Wayne, what pizzes me off is some of these new hunters lack of ethics. They spray lead and go and pick up their critters. They don't care how many other animals or people (for that matter) get wounded or killed in the process. My elk hunting partner and I witnessed this happen 2 days ago on the opening day of first season general season bull hunt here in Oregon. These guys fired off 40 rounds (at least) at these elk and went and picked up the remains. The other elk went crashing though the woods. We circled around and got ahead of the herd and my buddy shot a wounded bull that these guys had injured. It was shot twice. Once in the hind end and another grazed the front leg. My buddy could have taken a bigger bull in the bunch, but didn't want to leave this one to die in the woods. It's one thing to shoot an animal at "long range" and make that shot count, but to spray and pray and wound and maim critters in the process is just sickening to me.... I almost went to have a talk with these fu ckers, but figured a heated debate with guns involved would only lead to more nonsense. There were 4 shooters there, they fired a minimum of 40 rounds and dropped 2 elk. Wounded who knows how many. It's guys like these that give good hunters a bad name.
Well, this whole idea that hunting ethics have gone down doesn't really fit. Go read any JOC book and read of how much lead he and his associates slung at unknown distances with wounded game lost. Read some books written before his time when game was thought unlimited and many didn't even bother to track wounded animals as it was easier to just shoot another. A couple of good examples are the books by Sheldon and Hornaday written about hunting in the early 1900s.
Hunting has actually become more ethical over time as resources dwindle and awareness is increased. Sure, there are some bad folks out there, but there's probably more unethical people shooting short than long. Overall, hunters are more ethical now than they've ever been.
