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October 2009
In the Hunt
Dear Friends,
I have to admit that I am not much of a hunter. Although I spent a fair amount of my youth hunting pheasants and trapping beaver and raccoon (unintentionally, opossums and skunks too), these days I’m pretty rusty. I still hunt with my old single-shot 20 gauge, and pheasants now openly taunt me when I’m in the field. They know that I couldn’t hit a bullet with the broadside of a barn, and that the safest pheasant in the world is one that flies up in front of me. He knows there isn’t even a remote chance that a piece of shot will even graze his feathers.
That said, as a farmer and landowner, I support hunters and hunting. Landowners in this part of the world know about the huge deer herds in our region, which, when kept in check, are a positive development. When I was a kid growing up in the 1970s, actually seeing a deer was relatively rare. Pheasants were few and far between. Most game and nongame species were suffering from loss of habitat.
In high school, we raised pheasant chicks through a Nebraska Game and Parks Commission program, banding and releasing them into the wild at eight weeks of age. I’m not sure how many of the pheasants survived the harsh winters back then, but we saw a few of our own pheasants out and about in the fields.
Today, we are lucky. Pheasant populations are strong. Deer populations are even stronger. These days, it isn’t all that unusual to even see a mule deer in our region. Wild turkeys, once thought only to be present in western Nebraska, now frequent our farmyard, and even my parent’s home in town.
Thanks to the efforts of the Game and Parks Commission, sportsmen and conservationist groups like Pheasants Forever and Ducks Unlimited, hunters, trappers and farmers and ranchers around the state, the critters are back in force. Habitat producing programs aimed at private landowners, farmers and ranchers, like Conservation Reserve Programs, Wetlands Reserve Programs and other similar projects administered through USDA and local NRDs have changed the landscape for the better when it comes to wildlife.
Some urban folks still believe that hunting is cruel, but they just don’t understand the principles of wildlife management. The wildlife herds and flocks must be kept in check with the available habitat. If they aren’t, starvation or diseases aren’t very humane either. They aren’t aware of the damage deer can do to a hay pile in January, or a cornfield in June. They haven’t experienced extreme economic losses to wildlife like many farmers and ranchers.
As hunting seasons begin in our area, it is important for landowners and hunters to work together in the important wildlife management process that they participate in. One hunter who doesn’t ask permission to hunt, or leaves a gate open where livestock can roam free, most likely gives a bad name in the mind of that particular landowner for any future hunters wishing to hunt their property. Hunters also have to be aware that landowners often worry about the safety of the hunters they allow on their property, trying to coordinate hunting times and places. It isn’t the easiest of tasks, particularly for farmers who might be busy with harvest season, wishing they had the time to go out and hunt themselves. So, as hunting seasons begin, my only message to hunters and landowners alike would be, “Have fun. Enjoy hunting season. And be careful out there.”
Read more “Farm to Family” in the new book, “A Year with Farm to Family: A Journal of Rural Life” published by the Cedar County News. It’s available from the Cedar County News office, Amazon.com, www.downtoearthbooks.com, St. James Marketplace and Corps of Discovery Welcome Center.
Talk with you next week.
W.K. Kellogg Foundation
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