AllieBaba
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- Oct 2, 2007
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- #21
If we could back to the actual thread title:
The last paragraph is a bit telling and for me brings into question how credible the article is and what they authors really know about hunting.
First hunters are not "instructed" to take the largest animal. No one 'instructs' on which animal to take. No one 'instructs' any other hunter I know what to take either.
The reality is there is only so much wall space. My dad shot and had mounted the largest white tail he's seen to this day some 15 years ago. The largest elk he has shot and had mounted was more than 20 years ago. The largest mule deer I've shot I had mounted last year. The largest white tail my brother has seen was shot and mounted last year. The largest walleye I've ever caught was mounted 6 years ago. My dad's 5 years ago.
The point, you may be asking, is that after you get 'the big one' size after that for most hunters becomes irrelevant. I can say with a high degree certainty that my dad will never shoot a bigger elk, and my brother I can say with 99.9% certainty is never going to shoot a bigger white tail rack wise, and he has 40-50 years of hunting left.
The other thing I question about the study is if the human harvest is really enough of a factor that it correlates to what was observed (I don't deny their obervations). Given the deer hunting year in MN I find it hard to believe that humans are haveiung a huge impact on the animal population much less causing any evolutionary changes. We had a hard enough time competeing with the Timberwolves for deer this year and as far as large animals go, white tail deer are probably the number one hunted animal in the country. Interesting that they chose not to study those.
Do you have some sort of lodge to place all these mounted marvels of taxidermy?
Or do your poor wives have to dust them as they go about their daily chores?
Really, what room is a mounted fish appropriate in?