COMMENTARY BY DR. DAVE SAMUEL
At one time in their life, most hunters get asked the question, “How can you kill those innocent animals?” Sometimes, such questions come from those totally against hunting, but often they come from non-hunters who are trying to understand how hunters can kill wild animals.
If you dig into the discomfort the questioners have about killing wild animals, you may tweak out the belief they hold that animals in nature just grow old and die a natural death. I have no problem with people not wishing to hunt. But I must admit, deep down, it bothers me that many citizens feel that wild animals die in a peaceful way. The thought that wild birds perch on limbs, taking in the scenery, or mammals lie in green fields, occasionally taking a bite of grass. Free wild animals, not encumbered by human restrains, and not having a care in the world.
That whole idea is just not wild nature. Think about this. Every animal out there, big or small, has to find food every day to survive. We do, too, but it is pretty easy for most of us. Not so for wild creatures. Predators such as hawks, owls, foxes, etc. have to kill another animal, or scavenge some type of food every day. What if a hawk goes for a day without killing a prey animal? Does that hawk grow weaker and thus have more difficulty killing the next day? Or does it just slowly disappear and die, never found by anyone?
I think that many of us have a poor understanding of the realities of living, and dying, in the wild. Maybe we feel the slaughtering of 52 billion domestic cattle, chickens, hogs, etc. for us to eat is one thing, while the death in nature is somehow more natural, peaceful. Of course, that isn’t true.
Many hunters have seen such deaths often. While bowhunting deer, I’ve witnessed redtailed hawks zoom in and grab a feeding gray squirrel. I’ve seen that three times over the years and I can tell you, it isn’t peaceful. The squirrel is screaming as the redtail picks it apart. That is just part of nature.
Wild animals live in a human-controlled world. We have great impacts on whether wild animals live or die, and I’m not referring to hunting here. I’m talking about all the things we do that impacts the habitats of wild animals. Forget the notion nature somehow protects wild animals from human influences.
Although hunters consume tons of wild game they have harvested, most do not have to hunt meat to survive. So the thought hunting isn’t necessary is easy to understand, at least from that point of view. However, don’t rest easy believing the domestic animals we eat, for the most part, were somehow never a living creature. They aren’t just plastic-wrapped beef, pork, chickens, etc.
I guess the bottom line here isn’t that animals often die in horrible ways in the wild. As a society we tend to gloss over that fact. Hunters hunt for many reasons, one of which is meat. Wild meat is healthy, with no antibiotics in their food. I think that’s a plus for hunting and eating wild animals. Obviously, hunting and killing is natural for wild predators. I think that it is also natural for humans to hunt. We’ve done it since the days of early man.
I love the fact there are animals that roam free and experience wild nature. They are adapted to live that wild life. We love seeing them out there. That isn’t the situation with domestic animals. However, there is this growing demand for cattle raised on good diets that don’t include chemicals, and a growing demand for chickens raised outdoors with room to have some type of experience in their lives. And there is a growing demand for eggs from chickens so raised.
This topic is rather difficult, but for me, as a hunter, I’m glad we harvest wild animals. In so doing, there is an economic demand to keep as much wild nature out there, so that we continue to have wild creatures. There is no question I much prefer going to the freezer and taking out a package of venison, as opposed to a freezer wrapped package of beef. The experiences each of those animals had before they ended up as human food was very different. I know if I were that animal, which experience I’d chose.
