Hunting-Your Definition

[lizziedog1]

I started a poll/thread about often folks hunt. There is another thread about weather hunting should be considered a sport.

Here I ask that you define what hunting is to you.

A landowner has vermin eating his crop. You are invited to give the critters some high-speed lead poisoning. You spend a wonderful , fun day blasting away. In your mind, were you hunting?

Your buddy has gotten a new puppy. He invites you to join him at a pheasant club for planted bird hunting. He wants to show off his new dog. After a couple of hours you two bag all the planted fowl. You had a great time and even have something for the table. Do you feel like you participated in hunting?

You are out kicking around in the desert. When ever you spot a jackrabbit you take a shot at it. Once in awhile you connect. Are you hunting?

It is openning day of season. You pull into the hunting area and park your truck. You start getting your gear ready and you spot a great deer a few yards away. You load and shoot and drop the animal. Would you consider what you just did hunting?

Please, lets not turn this thread into a personal attack thread. I don't want anyone to define what anyone else thinks hunting is. I don't want anyone to put down anyone else's view or opinion. I just want to know what your own definition is.

 

[caribou]

Its how I make a living.
I hunt with a 12 gauge a .22 and a Mosin Nagant, traps and nets, as with Fishing, Trapping, Gathring, the arts and crafts we make come from our travels and hunts.

75% of what I eat is caught by the wife and I and we also trade iin Meat and fish.

Its called Subsistance Hunting, and there are thousands of "kinds" of Hunting, but mine is for catching what it takes to do so again, and again year round.

Defining Hunting is defining the Man, were all different.

 

[303tom]

Hunting is the practice of pursuing any living thing, usually wildlife, for food, recreation, or trade. In present-day use, the term refers to lawful hunting, as distinguished from poaching, which is the killing, trapping or capture of the hunted species contrary to applicable law. The species which are hunted are referred to as game, and are usually mammals and migratory or non-migratory gamebirds.

Hunting can also involve the elimination of vermin, as a means of pest control to prevent diseases caused by overpopulation. Hunting advocates state that hunting can be a necessary component[1] of modern wildlife management, for example to help maintain a population of healthy animals within an environment's ecological carrying capacity when natural checks such as predators are absent.[2] In the United States, wildlife managers are frequently part of hunting regulatory and licensing bodies, where they help to set rules on the number, manner and conditions in which game may be hunted.

The pursuit, capture and release, or capture for food of fish is called fishing, which is not commonly categorised as a form of hunting. Trapping is also usually considered a separate activity. It is also not considered hunting to pursue animals without intent to kill them, as in wildlife photography or birdwatching. The practice of hunting for plants or mushrooms is a colloquial term for foraging or gathering.

Skilful tracking and acquisition of an elusive target has caused the word hunting to be used in the vernacular as a metaphor, as in "bargain hunting" or "hunting down corruption and waste".

 

[Art Eatman]

For me it's always been a package deal, as far as real enjoyment goes. Trying to outsmart Bambi is part of it. Pride in a DRT kill is part of it. Sitting around a campfire with friends is part of it. Knowing that there will be yummi-tasty meat instead of store-bought is part of it; I'm a natural-food freak.

And that's why I rarely pay much attention to what other folks think. They don't define my reality; I do that quite well, thank you.

 

[beatledog7]

Hunting is the practice of pursuing...

...and pursuing is active in nature; that is, it requires that the "hunter" be non-passive. To me, non-passive means moving. In my definition of hunting, that movement could and almost certainly would include searching, sighting, following, managing the wind, stalking, closing, etc. You get the idea.

First, let me admit upfront that I have never taken a deer. I've never even tried to. But I'm studying the art and science of deer hunting and becoming a pretty good shot. Next season I will get my first.

Preamble done, I'm prepared to be flamed on this one.

In my way of seeing the world, sitting stink-free in a blind in the middle of a plot of a deer's favorite food baited with the scent of 100 does in estrus and simply waiting for a big stupid buck to be drawn within range doesn't meet 303tom's excellent definition of hunting.

Freezing one's keister off in a tree, desperately needing to take a pee while waiting for Bambi's father to drop by strikes me as more like fishing than hunting. But without the adult beverages.

 

[Sky]

The hunter or the hunted both require a set of skills for a positive outcome for your team. Just depends on who you be, " The or They"!

 

[rodensouth]

Slipping quietly through the woods taking the fat squirrels home for a mulligan, while scouting for deer sign.

Discussing where to place stands on our little 40 that would likely have most traffic. Feeding them some corn to keep them around until acorns start falling just before season.

Getting game cam pics of deer over corn to see what's there, sure helps to get excited!

Sitting as still and quietly as possible in the stand or ground blind enjoying nature while trying to decide if I'm meat hunting, or waiting on a big boy. It's hard for me to pass on a nice doe, that's why I don't have a head hanging on the wall!

Cleaning and processing meat to enjoy with family.

That's hunting........for ME.

As long as others are legal, ethical, and don't bother me on my land, I think they are probably hunting too.

 

[Loosedhorse]

You spend a wonderful , fun day blasting away. In your mind, were you hunting?

Nope, not hunting. The vermin came to me, their location was certain. Pest control is necessary--and might even be fun--but what you described isn't a hunt.

After a couple of hours you two bag all the planted fowl.

If the only fowl that were available were planted, and you bagged all the ones you brought, that suggests that either you hunted so soon after the drop, or the club is "enclosed" enough that it was not really a hunt, IMHO. Might still be a good experience for a new dog or a new hunter, though.

When ever you spot a jackrabbit you take a shot at it. Once in awhile you connect. Are you hunting?

What are you doing with the jackrabbits after you shoot them: taking them home for the pot, or letting them rot? Killing animals indiscriminately with no purpose except killing is not hunting.

You start getting your gear ready and you spot a great deer a few yards away. You load and shoot and drop the animal. Would you consider what you just did hunting?

Yup, assuming what you did was legal. Dumb luck is part of hunting.

 

[22-rimfire]

Hunting is the active pursuit of anything. I hunt mostly hunt with cameras and firearms. Hunting does not even require you to be successful in your pursuit. Fishing is an aspect of hunting where you are pursuing fish.

 

[Frozen North]

As long as it ends in me eating a critter, you can call it spelunking for all I care.

IMO, a real hunt has an uncertain result. Just like betting on a fixed fight isn't really gambling. I consider canned hunts and caged animals slaughter. Not that there is anything wrong with slaughtering a farmed animal for food. I will personally stick with steers and hogs if I am going down that road though.... They taste great and are much easier to catch!

 

[MCgunner]

No one definition. I hunt waterfowl, dove, deer, hogs, anything else I can get a chance to. I've used knives to kill pigs, handguns to kill quail (TC with .410 barrel), all sorts of stupid stuff.

 

[Armored farmer]

As a farmer, I have a sizeable amount of land to hunt on. My family and I look forward to hunting season all year. Quail, rabbit,squirrel, deer, dove, turkey, raccoon, . We have tromped and hunted the same woodlots and fencerows for generations.

I know the difference between target shooting and hunting an animal. I don't take an animals life just to verify that I can hit it.

 

[Arkansas Paul]

Couldn't have said it better Art. The list just goes on and on. The experience, the pride in a job well done, the campfire, the rush, and even the dissapointment are priceless.

 

[Geno]

If it's steel or paper, I'm plinking.

If I am filling a State of Michigan issued Death Warrant (hunting license), well, I'm hunting.

Geno