Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Alaska Wanton waste by the Alaska Natives

I addressed a fellow on another forum about him really hitting on the natives for their hunting with no season or no hunting laws for them to obey or enforcement of them. I have not lived in Alaska for several years and virtually no time in the villages. I don't agree with all he is saying, but some may be true.
His note below:

Butch,
In support of my earlier comments. I have spent 30+ years working in the many villages and towns across the state of Alaska.
Lived and worked in Bethel for almost a year, Kotz for over 2 years, Barrow over a year, etc, etc. Building everything in 20 different villages and towns and I can honestly say that about 50% to 60% showed obvious evidence of wanton waste.

I have always looked upon our historical treatment of the Indians as a shameful chapter and I have made many friends among the Natives and had many amazing times in these places.

You're friend "who has seen it all", apparently wasn't paying attention.

Most of these villages were staffed by a PSO(village state trooper) and there was a notable lack of interest in reigning in these excesses.

Not everyone was doing this, but I did not imagine the rotting Caribou, Seals, Polar bears, and Fish in these villages.

Respectfully,
Les

Definition of wanton waste ends at the point of consumption. Once it is "yours" you can do whatever you want with it. Left in the field? Wanton waste.

There is a lot of waste, just not technically wanton...

Let's look at the big picture here. 40% of the US food supply is wasted (not consumed). Landfills are 20% by volume food waste.

Things have changed now that it is so much easier to "harvest" with modern rifles, boats, outboards, wheelers, snow machines, etc.

I recall seeing a Yup'ik Hand symbol once The hand has a hole in middle of it. The meaning was to always let some not get harvested. We call this sustainable harvest in modern times.

I'm sure that traditions of the past are lost on the newer generations. We learn everything we need to know off the innanet now . . .

Yes Sir!

Wonton waste knows no color.
Proportionately there is more hunting going on rural Alaska, than urban
Inexperienced to the completely idiotic type, fishers and hunters live all over the state and some arrive in jets, some drive up that Alcan....they make mistakes and are often corrected, often by personal competition and a desire to do better, or learning from experience or by the law.

Some never learn.


Sometimes the mid summers rains spoil and mold fish, some winter warm ups extra carcass or fish can be spoiled by stray dogs and Ravens, often by weather. What Whitefish my wife caught this fall to freeze ended up getting dried, many fish that would have remained frozen all winter thaw and spoil mid winters during 5he multihull thaws.....
What used to be dried in Spring as it thawed, a winters accumulation of fish, shot game parts, leftovers, and things that used to be fed to dog teams for milinums now ends up in dumps

Native Lands are simply private lands subject to all State of Alaska laws with fish and game , limits, seasons, etc.
Federal lands and waters are regulated by the Feds.....Migratory Waterfowl, Marine Mammals, Fishing in our seas, etc.

Often Federal laws and State laws do not work in conjunction, and there are many conflicts in where, what, how and who (local or resident) can hunt/fish/trap for personal use (subsistence use)

Wanton waste is never acceptable. Once you get it home, do as you will.

I don't know what a PSO is, but most villages do NOT have any form of law enforcement, and those that do, it is lackadaisical.
My relatives are Natives, and I have lived in this area now for 40 years. Yup, no limits, get what you want, if it is there. License? Only white people get licenses. Moose? Any time? Poaching? No problem. They won't even get a fine, at least out in Bethel.
We are all equal, but some are more equal than others.

Sure. We actually have a lot of kids from rural Alaska get charged with big ticket violations and forced to come into town to serve time at Fairbanks Golden Heart Academy and then they live with foster parents under probation until they can return to their villages. One who was one of my students, shot a Grizzly that was breaking into his grandpa's Qunisaq (entry). He killed it but he didn't skin it and turn it over to the state. A trooper came in from Kotzebue and cited him for wanton waste and assaulting an officer after the kid took a swing at him because the trooper took his hunting rifle without explaining to him why he was doing it. The kid who was a leading member of a state championship basketball team was moved into Fairbanks where because of his foster parents was unable to play basketball at all.

I have seen waste but I have also seen waste out on the Steese during the Forty Mile Caribou hunt that is absolutely a lot worse. I would challenge anybody to prove to me that it isn't.
Most people from the villages respect the land. The ones who don't generally are as uneducated as the slob hunters who are urban. They spend all of their time playing call of duty and ordering from Eastbay.

It go’s without saying, your chances of seeing anyone of Native decent , the highest percentage of people in a village usually are, commit wonton waste, in a village, is pretty high........just live in a village and wait....

Want to see wanton waste with non natives? Watch who explains what at an airport when there’s only antlers in the luggage.
The percentage of non Natives jumps up, maybe 99%, right there.
I worked at Kotzbues airport back inthe 80 s, and saw a lot of FnG dealing with such via Markair.

http://www.adfg.alaska.gov/index.cfm?adfg=wildlifenews.view_article&articles_id=236

Stupid knows no ethnicity.

Caribou, I've no skin the game (I'm not Alaskan of course)but I noticed the link was to a article from 2006. What has been the outcome in unit 23 from the apparent pressure of too many in one place?

Another thing I noticed that really surprised me was that there were (Maybe still are not) any game processors or freezers available in Kotzebue? Seems like a opportunity for someone.

I grew up on a dairy farm in the heartland. We never had a hunting license or observed a hunting season. A piece of paper meant nothing to us. All we wanted was the job of selling the piece of paper.

Are the hearts of the animals left in the field?

I think much about village life would shock you if the lack of processing facilities surprises you.

I hate saying it but I would support a mandatory meat processing and respect weekend for hunters both in the villages and in the cities too. I have seen way to many racks of moose ribs in the dumpsters. Let's say you are a single military guy stationed up in Ft. Wainwright and you shoot a large moose. What do you do with the extra moose? I have seen time after time military wives coming in to Sportsman's with a look of pure terror. What do I do? My husband expects me to process this cow sized animal and I don't know how.

I remember that when I taught in Ambler I would take my students hunting. Most had never gone before and the ones that had didn't have the proper respect for the animal and meat. I would have Minnie Gray who just passed on teach them how to process the caribou the traditional way. Two days later they would be done and would have a different outlook. Just because a kid lives in a village doesn't mean his or her family taught them how to cut up meat. It doesn't always work that way. I can imagine that Chip and his family have probably taught many, many, many young people how to properly process meat without leaving much. Most people don't keep the lace fat, the bible, the intestines, the kidneys and the tongue and head anymore.

I remember that the first caribou that my father shot when I was eight was a mess. He really didn't know how to properly butcher the caribou. He had me do it. I decided that I would learn how to do it right so I sought out help from Frank Billum who was an old Ahtna hunter and chief. We went up to the Denali Highway and took quite a few caribou and moose for a couple of years and he made sure that I saved everything. He had learned how to hunt sheep and caribou with bow and arrow. He was in his 90s when I was 10. His first rifle was a muzzleloader and then he got a 44-40 model 73 that I am sure is lost in time and space. He was using a 30-30 prewar model 94 when I was hunting with him and would just work quietly still hunting to get close. I would guess that a majority of the meat that we took went to families that didn't know how to hunt. They had lost that and the kids were not willing to go with Frank because he worked very hard. Frank was retired from the railroad and worked hard right up to his death. We would go from before dawn to darkness and in early September days were still long.

The Frank Billums and Minnie Grays are rapidly disappearing in Alaska. Think about it. Art, you are in a position to probably teach many of the young people what to do with a moose and how to cut it up. There are not many people that really know how to do it right. We are talking about respecting the meat of the animal and the sacrifice that it makes.

Alaskans shoot everything I don't care if you kill everything in Alaska...FTPOPO

???

I guess I do not understand either.

I did figure out the F The POPO...

I am glad you figured it out. I spent 3 years in anchorage and hated every minute of it.. Had $800.00 stolen by two Eskimos would of killed them if I had the chanch.. cops were worthless. Eskimos are more worthless than Niaggers.

As an Anchorage resident for well over a half-century I appreciate your boost to our economy and thank you for leaving.

Sho Nuff glad you gone!

not as glad as I am.

Everybody is happy! Life is good!

Geez, what an a hole. I'm finally in AK and it will take a LOT for me to leave. But then I"m thankful that A holes don't stay here long.

As to waste of game, I waste my fair share. Hmm. Shouldn't admit that eh? What about food we leave in the freezer and forget about using and toss out years later? I HATE that.

What about the lower cuts of meat I"m not legally having to keep? Shanks and such. 90% sinew, PITA to process. Thats why I'm interested in a pressure cooker to try that meat.

For me, though I admit I like to preserve skin and antlers and horns, I'd sooner leave them lay than not take the meat.

What about organ meat as mentioned? I can't stand the stuff, though moose tongues I keep. If I knew anyone that would take the organs I"d save em in a heartbeat.

We have to take X deer off the lease, or its over populated, and as such we generally give away a couple each year. To folks that use them. One of them always brings me a pot of chili or bag of chicken fry.,. no need to though. We bring them quartered meat in a cooler.

So far here in ak, I've only bought one pound of hamburger and lunch meat. Well some spam and such is a change of pace too, but eating moose and sheep so far. Hope it stays that way and ad a bunch of salmon in that mix.

Yep, folks waste, but there are different levels. To kill like some wolves just to kill and not use... I hate that. I hate the ones that take the hinds and backstraps only too.

But then on fish, if we filet, aren't we wasting too?

Fine lines in ethics in ways. Legals lines are even more iffy. I trim between the ribs on moose, down to a clean carcass. We can grind it all up in burger as needed.

Someone that knows how to fillet is wasting VERY little meat.

If they take the bellies and cheeks.... That said we filet catfish, then fry the bones.. the bones have better taste actually, IE the meat left on the bones.

I at least know how to filet warm water fish fairly well... Well except for flounder, I have only done a handful... I suspect I'd fail on a butt... But I sure want to catch a butt, well really the others, rockfish, orange things, the ones that eat even better ya know... Eventually I'll get a chance at that I"m sure.

Indeed, it is iffy, especially in Unit 13.

Prior to Oct 1, meat must remain on the bones of the front quarters, hindquarters, and ribs until removed from the field or
processed for human consumption.

Moose ribs on an open fire beat pressure cooker loads shot over the table, every time!

Nah, I live in the middle of a reservation, and used to be out and about all the time while doing business.

My surprise was that is if there is such a problem with waste of game, and so many people are soooo stressed about it, why someone hasn't got the bright idea to address those concerns and also make a little money on the side.

I see your point, but the fact is most of the issues from a legal standpoint happen in the field. The sport hunting that gets done form there is mostly guided and they deal with the issue. There are only a bit over 3,000 people in Kotzebue and the hunting would be very seasonal.
Even Bethel at twice the population does not have a butcher that I am aware of.

No need for a pressure cooker to get shank meat tender. Since I learned to cook it overnight in a crock pot, shank meat is one of my favorite cuts. Falls apart with a fork, and stays moist.

That thought had occurred, but if I didn't want to cook it all day or overnight.. hence pressure cooker. GLAD to know that crock pot works.

Gotcha sir. Thank you.

Works like a champ. Put in some potatoes, onion, carrots in beef broth and it'll surprise you. Sometimes I put it out on the porch or in the garage to cook, it will aroma-tize the whole house.

i had the head cut off the boar i killed to win the biggest hog contest at the campfire hog hunt and the rest thrown in their gut pile dump. no way way i'd eat that stinky bastard.

Right now there is a dead whale washed up at the head of Turnagain Arm. With certainty bears are eating it and rolling in it. It is perfectly legal to go kill those bears.

Cannot imagine skinning one of them after they have rolled around a bit in that stench. Eating the bears would just be ridiculously groteque.

thats a whole other story... feral hogs. We never go by size only by odor when we walk up. If you can smell them, toss them. No matter size. If not, even a bigger boar, like IIRC we've had boars up to 225 or so that were fine.
Barrows are fine, but there are not enough of them.

[quote=kaboku68]I can imagine that Chip and his family have probably taught many, many, many young people how to properly process meat without leaving much. Most people don't keep the lace fat, the bible, the intestines, the kidneys and the tongue and head anymore.

What is the bible?

I know what lace fat is from watching Caribou's show.
Couldn't all the fat off an animal be rendered into grease?

I would keep the tongue to eat. Just how much meat is on the head? I figure you could do it the same as a hogs head and and make sausage. Could you keep the brains to tan the hide with?

The kidneys and liver and probably some other organs I would think would make trap bait,no?

Can the intestines be cleaned out to make casings for sausage?

I watched a survival show where they would catch the blood and cook it into a pancake but I would draw the line at that.

I know that is a lot of questions but am curious
Thanks to anyone who could answer. I have reread this thread twice and have really enjoyed it!

Its part of the stomach, turned inside out and washed. It doesn't taste bad.

The liver, if it doesn't have any flukes, cold-washed in a creek till its blue, is probably one of the best pieces of meat in most herbivores that you hunt. Dall sheep often have liver flukes but I have had dall sheep liver and their testicles sliced and pan fried and its good.

There is some stuff that gets cooked up that would test the will of any westerner. The little chickadees that the young boys catch on berries and then put them in river banks to ferment or fermented seal guts that are held in a seal polk to season the oil and are sliced up as Inupiaq chewing gum. I used to eat (you have to eat there is no way out of it) traditional porcupine from my adopted native grandma who would take the whole porky guts and all and put him in a campfire that was burned down and just coals. She would roll him around in the coals with an old shovel. The quills would burn on and the outside meat would be charred and the inside meat would be a little pink. That took some getting used to.

Thanks for your answer. I have tried beef, pork and chicken liver. I cant past the taste enough to get it swallowed. I forgot about the mountain oysters, I would definitely keep them and the bag they came in.

I had $ 800 stolen by a white guy in Anchorage... so I try to stay out of it as much as possible.

But Anchorage isn't Alaska.

Kotzebue has had refrigeration/freezer blues since forever......

I worked many an extra hour at Markair in Kotzebue in the 80 s, and the fish plants freezer or ice maker would quit and we’d get a slug to load into a few Herc’s worth of Salmon.
Then fishing went belly up for a lot of years and those freezers went unrepaierd, unused.
The money that could have been saved, and made .......the worst effect was that the WACH was at a peak 475,000 Caribou, with plenty for all, and non red could get 5 each, and they did, and came back again, untill they were restricted to 1 Caribou each, and Cabellas army stopped showing up by the jet load.

Arts and crafts sales plummeted and folks trying to make a summers worth of work into big money had to find other outlets for sales.
We used to make stuff and stop in Kotz on the way home and make twenty grand in 3 -4 days, and head upriver for our own meats.

There were two additional problems, one was that most locals had meat, and there was little opportunity to give any away, as well, inexperienced hunters having 5 animals on their hands was often overwhelming, so meat care wasn’t at its best and that, too made it hard to give away.
Around here, most carcasses are hung in the skin in the chilling fall, stored for later use in Winter, the skinned meats need further care and that’s when the clock starts ticking.

We don’t render Caribou fats, as they are lean, and the belly fats are sweet, so we save them for cooking. Besides, we have Seal oil, fish oils and Bear oil, each a condiment with a taste very different taste and in combo with different meats.

The fall Bulls eat very well, and a mature Bull picks and eats good moss, lichens and such with no mud or sticks, so we get the
Rumenets bag and boil it with contents inside, and that’s our “Bible” or to some, the book, as it’s a multi chamberd stomach that’s breaking cellulose down.
Good boiled with gut fat, toung, kidneys and liver as a first meal while the riguremortise leaves the meats of the carcass.

We make sausages from the innards, but they are delicate, we often use tougher seal intestines.

Education and a bit of competivness amongst fellow hunters usually have the young ones making better on mistakes, rumors of misuse or waste around someone usually gets chiding in a village and social pressure to do things right is overwhelming, but like any moral decisions, some [bleep] don’t have morals, no matter skin color.


Ona sad note, Minnie Grey was buried a couple weeks back.

Hey Caribou,
Do you know Tony Henry, he went to the Kiana School in the late 70's..
I don't run into too many people from your area, just curious.

Do any of you remember Art LaHa? He was a bow hunter from Wisconsin who came to Alaska on hunts. He made a video about native hunting. There is a part in there where 10 boat (Umiak's) loads of hunters surrounded an ice flow with Walrus's on it. Each man fired several shots at them. The video was "No Land for the Timid". It had an interesting perspective on use of the resources. They only recovered one Walrus, That was the one that Art had shot with an arrow and line attached.

If there is anyone that would like copies of "No Land For The Timid" or any other of my fathers movies or books please contact Connie LaHa Ghiloni. I am the daughter of Art LaHa and his movies are copyrighted. I would be glad to sell you a copy if you would like. Please do not make un-approved copies of my fathers hard work. Thanks.. I can be reached at gwghiloniyahoo.com or 715-686-2223

Never heard of it.(grin)



TRULY the pinnacle of Alaskan footage and congrats to you,for the connection. I've multiple copies in both VHS and DVD,all of which are on the level.

Glacier Bear,Polar Bear,Brownies,Caribou,Sheep,Moose(80+"),Wolves,Wolverines...the Northern gamut are all encompassed. Then there's the Seals,Walrus and Whales.(grin)

What an amazing compilation of magnificence.

Kudos..................

Chip, Thanks for your very informative post. Always like reading what you put on here.

Thanks for posting Chip

Unfortunately, sometimes they do stay. Hell, I've been here for almost 30 years!

Me thinks historically and by todays standards, there has been lots of "wanton waste" in rural Alaska by the Native population. Not all of it was intentional, a lack of quick transportation and refrigeration did not help. Over the last few years multiple reports of caribou slaughters have been reported and left to tribal courts to deal with. A white person is not treated the same.

History says over 30 million Bison were slaughtered over a 10 year period by hide hunters and the pickled tongues were shipped back East and the U.S. Govt. believed it would force Native Americans onto reservations. Pretty sick in my opinion. No one ever came up with a figure on how many Bison were killed by being run off of cliffs and ran off with an arrow in there body only to die a slow death. Lots of meat was left to rot due to no way to preserve it other then smoking and drying.

The white man committed many atrocities on the Native Americans. Native Americans committed many atrocities against other Native Americans. They murdered each other, raped each other, enslaved each other and tortured each other. They ran other tribes out of their "traditional" hunting grounds. If any one thinks the Sioux were the first ones in the Dakotas, Montana, etc. they don't know history. None of those tribes ever gave back any thing they took from a weaker tribe, weakness was not respected. Only the white man gave land back, gave money, gave hospitals, housing, etc.

Alaska's villages are not a Shangri-La. Murders, rapes, incest, domestic violence, alcohol and drug abuse are the norm.

I have been in Alaska for 54 years and my Native Alaskan wife of 43 yeas was born here. We love this place and it's people of all races. We both believe every one should be treated the same and that Alaska is much better off because the U.S. bought the place from Russia. Picture Alaska and the native population if Russia still owned the place.

Excellent post, with each paragraph providing truths that need to be remembered.

Ha! Soon after I got married my wife sent my Japanese MIL pics of a cooler packed full of filets I'd brought home and indicated to her that it was cod, her mom's favorite fish to cook and eat. She wrote back to Mrs. KG, "Oh, how nice that your husband brings back such things fresh from the ocean. But... where are all the heads? That's the very best part of the fish. And was there any roe? If so, surely he didn't just toss it in the ocean. He is half Japanese, isn't he?"

Assuming sweet old Hubert is of the caucasian persuasion, the devil in me wishes that the blokes that beat him for his 8 bills were white also. Then he'd have been in a real pickle. Forced to live in east L.A. or Harlem or something, else every time he saw a white dude he'd damn near blow a gasket...

Was on a charter the other day, the clients asked if I fished after work, yes of course, sometimes. What is my favorite fish. They may have meant locally or in AK, but the answer is yellow or flathead catfish big enough to where I can get cheek meat off the cheeks.

Cod is VERY good though. Lots of fish are really good

Best to you, the Mrs, and the "kids"

Ha! 'A flathead *what*?' Back atcha', my man. You're a bit farther away than you were in TX but that's OK, planes fly to AK too. One of these days we'll meet up and make some memories, I'm sure, out there or over here. I still owe you. Your generous gift of .223 hunting loads for my M4 are still unfired, but they will be put to good use for sure. Best to you and your lady as well.

We will cross sooner or later! So much non heat and humidity here, No politics basically in this job. It was well worth the wife insisting that I quit my other job before I'd managed full retirement.

Makes money issues much harder, but life much softer.

Best to you and yours as always.

And I chuckle to think of Roger sweating for a few more months...

So how did chip make out after his snowmobile crash?

No matter how close you fillet a fish, there is flesh left on.. On well filleted Reds, 2 carcasses of said will yield a meal for one (and I like a lot of fish-flesh!)

Depending on the yield of effort, I mostly save mine and BBQ the backbones. But 20-30 tends to be a bit much, and there are not all that many people I care to have over.

Somehow giving boney carcasses away doesn't seem to go over all that well....atleast among us whiteys.

As to "Native Waste"- some do, some don't. I can cite examples of each- tho the "do" tend to stick in mind more.

Wste is more prevalent among the young studs(and anti-white's) as is , say, running caribou down with 100mph snowmachines, vs stategic methods, and actual "hunting".. I've killed a chitload of caribou from (or near) my snowmachine, and never run one. It can be done.

I've spent 15 of the last 40 years in various remote villages- Pt. Hope, Barrow, Galena, and 8 in Kotzebue. There is much to admire in the Native culture, and much which goes against my cultural norms. Technology has in places overwhelmed ethics, but they are learning.

Enforcement in remote areas is nominal, at best, so it boils down to cultural values, and personal ethics, which need to be adjusted according to technological advances. There is a lag factor here.

The young tend to think the old folks don't know chit.... or they just don't care. And with enforcement thin on the ground, this can be a problem.