For someone with such a high opinion of themselves, your writing style sucks the big one.
Try not sounding like a douchbag for a change, that would definitely help.

Cut Illy a little slack...his last couple posts at least are complete sentences, and on topic...both of which are significant steps forward.

Fish on...

Todd

You are certainly entitled to your opinion todd, but for some arrogant douchebag to simpfly the reasons I hunt down to simply"killin schit" or "proving my manhood" really pisses me off and is completely inline with your "my way or the highway" attitude in life.
Some would certainly consider dragging an endangered species through the water by a barbed trebble hook burried deep in it's mouth simply for sport to be an act of depraved selfishness as well.

I have many times reflected my reasons for hunting.

I have compassion.

20 minutes ago I filleted a hen King Salmon.
I remember feeling remorse as I popped her gills in the river and watched the life drain from her body in a red bloody cloud.
As I removed the skeins of eggs from her belly I felt some angst as I wondered how many of those eggs would have matured to fruition as beautiful Kings that would have returned to my most precious river.

As a young boy I was in complete awe of the creatures that I share this world with.
I would walk into a local sporting goods store and simply stare in awe at the magnificent trophies mounted on the walls.
Nothing mankind has ever created can compare with the beauty that I find in nature.
From the majestic rack of a rutting six point bull elk, to the imposing power of the mighty Grizzly, to the sleek beauty of a chrome bright steelhead, I have immersed myself in the artwork of Mother Nature all of my life.

Selfishly taking the lives of these creatures then trying to rationalize that nearly sinful act is a paradox that I continue to wrestle with to this day.
I simply cannot convey in words the reasons i bear to kill beautiful animals that aren't generally classified as food.
Human greed and a desire to bring them into my life might be a twisted rationale that I use .
The dead creatures that surround me in my trophy room are finer axamples of art than any Van Gough or Picasso in the Louv're.
I don't have many people over to my house, but preserve that incredible beauty just for me.
Human selfishness I suppose.

This year was the first year since the 1980's that I didn't kill a local Blacktail deer.
Yes, I had multiple opportunities at legal bucks at close range with both rifle and bow.
My son killed two bucks, our freezer is full of meat and I really had no desire to kill another animal.
Had an exceptional example of the species given me the opportunity, I'd have taken him and been proud to do so, conquering a wily, overly mature specimen gives me deep feelings of satisfaction knowing that you outwitted a creature with senses hundreds of times greater that those of man .

Often I feel that Man is the cancer of this planet, that the beautiful and innocent creatures that I pursue are much more worthy inhabitants of this incredible thing we call Earth.
I hunted with a bow on the last day of rifle season, a fine looking 18" 3x2 gave me a perfect broadside shot at 18 yards and I had him at full draw, only to let him walk.
I felt contentment knowing that I had decided life over death.
Weird huh?

On topic, No. I don't hate Wolves.
Maybe just the oposite, I have a such deep rooted passion for all things wild.
I want to run my fingers through their sleek fur, smell their punget smell, hear them howl that deep bellowing howl that echoes through the mountains on a crisp full moon night.

Few things on this planet match the love I have for my dog.
It has an intelligence, it has emotions, it feels pain and stress and companionship.
I'd be a fool to think that a Wolf didn't share those same feelings and basic animal instincts, after all a dog is a wolf.
Yet I understand the violent nature of a Wolf's world, they kill rivals, they kill to survive, and they are intelligent and they are apex predators and I compete with them as a hunter of hooved animals.
It is man that I dislike most in this world, yet I am one.
It is wildlife that I love beyond description, yet I kill.
This paradox, this conflict, this wrestling with emotions I cannot define in words though I've tried so many times.

Remember that when your turn comes.



Cope, Cope, Cope, Cope.

http://www.sfgate.com/outdoors/article/Lion-attack-on-tent-camper-is-unprecedented-3690819.php

http://articles.cnn.com/2012-08-26/us/us_alaska-bear-attack_1_park-service-park-rangers-toklat-river


http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/Alaska...9178/story.html

Such a paradox where society wants to save the wolves but partial birth abortions can be legal.

Two down.

http://www.king5.com/news/environment/State-kills-2-wolves-in-northeast-Wash-171266721.html

Then kill them all!

I have a rifle by the front door and any coyote that walks on my land that i see dies....

Well said. I don't agree with all, but I do agree on much of what
you posted.
Went scouting our hunt area Sunday. 12 Coyotes, 10 White Tail deer,
and 4 Mulys were observed. I will take a White Tail doe for the
freezer. Horn mounts are just something else to dust, to me.
To each his own.

Damn Salmonella......one of the best posts around here in sometime.

Very nicely put Salmonella, conveyed a lot of my feelings.


Fishy

I love when Samonella or Dogfish gets their dander up and end up eloquently typing exactly what I feel- compassionate respect for a resource with a paradox between the love of harvest and the regret that comes from ending a life- fish, foul or other.


I enjoy feeling like I am a part of something bigger, savoring an opportunity past, often not killing and equally celebrating success.


Aldo Leupold said that a bird watcher is depriving himself of part of the experience if he doesn't have a chance to feel the warmth of his curiosity, take in the smell and heft of his prey.


Ironically, he also wrote this



Killing the Wolf

[....] We were eating lunch on a high rimrock, at the foot of which a turbulent river elbowed its way. We saw what we thought was a doe fording the torrent, her breast awash in white water. When she climbed the bank toward us and shook out her tail, we realized our error: it was a wolf. A half-dozen others, evidently grown pups, sprang from the willows and all joined in a welcoming melee of wagging tails and playful maulings. What was literally a pile of wolves writhed and tumbled in the center of an open flat at the foot of our rimrock.

In those days we had never heard of passing up a chance to kill a wolf. In a second we were pumping lead into the pack, but with more excitement than accuracy; how to aim a steep downhill shot is always confusing. When our rifles were empty, the old wolf was down, and a pup was dragging a leg into impassable side-rocks.

We reached the old wolf in time to watch a fierce green fire dying in her eyes. I realized then, and have known ever since, that there was something new to me in those eyes—something known only to her and to the mountain. I was young then, and full of trigger-itch; I thought that because fewer wolves meant more deer, that no wolves would mean hunters' paradise. But after seeing the green fire die, I sensed that neither the wolf nor the mountain agreed with such a view.

Since then I have lived to see state after state extirpate its wolves. I have watched the face of many a newly wolfless mountain, and seen the south-facing slopes wrinkle with a maze of new deer trails. I have seen every edible bush and seedling browsed, first to anaemic desuetude, and then to death. I have seen every edible tree defoliated to the height of a saddlehorn. Such a mountain looks as if someone had given God a new pruning shears, and forbidden Him all other exercise. In the end the starved bones of the hoped-for deer herd, dead of its own too-much, bleach with the bones of the dead sage, or molder under the high-lined junipers.



I believe his view reflects observation from a different time as I grew up seeing nothing but a maze of deer trails and I have never seen a wild wolf however, I doubt he would disagree with moderated interference in the name of balance when it comes to wolves today with exception of the ludicrous idea of reintroduction (but that mistake has already been made). The severity of interference should be based on science not emotion though and a wolf legally harvested in an area of concentration is expected.



I think Samonella's wolf is incredible and such a rare experience should be celebrated even if it isn't a personal goal of mine.

Some of us read A sand county almanac while Tood must have read A sandy vagina almanac

Sal, if you think I'm talking about you, then perhaps you should consider why you think that.

Joad, you should consider why it is you fail to think at all.

Fish on...

Todd

And Sal, I appreciate your last post a lot.

When it comes to wolves I have my opinions, and that's all they are...if I'm going to kill something it will be for a few specific reasons, no matter what the animal is.

If it's something I can eat, and I enjoy eating it, then I'll participate in a hunt.

If it's a depradation hunt that I think needs to be done, then I'll participate in that, too, but again only if it's something that can be eaten.

I won't kill a wolf for killing things. It's what wolves do, it's their nature and beauty, and I won't kill a wolf for being a wolf. Same goes for a coyote.

I've killed and eaten black bear, thought it ate like crap, and never killed another one. Don't need a rug, or a mount, so I don't need a black bear.

I haven't killed an elk since the last one I killed took three of us two days to move the good parts 1.5 miles out of a steep canyon to the nearest pickup point...it wasn't fun, and if it's not fun then what's the point? I like eating elk, though, so have no problem with borrowing a few steaks every year from my hunting buddies

In the extreme my "killing schit just to kill schit" comment would go to hunts like safari hunts...there's no reason to shoot a water buffalo, or a rhinoceros or elephant, unless it's to be the Great White Hunter. Drive out there with your guide (who picked out your animal a month ago for you and has been keeping tabs on it), he says "there's your animal", shoot it, pose for pics...not sure that there's any point to that except to prove that you can't hunt.

Trophy hunting to just collect more things on the "look what I've killed list" goes in the same category, if that's your only motivation to do it.

I really enjoy the hunting aspect of it, I'll admit, and I've been known to take my elk calls out and mess around with the elk without ever carrying a gun...I can get the satisfaction of calling them in and checking them out just fine that way, too.

The wolf issue gets me a little wound up every time it comes up because I hear from hunters who express dismay for the poor farmer and cattle, when what they really mean is "I want to kill a wolf", and their sincerity about it is paper thin.

If you want to kill a wolf because it is a problem animal, or is in place/time where a pack needs to be thinned for some management reason, then there's your time to do it...if a hunter just wants to put a check mark on his list of dead animals then I think that's creepy.

I hunt and fish for the same reasons you, and presumably most everyone else does...there's a reason I live in the Pacific Northwest where fish and game and the opportunity to pursue them is a year long and life long endeavor.

Fishing, of course, is a little different...while it is indeed a blood sport and fish do die, intentionally or otherwise, you do have the ability to let them go and the great majority of them will live to spawn. I mostly participate in kill fisheries when it comes to river and salt fisheries, and I love bringing home fish to eat...and my neighbors and non-fishing friends love it when I do, too

Fishing for wild steelhead is pretty much the only non-harvest fishery I participate in, and not surprisingly it's my favorite thing to do, too.

I've certainly caught a pile of "trophy" wild steelhead that could have been bonked, and would have made nice mounts, too, if I was into that...nowadays most of the fisheries require the release of those fish, and I'm fine with that since I haven't bonked one since the early '80's (bonked two way back in the day ).

A day in the woods...or a week, or a month...with my buddies, and a few pics if we bring along a camera and take the time to use it...good food, good company, good times. That's why I'm out there, too.

Fish on...

Todd

Most hunters would prefer to be the deciders, instead of nature.
And they don't like any animal that competes with their vision of what hunting is.

Well said Todd.

What this hunter doesn't like is the reintroduction of a species that hasn't been here for decades. Other predator species have filled in some of the gaps in the absence of wolves, the way that the number of cougars have increase, and as some have said, coyotes too.

The primary arguement for the people who want wolves here is the coolness factor. Everybody who goes outdoors into the woods, and lives in areas, where wolves are present and are expanding their packs will be impacted.

So your saying wolfs have not habitated the PNW for decades?
How would you compare that to tens of thousands of years prior to that?

I don't believe you can say this truthfully if you havent been in that position..

I own a 10 acre mini farm and if yotes are around they die... I have lost 3 cats and several chickens to yotes and all cost me money to feed and purchase... If my family dog was to kill one of the other animals he is dead as well....

Other than some fishing report, I think that was the most thoughful and self-introspective thing you've ever written here Todd... that I have read anyways.


I admire your intelligence, conviction and willingness to debate on a daily basis, even if I just as often disagree with your opinion eventhough I consider myself less than a qualified critic. But, I think it is rare that you do much to confess your true feelings and that seemed unusual but refreshing IMO.