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Game Diversity and Hunting Opportunities

2K views 23 replies 11 participants last post by  Dallas53 
#1 ·
150 generations ago, where we live and where most everyone else lives in North America, we had a true variety of game, perhaps exceeding what is in Africa today.
We had three varieties of Bears, two varieties of Sloths, huge Sloths, and a couple of smaller varities that lived in trees, I understand like in South America today.
We had tow varities of Elephant type creatures. The Blue Locust and others we still have today evolved to keep the Mastodons, and Mammoths, or at least one of them.
We had Sabre Tooth cats, cave lions, two or three types of wolves, horses, camels, and , Elk and two huge deer and, two types of buffalo, several grouses and turkey of course, and billions of Doves and some others I don't remember reading of.
Today what we have is Whitetail Deer or Mule Deer and Turkeys and in some places a few Black Bears or Black Bears and Grizzlies.
Right where we live just White Tails and Turkeys and Squirrels and a few Rabbits.
The Rabbits are dying out from feeding on the soy and corn treated with poisons. The deer are learning to avoid the crops when they are the most contaminated, anyway, just from casual observance.
Why don't we have Elk and Buffalo and Bear, along with the geese, and Passenger Pigeons, and all the varities of Grouse. We have a few transient Mountain Lions,and Black Bears, that very few ever see.
We will probably never see the Passenger Pigeon again, even though scattered reports of one or two or small groups every so often.
Why is it that Big Ag and others re allowed to continue poisoning and killing Big Game and small game on our Public lands and elsewhere, so their cattle can have the forage without competition?
As far as here, most people are unfamiliar with living with Elk and Buffalo, and Bear and such. But if we could restore them to their historical grounds Americans could learn to live with them. It would means some stout fencing, in places, but a sterile landscape, outside, cities and subdivisions is what we see. A big spread with one or two tax deductions roaming around. Livestock Operations and Farms are taxed at greatly reduced rates.
Al that aside I fear if we don't restore what wild game is still with us to available native ranges, our Great Great Grand Kids might only see them in zoos. Indeed that is the only place most see them now. I've never seen a wild Elk, and only one Moose, one Porcupine, a few wolves, Coyotes, and two instances of black Bears near the Smokies, personally. There is little in the way off wild foods either. I have one America Chestnut on the property but no wild grapes, no muscadines, a few Persimmons, Walnuts and Hickories but that is it.
 
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#3 ·
Some of the game you mention tend to be regional, plenty of elk in Wyoming, Montana, Idaho. Here in Maine, we have whitetail deer, moose, black bear, coyotes, coywolves, turkeys, bald eagles, hawks, and owls and many others.

Wildlife populations change over time when I was a boy whitetail were very rare and eagles almost nonexistent. Some of this is due to man and some to climate and availability of food.
 
#4 ·
When I was young Grand Ma had a box antique to us buttons and so forth. Among them she had fish hooks made from Elk leg bone. They had been used quite bit and most of the points not so sharp. One of my Cousins has a skull o a bison from Tn passed down by our Ancestors.
Some passages our Dad's Ancestors from when they came through the Gap, before Boon and Henderson company, speak of hue herds o Elk and Bison and evidently larger than their western cousins. Plenty to eat all year in this part of the Country. The reason where Dad was brought up was called Elk Valley were the hue numbers of Elk and everything else, in Tn
I know where there is or was on the mountains a trace several feet deep from Buffalo, Elk and whatever else and of course Natives.
About 1805 or so Europeans decimated them all. Tamed the land for whatever. In the eighteen and early ninteen hundreds, I can show you graveyards where the average age seems to be mid twenties. Mountains are not real good for crops and they killed all the game so they lived in near starvation and diseased and o course died of starvation. They did raid the Native camps and stole their food and everything else.
 
#5 ·
Tinbucket, it's nothing new. it's an ongoing process called evolution and civilization, and an increasing population that is encroaching upon the natural habitat of many species of animals. if you live long enough, it's not going to stop, but will further increase as we need more land for noising and crops for food. many of the natural habitats for many animals will cease to exist, and more species will be sacrificed for the expansions of progress and people.

the question is, what are we going to do about it?
 
#19 ·
Tinbucket, it's nothing new. it's an ongoing process called evolution and civilization, and an increasing population that is encroaching upon the natural habitat of many species of animals. if you live long enough, it's not going to stop, but will further increase as we need more land for noising and crops for food. many of the natural habitats for many animals will cease to exist, and more species will be sacrificed for the expansions of progress and people.

the question is, what are we going to do about it?
Well, what we do NOT do about it is adopt the Liberal tactic of passing laws to force land owners to do the conservation for us. What we DO is buy land and PROTECT it.
Almost forty years ago, we bought 80 acres of land here in TN. There was not a rabbit, squirrel, deer, turkey, NOTHING on it but a few non-game birds. Hunters were everywhere, hoping to get ONE MORE deer or squirrel. When I got a good luck at the "hunters" in this area, I quit hunting. I have hunted my whole life, from IL to Alaska, but no more. We closed this place to hunting, and we enforced it. Over the last forty years, we have re-built the populations of deer, turkey, rabbit, squirrel, and have the occasional fox, coyote, fisher, and even a Bald Eagle or two.
I cannot speak for other areas, but I know positively that what wiped out everything here was people killing everything that moves.
And to make sure it STAYS this way, we donated a conservation easement on this farm to the Land Trust for Tennessee, who will oversee it in perpetuity, guaranteeing that no one builds another home here, cuts the trees, develops it in any way. This easement can only be broken by the Government in a condemnation proceeding if they want to build a road through here for some reason. I have these signs all around the perimeter, and since people around here don't know for sure what this means, they stay the heck away even more now.
THIS is the kind of conservation I believe in!
Plant Rectangle Font Grass Tree
 
#6 ·
Supposedly my area was once all forest. Today it's almost all ag. Deer are fringe critters............thrive in the changed habitat.

Used to have red and grey fox. Now just reds...........and coyotes. I varmint hunted a lot as a kid, tons of groundhogs. Coyotes rare and not in the area, had to drive west an hr and rare to see even then. Buddy shot one around '85 and it was kind of a rare deal.

Pfft, I can hear them howling outside my neighborhood. Now with yotes everywhere...........groundhogs are few and far between. Turkeys all over, none as a kid.

Heck even Canada geese were kinda rare. Now they are like rats.
 
#7 · (Edited)
Be careful griping about the American farmers while eating your sausage , and cheese biscuit.

Folks are going to eat and keep on procreating.

I am one of four siblings, two of us have no children. But my mother still has seven grandchildren and fifteen great-grandchildren and sixteen is on the way.
 
#12 ·
Dad's Family were Sharecroppers. Very lean living. Dad talked about struggling to get the crops in before the Geese came in. Seems they must have learned when crops were ready, perhaps. From what he said they must have lost at least one or two. This was in the twenties. We have had quite a few around her the last two decades, but last year only a hand full. So far this year not one.
What I was speaking of is the millions of acres, just in this state best described as Hobby Farms,mostly into one or two horses but they afford all the land by being taxed as agricultural, then vast areas locked up by mostly out of state developers, that leave an old home or build one, but no one lives there except maybe on rare occasion to justify it as agricultural or a home to be offered or sale. Not the exact term and I would have to look it all up again to be spot on.
As far as Farming very little Family arming goes on anymore. Under Gov Alexander removed sales tax exemptions for Small "Truck Farms"on behalf of Grocery Association and wholesellers. Most all comes from Mexico or California etc. Local Farmers were taking their Customers.
The Corporate Farm is the norm now or Big Business.
Out west BLM and other public lands , they poison and shoot every animal that competes with or is viewed as not compatible with cattle and sheep. That just shouldn't be.
 
#8 ·
Missouri has more deer and turkeys today than before the whites came. What we're experiencing is a fur market which has collapsed, causing predators to explode in population. Farming is now a matter of scale. Fencerows are largely gone as the small farms that provided a living for many are not profitable nor are good jobs available in rural areas. My county (Ralls County) has fewer people than in 1920. The number of hunters (who provide the Pittman-Roberts $ from the sale of firearms, archery, and equipment) is going down. Trappers ? Only know about a half-dozen today. Used to be every farm boy had a string of traps. Not now.
Wildlife has to have food and cover. I've kept both on or 200 acres, cash rent just enough crops to pay taxes and insurance. At $5,500 an acre (what I've been offered), I could sell out and go somewhere else. But what would happen to the deer, turkeys, quail, rabbits, bobcats, and ...the blasted coyotes and *****? They'd be gone forever. Nah ... they'll find me dead in my woods someday with a muzzleloader in my hands and a smile on my face. I'd have gone to Alaska had I seen it as a young man. Amazing place with great people.
 
#9 ·
Wild hogs have adversely effected the deer population in much of Oklahoma. Deer don't even like to drink from ponds where hogs wallow. i've watched hogs chase deer from wheat fields, game plots and ponds. Hogs have good noses and they can sniff out fawns. Caught two big boars killing fawns.

There are very few foxes in this area, the coyotes kill them. Turkeys are plentiful in some areas but few folks hunt them. There is a surplus of raccoons but almost no one hunts them.

OK farmers are still dozing and burning woodlots and fence rows to make room for government subsidized wheat: There go the quail.

My properties were mostly bought cheap many years ago. Now everyone wants to cut and bale the hay and pasture their cows. i'm not having any of that. Don't need the money or the drama. Allowed a lazy butt to cut the hay for three years. He promised to spray it every year but did nothing so i cut him off.

The biggest problems i have are the invasive eastern red cedars and one scumbag poacher.
 
#10 ·
Wild hogs have adversely effected the deer population in much of Oklahoma. Deer don't even like to drink from ponds where hogs wallow. i've watched hogs chase deer from wheat fields, game plots and ponds. Hogs have good noses and they can sniff out fawns. Caught two big boars killing fawns.

There are very few foxes in this area, the coyotes kill them. Turkeys are plentiful in some areas but few folks hunt them. There is a surplus of raccoons but almost no one hunts them.

OK farmers are still dozing and burning woodlots and fence rows to make room for government subsidized wheat: There go the quail.

My properties were mostly bought cheap many years ago. Now everyone wants to cut and bale the hay and pasture their cows. i'm not having any of that. Don't need the money or the drama. Allowed a lazy butt to cut the hay for three years. He promised to spray it every year but did nothing so i cut him off.

The biggest problems i have are the invasive eastern red cedars and one scumbag poacher.
wild and feral hogs have become a problem for many species of animals. the hogs will eat anything they can get hold of.

many years ago, fire ants became a huge problem. they just about decimated any ground nesting bird species there were around here. we use to have plenty of quail and dove around here. now i'm just now starting see them occasionally.
 
#11 ·
alsaqr

That is what happened down by our Texas Lease the hogs actually put the peanut farmers out of business. Now they raise cotton and cattle. And yes we kill every hog there we can find both day and night.
You are also correct about the removal of cover on fence rows. I use to have English Setter and hunted Quail and Pheasants in Indiana every week and trained new pups. But then they started clean farming an all the hedge rows,fox tail and other cover for the birds was gone. So soon they were mostly gone as well since winter also killed a large amount of them in the cold Indiana winters. What a shame! I sure do miss those days of bird hunting over the dogs. Really did not even have to shoot I liked watching them work so much. And maybe some day I will take a trip to Georgia for Quail or Nebraska or the Dakota's for Pheasants. But it would bring back great memories and I would miss my own dog/s.
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#16 ·
That is what happened down by our Texas Lease the hogs actually put the peanut farmers out of business
i've seen what hogs do to peanuts. Every hog i can get my sights on is shot ASAP. In three years at our lease i've seen only two fawns. The hogs, coyotes and bobcats get them.

This year i went after wild hogs with a vengeance. Killed over 40 small pigs with a .22 LR, hunted down 15-20 big boars and shot a bunch of sows and juveniles at feeders. Shot and snared several coyotes as well.

i don't like the big agri-businesses that are dictating US farm policy. After the dust bowl era of the 1930s the US government planted windbreaks of trees. One stretched from the Mexican border to Canada. Most of those windbreaks have been destroyed to plant wheat.
 
#14 ·
Had some quail and pheasant, blizzard yrs ago knocked em down.
No more fencerows, different farming practices........loss of habitat/food.
Then there was the change in predators........coyotes.

Also cats.
coyotes and feral hogs are our worst problems. the coyotes are being dealt with by killing them anytime we see them.

the feral and wild hogs we are dealing with by reinforcing all of our fencing with hog wire fencing, and keeping them out to begin with. so far that seems to be working pretty good.
 
#15 ·
Several of my farmer friends take advantage of every government program available and I'm ok with that because without them, they'd be s.o.l. one year out of three. I've locked in two fields into CRP/WRP (wetland preservation). Their farms are cropped all the way to the road. No quail nor rabbits. Easily a half-million in machinery for each one to stay in the black (and that's conservative). The only way a youngster can start farming around here is to inherit or marry into an operation. They don't do hunting leases primarily because they have nothing to hunt. Times are changing but Missouri is blessed with an excellent Department of Conservation and quite a bit of state-owned land and lakes managed for everyone to enjoy. The Department brought back deer and turkey and now have established an elk herd. Private land conservation management assistance has also been a success. Non-native plants not so much. Multiflora Rose and crownvetch suck.
 
#18 · (Edited)
I wish I had a xerox memory. But didn't a young child get hurt and his dog killed with one o those cyanide bombs, not too long ago.
I do remember reading that well into the 1900s, in Texas bears, jaguar, mountain lions, etc were being killed. One Rancher shot a herd o Elk that were feeding on his alfafa fields and bales.
And in Wyoming complaints led to the slaughter of a much larger than usual number of Buffalo that let Yellowstone...onto public lands. That was few years back but there was a report on killing or culling more o the Yellowstone herd because they were leaving the park. Every year they kill everyone of the that leave the park.
 
#20 ·
tin, you're talking about some things that were outlawed 50 year ago

The "coyote getter" was outlawed in the 1970s.

The buffalo from Yellowstone are given to the indians to slaughter because they carry brucellosis to cattle on PRIVATE ranches.

The BLM and USFS have been truly outstanding stewards of the public lands in the west for many decades. Our ranchers, for the most part are excellent stewards of their land also.

There are more deer and elk on the PUBLIC land in Wyoming than there were before the white man got here.

There are tens of MILLIONS of acres of PUBLIC land here where I can hunt, fish, camp, hike, ski, snowmobile etc without fees or restrictions. And there is enough game that I can fill mt tags every year.
 
#23 · (Edited)
The story that Buffalo give Brucelosis to Cattle has been debunked many times.
Cattle gave many diseases to buffalo and elk among others.
The Cattlemans Association keep troting this out know it is a lie because they don't want Buffalo on Open Range or pubic lands or theirs to compete with cattle.
On one Rural TV Show a Vet was addressing this on phone, and was cut of and they went on to something else BLM Scientist and Vets know it very well too but...BLM Dept of Ag Serv3 the interest of Big money western Governors and Ranchers. I repeat Buffalo do not pass Brucelosis to cattle, even though just about all Buffalo in the US now have domestic bovine genes.
Cattle can give Brucelosis to Buffalo, if the Buffalo ingest the after birth or milk, of an infected cow. The same goes for Elk.
In 1917 Brucelosis was found in a Buffalo confined in a pen with cattle.
All this bring into question are the cattle allowed to roam public lands disease free?
 
#21 · (Edited)
The federal government is still using the M-44 cyanide coyote killer. i don't have a problem with that so long as the devices are set well away from built up areas. Problem comes when US government employees don't use common sense in the placement of the devices.

The far out antis are against the killing of coyotes; period.

http://kdvr.com/2017/10/26/cyanide-...-colorado-set-coyote-traps-despite-accidents/

Oklahoma has a dearth of public land on which to hunt. If one wants to hunt the best bet is networking with land owners and/or leasing. The OWDC runs the wildlife management areas like a private fiefdom.
 
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