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- Jan 28, 2003
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Prior to the formation of the Boone and Crocket club in 1887 hunting in America was a profession. Market hunting was decimating wildlife at a ferocious rate. There were no seasons or regulations to prevent the mass slaughter of wildlife for food and animal product markets. Animals were killed for their products irregardless of their age or sex, if it was brown it was down. This was completely unsustainable for wildlife. Theodore Roosevelt and George B. Grinnell had traveled and hunted and in particular they had seen the the unregulated rapid paced killing of animals in the American west. They realized that it wouldn’t be long before all wildlife was going to become extinct.
In fact they had organized hunts to collect specimens for our national museums so the we could have historical examples of animals that were rapidly disappearing and soon would be extinct. Roosevelt and Grinnell understood that without swift reform we’d soon be a nation devoid of our national wildlife treasures.
Their solution was to form the Boone and Crocket club. The B&C club mandated fair chase, seasons, licenses and sustainable off take. And in particular they understood that taking older mature males is a net positive to the herd health. That is why they started a score system and henceforth placed value on big older “trophy” males. This system is the foundation of our conservation success and the very reason we have blossoming numbers of wildlife through out the United States.
Those early reforms have grown into the wildlife conservation methods we employ today. I am proud to say that I’m a trophy hunter. As an example when I finally drew my Shiras Moose tag after 17 years of applying in Colorado I passed up 15 mature prime breeding age bulls before finally taking a battered geriatric who was past his prime and carried a declining yet still trophy rack. By doing so it allowed those prime bulls to breed and pass on their genes. It took an old bull out of the eco system who was still fighting younger bulls but was at the end of his breeding years. This old bull was no longer competing for feed or cows making for a healthier herd. Taking old bulls or old dry cows benefits herd health.
Of course this system has been so successful that we are now required to take off females and young males for population purposes and that’s fine too. But it turns my stomach when I see “trophy hunters” being vilified by the press and it really twists me to see other hunters doing it. Doing so is a complete lack of understanding of how we got to where we are today.
Teddy was smart enough to know that conservation was dependent on having people value and the animals and by setting up a regulatory system that allowed the public to hunt and to to do so in a sustainable fashion has worked and worked well. By assigning value to hunting primarily old critters with his score system he started a conservation revolution. We have the best hunting and conservation system on the planet.
I am proud to be a trophy hunter. And by that I mean I’ll hunt for population control where needed, I’ll only kill old mature critters where needed and I harvest all the meat from a juicy young doe or a gamely old bull. I am not a market hunter, I’m not a sustenance hunter, I hunt for the trophy of the experience and thank my maker that I live in a country where I can pursue my passion for wildlife and wild places.
In fact they had organized hunts to collect specimens for our national museums so the we could have historical examples of animals that were rapidly disappearing and soon would be extinct. Roosevelt and Grinnell understood that without swift reform we’d soon be a nation devoid of our national wildlife treasures.
Their solution was to form the Boone and Crocket club. The B&C club mandated fair chase, seasons, licenses and sustainable off take. And in particular they understood that taking older mature males is a net positive to the herd health. That is why they started a score system and henceforth placed value on big older “trophy” males. This system is the foundation of our conservation success and the very reason we have blossoming numbers of wildlife through out the United States.
Those early reforms have grown into the wildlife conservation methods we employ today. I am proud to say that I’m a trophy hunter. As an example when I finally drew my Shiras Moose tag after 17 years of applying in Colorado I passed up 15 mature prime breeding age bulls before finally taking a battered geriatric who was past his prime and carried a declining yet still trophy rack. By doing so it allowed those prime bulls to breed and pass on their genes. It took an old bull out of the eco system who was still fighting younger bulls but was at the end of his breeding years. This old bull was no longer competing for feed or cows making for a healthier herd. Taking old bulls or old dry cows benefits herd health.
Of course this system has been so successful that we are now required to take off females and young males for population purposes and that’s fine too. But it turns my stomach when I see “trophy hunters” being vilified by the press and it really twists me to see other hunters doing it. Doing so is a complete lack of understanding of how we got to where we are today.
Teddy was smart enough to know that conservation was dependent on having people value and the animals and by setting up a regulatory system that allowed the public to hunt and to to do so in a sustainable fashion has worked and worked well. By assigning value to hunting primarily old critters with his score system he started a conservation revolution. We have the best hunting and conservation system on the planet.
I am proud to be a trophy hunter. And by that I mean I’ll hunt for population control where needed, I’ll only kill old mature critters where needed and I harvest all the meat from a juicy young doe or a gamely old bull. I am not a market hunter, I’m not a sustenance hunter, I hunt for the trophy of the experience and thank my maker that I live in a country where I can pursue my passion for wildlife and wild places.
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