Tag: Fishing

Bush/Kerry — No, I'm the Bigger Sportsman

Animal rights activists can see just how relevant they are by noting the ongoing battle between presidential candidates George W. Bush and John F. Kerry to demonstrate which is the bigger supporter of hunting.

In July, Kerry described himself as a deer hunter and has tried to reassure rural voters that his longstanding support for gun control does not mean preventing hunters from buying and owning guns.

Meanwhile, as the Republican National Convention opened in New York, the Bush administration announced that it was opening up land at 17 national wildlife refuges and wetlands to hunting and fishing.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced on August 30 that it would open four national wildlife refuges to hunting and fishing — Mount Long Leaf in Alabama; Cypress Creek in Illinois, Red River in Louisiana, and Waccamaw in South Carolina. It also opened up six wetland management districts to hunting and fishing — Devils Lake in North Dakota; Huron, Lake Andrews, Madison, Sand Lake, and Waubay in South Dakota.

In addition, the USFWS announced it was expanding land and mashes open to hunting and fishing at seven other wildlife refuges. In all, the USFWS opened up an additional 243,500 acres for hunting and fishing.

USFWS directory Steve Williams told The Associated Press,

This is just another example of the president’s commitment to sportsmen. . . . By law, Congress directed the service to consider and provide opportunities for hunting and fishing where it’s compatible on the refuges. We take that quite seriously.

Source:

Bush opening more lands to hunting and fishing. John Heilprin, Associated Press, August 31, 2004.

Group Threatens Celebrities Over Hunting and Fishing

A group calling itself Badgers Unknown put up a web site in March listing the names, addresses and telephone numbers of more than 100 British celebrities that it labelled “bloodsports scum.”

The site urged viewers to take violent action against those on the list, including Guy Ritchie, Sting, Jeremy Irons and others. According to the group’s site,

These people are not immortal and their houses are not fireproof.

Most of those on the list appeared to have gotten there because of their love of angling.

Sources:

Sting on hit list. Zoe Burn, Sunday Sun, March 7, 2004.

Animal sickos: Harm stars. Alistair Taylor, March 8, 2004.

Georgia House Approves Ballot Question for Hunting/Fishing Amendment

In January, the Georgia House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved a ballot measure that would provide a constitutional guarantee of the right to fish and hunt in that state.

By a vote of 154-14, the House approved asking voters in November whether the foll0owing should be added to the Georgia constitution,

Paragraph XXVIII. Fishing and hunting. The tradition of fishing and hunting and the taking of fish and wildlife shall be preserved for the people and shall be managed by law and regulation for the public good.

The proposed ballot measure is now making its way through the Georgia Senate. If it is passed by a supermajority there, then it could go to voters as early as November 2004 where a simple majority vote would result in its adoption.

The full text of the proposed ballot question can be read here.

Source:

Hunting/fishing ‘right’ must be written. Ledger-Enquirer (Georgia), February 8, 2004.

Animal Rights Groups File Lawsuit Against USDA Over Cormorants

In February, four animal rights groups filed suit in federal court against the U.S. Department of Agriculture in an attempt to prevent new rules for killing the double-crested cormorant (a fish eating bird) from going into effect.

The Animal Rights Foundation of Florida, Defenders of Wildlife, the Fund for Animals and the Humane Society of the United States filed the lawsuit to overturn a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service ruling to allow state, federal and tribal officials in 24 states to kill cormorants in order to prevent the birds from killing too many fish.

In the 1960s and 1970s the cormorant was threatened. Since 1972, cormorants have been protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act and cannot be killed without the approval of the federal government. In the intervening years, the cormorant recovered and thrived to the point where fisherman and owners of fish farms complain that the cormorant is cause a significant decline in fish populations in many parts of the country.

In a press release announcing its lawsuit, the groups said,

The recent decisions by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) allow state fish and wildlife agencies, Indian tribes, and USDA agents to kill unlimited numbers of cormorants — in 24 states where the birds are allegedly depleting fish stocks for sport fishing, and in 13 states where they are said to impact commercial fish farms — without any restrictions on time of year or location of the killings, and without showing any specific, localized harm caused by the birds. The government’s decision also allows, for the first time, killing of cormorants at the birds’ winter nesting sites by shooting, gassing, and breaking their necks, as well as destroying their nests and eggs.

The organizations filing the suit — The Fund for Animals, The Humane Society of the United States, Defenders of Wildlife, and the Animal Rights Foundation of Florida — point to studies indicating that the amount of fish eaten by cormorants represents only a small fraction of fish productivity, and suggesting that fish-eating birds like cormorants tend to eat diseased or dying fish because they are easier to catch, and therefore play a beneficial role at fish farms by decreasing the potential spread of disease. The FWS itself has flatly conceded that “commercially and recreationally valuable fish do not generally make up a large proportion of [cormorants’] diet.”

The oddest statement from the group came from The Fund for Animals president Mark Markarian who offered this interesting defense of hunting,

Cormorants, like many other birds, eat fish to survive, and should not be punished for doing what comes naturally. Writing a blank check to kill tens of thousands of protected birds at any time and any place is an extreme knee-jerk reaction to placate the sport fishing and commercial fish farming industries.

Why couldn’t the cormorants just learn to switch to a vegan diet? And why is The Fund not so understanding when humans just do what comes naturally and hunt/fish for food?

The full text of the lawsuit can be read here (97kb PDF).

Sources:

Federal lawsuit filed to stop mass killing of double-crested cormorants. Fund for Animals, Press Release, February 5, 2004.

Animal group sues over cormorants killing. Frederic J. Frommer, Associated Press, February 6, 2004.

Paul Watson Attempts Takeover of the Sierra Club

Paul Watson’s announcement last summer at AR 2003 that he was just three seats away from controlling the board of the Sierra Club suddenly started getting a lot of media attention in early 2004 as the Sierra Club’s April election deadline comes closer.

The Sierra Club, of course, has a $95 million budget which Watson wants to control in order to push his agenda. According to the Center for Consumer Freedom, Watson said at that time,

One of the reasons that I’m on the, um, the Sierra Club board of directors right now is to try and change it Â… we’re only three directors away from controlling that board. We control one-third of it right now. And, uh, once we get three more directors elected, the Sierra Club will not, no longer be pro-hunting and pro-trapping and we can use the resources of the $95-million-a-year budget to address some of these issues. And the heartening thing about it is that, in the last election, of the 750,000 members of the Sierra Club, only 8 percent of them voted. So, you know, a few hundred, or a few thousand people from the animal rights movement joining the Sierra Club — and making it a point to vote — will change the entire agenda of that organization.

According to Sierra Club executive director Carl Pope, about 18 percent of Sierra Club members fish or hunt, and Pope worries that those individuals would be driven from the organization and that it would end up marginal,

It’s important to have hunters and fisherman in the Sierra Club. We are a big-tent organization. We want the Sierra Club to be a big-tent organization. We want the Sierra Club to be a comfortable place for Americans who want clean air, clean water, and to protect America’s open spaces.

The most amusing commentary on the controversy came from FARM USA’s Alex Hershaft who distributed a letter charging that it was, in fact, the hunters and fisherman who were trying to take over the Sierra Club rather than vice versa. According to Hershaft,

The Sierra Club, with 750,000 members and a $95 million annual budget, is being hijacked by the hunting, trapping, and fishing cadres in the forthcoming Board election. Their leaders have been urging members to join the Sierra Club in droves. We can not do any less.

Hershaft parted ways with reality long ago, so this claim should not surprise anyone.

According to Hershaft the three candidates the animal rights activists want to win are activists Kim McCoy and Robert Roy van de Hoek as well as Cornell University Professor David Pimentel.

Pimentel is part of the other group that is trying to hijack the Sierra Club — an organized effort by right wingers and extreme environmentalists to turn the Sierra Club into an anti-immigration organization. A few years ago this coalition managed to put up to a vote by the members a proposed anti-immigration stance that they wanted the Sierra Club would take, but that failed. Along with Dick Lamm and Frank Morris and promoted by racist web sites like VDARE.Org, the anti-immigration effort has also seen the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Morris Dees enter his name as a candidate for the board in order to protest and highlight the anti-immigration effort.

Sources:

Keep the Sierra Club Out of Hunters’ Clutches! Letter, Alex Hershaft, January 23, 2004.

Sierra Club: Ever More Radical. Center for Consumer Freedom, September 4, 2003.

Amendment to Protect Hunting and Fishing in Pennsylvania Passes State House

In January, the Pennsylvania House overwhelmingly approved a proposed amendment to the state’s constitution to protect the right to fish and hunt in the state.

By a vote of 189-11, the state House approved the amendment and sent it on to the Pennsylvania Senate for consideration. Under Pennsylvania’s constitution, an amendment must be approved by both chambers during two successive legislative sessions, and then must be approved by voters as well. The earliest that this amendment could go to voters would be in November 2005.

Rep. Matthew Baker, who introduced the legislation, said the proposed amendment was important to forestall future efforts to limit hunting, fishing and trapping in Pennsylvania. He told Penn State’s Collegian,

There’s not an immediate threat, but what a lot of people are failing to recognize is it is a lot easier to address these issues before there is a crisis than when there is a crisis.

Animal rights groups, of course, oppose the proposed amendment.

Fund for Animals’ released press release quoting national director Heidi Prescott opposing the amendment (emphasis added),

The constitution is a sacred document which shouldn’t be used as a graffiti
wall for political rhetoric.

. . .

To establish constitutional protections for recreational pursuits such as
hunting is not only inappropriate, but redundant. Nearly a
million people already hunt in Pennsylvania without having that ‘right’
enshrined in the constitution.

. . .

Prescott said the bill may expose the Pennsylvania Game Commission to
lawsuits from hunters who do not think any restriction on hunting is
reasonable – wanting larger bag limits, longer season dates, and additional
species to shoot.

Who knew animal rights activists were so concerned about frivolous lawsuits over hunting?

The full text of the proposed amendment can be read here.

Sources:

‘Right to hunt’ advances in Penn. Don Sapatkin, Philadelphia Inquirer, February 15, 2004.

Pa. law may protect hunting. Erin James, The Digital Collegian (Penn State), February 26, 2004.

No Constitutional ‘Right’ To Hunt, Say Animal Advocates. Fund for Animals, November 25, 2003.