Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game When hunting became shooting

Just like anything else.... As soon as something is past someone's "personal comfort zone", it immediately becomes wrong and unethical.

I love to get close to critters. If I had it my way, I would never shoot big game over 100 yards. But I'll be damned if I'm going to watch an animal that I just hiked for 4 hours after walk away because I handicapped myself with my equipment and lack of practice.

What a bunch of babies. If you don't like someone's methods, cut it down and brag yours up. The premise that so much game is wounded at long range is unsubstantiated. One post claimed finding several dead animals that were wounded at long range. How would you know?

Sneaky people with primitive weapons seem to think they are better than long range shooters, just like bicycle riders think they are better than people with cars. They are both wrong. Long range shooters like to brag about their long shots, but I don't hear them telling everybody that they need to go to long range shooting.

We can all think back to the day when hunting was done with a black powder rifle and iron sights. You will also have to consider the fact that game was more plentiful and hunting areas were less crowded and urbanized.

I hate people that drive Subarus and vote Democratic. They are still Americans and even though the country would be better off without them, they still have a right to be here. The fractured aspects of hunting and what is accepted from one hunter to another is what gives the anti-hunting crowd the ammunition they need to destroy what hunting we have left.

Snivel snivel, whine whine, cry all you want, I am going hunting they way I choose and enjoy and I still belong to the NRA and support every aspect of gun owner's rights and hunting/fishing opportunities as much as I can so that it can be enjoyed by at least one more generation.

And that is one time when hunting becomes shooting.

But there are many other ways in which the whole "hunting experience" is being diluted with technology.

I don't think the argument about giving anti's ammunition holds water, becasue people use that to justify anything and everything. Plus, nothing that we do or don't do will change the way they think. Nonhunters (not antis are a different story.

In a lot of cases, game is MORE plentiful, much more plentiful, than it ever was. Yes, there is more competition for that game now, but the animals are often much more abundant than they ever were, and much more accessible too (effectively increasing their apparent abundances).

Competition for game spurs a lot of the drive for technological advantages to "get an edge" over the competition.

I'm guessing there is a reason a person doesn't carry only an 8 iron in their golf bag.

Repertoire

to me the satisfaction of shooting comes from how close i can get to the game not how far i can shoot them from.

I think if tanner (or anyone) has hiked 4 hours he is doing more hunting than alot of guys around here do in a year. And from his avatar it looks like he's doing it in the mountains. He IS hunting. What I see in my area is guys sitting in their pickup, on a hill top, drinking coffee, lobbing bullets towards anything they can see in their spotting scopes. They are not hunting.

If tanner has hiked 4 hrs he has hiked 4 hrs. Lots of folks hike for 4 days, never mind 4 hrs and they might not even carry a gun doing it. When is hiking - hunting?

But be that as it may, does 4 hrs of anything entitle someone to a bull, buck or bear? What difference does it make if he hiked or road and ATV or sat on his butt next to the road for 4 hrs?

Of course, I don't golf either. But if I did, I'd only use and 8 iron I'm sure.

Nobody mentioned anything about being entitled to game.... I've known from a young age that success is earned and not given, and that's precisely why I choose to have the ability to capitalize upon hard work in getting to an area where I may find a good buck/bull/ram/,etc....

I will firmly state until I die that being "out there" and sharing time with my Dad, brother, Sister, hunting buddies, and the Outdoors is easily more than half the fun-but it sure is more fun when you're walking out with a pack full of meat and a rack over your shoulders.

Yep, time and time again when discussion turns to historical game populations many scoff at the suggestion that in some cases today is better than 'the good old days'.

The answer to the first question is no, he still has to make the shot, at whatever distance. Then he's entitled.

If someone has to explain the answer to your second question, I pity you.

Seems hunting at some point always becomes shooting, else it's just walking around with a gun/bow whatever.

Pretty sure shooting doesn't have a defined range to qualify it as shooting. When one pulls the trigger at 25 yards or 500 yards they are still shooting.

Whitetails most definitely are probably more abundant. Antelope? Good chance their population has increased.

Elk? I doubt it from what I've read. Like the Buffalo their numbers on the plains was often incredible from the writings of those who passed through during that time.

Sheep and Mt Goats? Not likely from the old timers accounts that I have read.

Small Game? At least here in the East in my own lifetime, the numbers have decreased more than a little with time.

Turkeys? I think it was Lewis and Clark who reported unbelievable numbers East of the Missouri.


What native game animals other than Whitetails have a proven population increase over the numbers of the 1800's?

Yep...

Putting a number on "right and wrong" and "unethical" is foolish, IMO. I guarantee I don't have the stalking ability that guys that hunt whitetails in the eastern woods have, but I'm not about to call it unethical because I can't do it...

Next time you see us sitting in the truck stop by for coffee, we will let you gut shoot a few deer too Hell with spot and stalk, I like drive and shoot.

Right on Tanner.

Ruffed Grouse and Black Bear.

Give you Black Bear.

Check the historic 10 to 12 year peaks on Ruffed Grouse in Wisconsin and you will see a steadily declining scale.

Pigs, pheasants, around here, squirrels and bunnies.