as too provocative, what could be done instead? So limit the available types of ammunition that it excludes the working class hunter. Justify this on "environmental" grounds.
6. If hunting can be markedly discouraged, and hunting is the ONLY reason to own a firearm, then firearms ownership can be diminished and then eliminated.

This is the method used to disarm Blacks in the Jim Crow South. Inexpensive handguns were banned. The "Army and Navy Revolver" laws aimed to make firearms ownership financially prohibitive to poor Blacks (just as did the Sullivan Law in NYC).

Forty years ago, I noticed that the anti-gunners invariably SAID the same things over time. They also DO the same things.

 

[CraigC]

No hunters I know. I wonder how we cast bullet hunters are going to vote?

Here in Wisconsin, we lose about 20 Bald Eagles a year due to confirmed lead poisoning. These birds are not shot, nor have they ingested the lead naturally. They got it from scavenging gut piles during and after the gun deer season.

I don't believe that for one minute. IMHO, if a study concludes that, it's junk science with an agenda.

 

[buck460XVR]

No hunters I know. I wonder how we cast bullet hunters are going to vote?

Problem is.......as in the past, it probably isn't going to be up to cast bullet hunters voting for anything. Comes down to who determines the regs in the state/jurisdiction you hunt.

I don't believe that for one minute. IMHO, if a study concludes that, it's junk science with an agenda.

Seems to be the conclusion of most folks hard set against any change. While some of those folks apposed to lead use inflated examples of the amount of damage, so can be said for some of those supporting the use of lead, and their denial of any problems. Doesn't take much investigating to see most of the studies have nuttin' to do with an agenda or political affiliation, just as there is a ton of evidence of those in favor of hunting, proposing limiting the use of lead. I don't think we need to go to extremes, again, I do believe as hunters, we need to show a concern or at least some what of a transition away from the use of lead for some species, before we are forced to make the change.

IMHO, Part of the reason steel shot was so ineffective when it first came out, came down to to reluctance for the change, both from ammo makers and the general public. Again, if you don't believe it's broke, there's no reason to fix it. Then when it was forced upon us, ammo maker scrambled to put something on the market and folks used the same ol choke systems and shot sizes they always did. There's no doubt that the switch to steel shot has helped waterfowl health and populations. There's also no doubt that modern steel shot is much better than early steel shot. http://www.ducks.org/hunting/shooting-tips/the-need-for-speed

While we as hunters may disagree on this, we need to discuss it in an adult manner and personally research it fully. Taking blind statements from folks on the internet is not research, only accepting what we want to hear. It's not like there is a lack of non-biased info out there. As for those who shoot lead in Bullseye competition, odds are that will be determined by the range you shoot at. I know of many indoor ranges that have already prohibited it's use. Can't claim that shooting ranges are anti-gun.

 

[Fine Figure of a Man]

Doesn't take much investigating to see most of the studies have nuttin' to do with an agenda or political affiliation[/QUOTE

I doesn't take much investigating to see that the eagle population is at record high levels and growing and that lead poisoning is not a significant issue.
https://www.news.iastate.edu/news/2014/08/08/leadexposureeagles

Part of the reason steel shot was so ineffective when it first came out, came down to to reluctance for the change, both from ammo makers and the general public.

Another part of the reason steel shot was so ineffective is, it was (and is) so ineffective.