News: Monster Bucks

With the upcoming hunting season fast approaching how about a little teaser to get you even more exited? The Boone and Crockett Club just released the new entries to their trophy record book.

The trophy buck that peaked my interest right away was the monster buck taken in Alberta, Canada. This very unusual buck was taken by Scott Reeves last fall in Alberta. While only pushing the 11-1/2 inch mark in greatest spread, this deer has 25-inch main beams and reportedly scores in the 186-range as a non-typical! What a weird looking buck. In this case it was the antler mass that gave him a 186-point ranking. Truly a unique trophy. Alberta is known all over North America for its trophy sized whitetail deer. Another fine Canadian Province I have earmarked in my calendar for an upcoming hunting trip in the future.


The next buck I show you has been taken in my old hunting grounds of Illinois. Having lived in that deer hunter paradise for 10 years I know how big these corn fed deer can grow. Illinois consistently produces trophy deer every year. Dave Voorhees arrowed this all-time records book giant, scoring 170 B&C, on December 23rd. He was also able to get great velvet footage of it earlier in the year, as well as video of the hunt. This great 5x6 has over 6-inch bases! The Voorhees buck was taken in Peoria County, not far from where I use to live. I think I will go back there one of these days. Man, I am “home sick” now.


Tags: Trophy Bucks , Whitetail Deer

Misc. Doctors kill more People than Guns

Today my email inbox was abuzz with messages coming in from everywhere. It happens every year when the hunting season gets closer. Fellow hunters ask me for last minute tips on early season deer hunting strategies, like. “Hey Othmar, whats the best way to get a big buck in the early bow hunting season?” or “Hi Othmar, what do you think about this stand location for an early season buck ( see drawing of the map)…

But some people also know that I am a sucker for statistics and so they send me at times some very interesting ones like the one below.

I cannot substantiate the truthfulness of this study, but it still interesting.

Results of New CDC Study...
Doctors:
(A) The number of doctors in the U.S. is 700,000
(B) Accidental deaths caused by physicians per year are 120,000
(C) Accidental deaths per physician is 17.14%
Statistics courtesy of the US Dept. of Health &Human Services
Guns:
(A) The number of gun owners in the US is 80,000,000 (yes that’s 80 million)
(B) The number of accidental gun deaths per year, all age groups, is 1,500.
(C) The number of accidental deaths per gun owner is 0.001875%.
Statistics courtesy of the FBI
So statistically, doctors are approximately 9,000 times more dangerous than gun owners.
Remember, guns don ~t kill people, doctors do.
FACT: NOT EVERYONE HAS A GUN,
BUT ALMOST EVERYONE HAS A DOCTOR.
Please alert your friends to this alarming threat.
We should ban doctors before this gets completely out of hand!
Out of concern for the public at large, I have withheld statistics on lawyers for fear the shock would cause people to panic and seek medical attention.

Makes me kind of thinking differently about my next doctor appointment.

Hunting: The World Hunting Association still doesn't get it!

I got another email form a World Hunting Association supporter in response to my article “Finally seeing common sense”. In which I report that the WHA had to change it’s plans of chasing deer with tranquilizer guns and offer price money to the person who can dope up the biggest buck. Faberman, the CEO of the morally and ethically highly questionable WHA, got the idea – so he says – from the bass fishing tournament and wanted to do the same “catch and release” spectator show with deer.

Mind you it was not that the WHA changed its plans on their own accord. They where forced to after thousand of hunters and every single hunting organization protested against this unethical plans of the WHA.

Other than the plans of the WHA it seems nothing has changed, least of all their attitude toward the real hunters, they still think we are wrong, or as Hack Albertson put it, “way of base”. Here I give you the email to read and my response to it.

The email:

Hi Othamr,
Hey your way off base on the WHA event. There are no livestock deer. They are free ranging deer born on the property. It is 1,000 acres with no pens of any type on the property.
4 hunters at a time will be on the property, so it will be 250 acres per man. I just wanted you to know the facts about the hunt.

Hack Albertson

My answer:

Hi Hack.

Funny thing WHA supporters have told me and other critical writers a few times that we are “way of base”. Yet we have all the support while the WHA has no support and finally had to give up their unethical plans to dart deer with potentially dangerous drugs.

The WHA chases deer on a game farm that is fenced in, there might be no shooting pens, but the deer are still fenced in. These are not deer that have been breed in the wild but on a farm and that makes them livestock any which way you look at it. Even the law conceders these deer livestock and that is the reason why the WHA can do what they do. That never would work under the normal hunting laws, on land that is under the control of the DNR.

I know the facts as they are written in the law books and in the ethical hunter code and not as you folks interpret them or make them up as you go along.

Othmar Vohringer

Hunting: Finally seeing common sense

Today I read the best piece of news in a long time.
The World Hunting Association has finally bowed down to the pressure of the hunting community and announced that no darts will be used in their deer shooting competition. Also the WHA will not hand out prize moneys for the competition winner. Faberman has said that he changed his plans because of the pressure from the hunters and hunting organizations.

To me this shows clearly that if hunters stick together and keep at it we can change things for the better. There are many issues threatening our hunting rights and heritage. Such danger comes from many different sides, like PETA and the American Humane Society. Perhaps we should take on next with the same determination as we took on the WHA and forced them to change.

I am still not quit happy with the outcome but it's a heck of a lot better than what I imagined it would be. Faberman still thinks that he is the one who can give hunting a much needed boost and they still hunt livestock deer behind a high fence on a deer farm.
But as I said in an earlier article; “The opera is not over until the fat lady is done singing.” I am still convinced that the WHA will go away. This is the beginning. If I would be a betting man I would bet that the WHA will be a thing of the past within the year or two.

Here is the article I found in the Detroit News

A controversial Southfield-based hunting competition, The World Hunting Association, has dropped the most contentious of its issues -- shooting whitetail deer with tranquilizer darts -- as it prepares for its opening event, Oct. 5, at Lost Arrow Ranch near Gladwin.

David Farbman, founder of the upstart WHA, said Saturday that intense criticism from the North American hunting circle mandated a change in format for his project, which he sees as hunting's counterpart to the professional bass tour.

"After hearing the voice of so many concerned people in the hunting community, I think the biggest issue was the darting," said Farbman, 34, an executive in his family owned real estate company that manages properties such as Detroit's New Center One building. "Our only goal will continue to be to build something that will promote the heck out of hunting (participation) numbers.

"I think we can accomplish that with a traditional harvest option."

Farbman's plan had called for the WHA's roster of "professional" hunters to shoot trophy deer with tranquilizer darts during a particular event.

Antler spreads would be measured, and after the deer recovered from the sedating drugs, the whitetails would be returned to their habitat 24 hours later.

It was the WHA's answer to catch-and-release fishing, which is a staple of competitive fishing tours.

Shooting deer with tranquilizers, however, incensed much of the hunting galaxy and threatened to doom Farbman's ambitious vision.

Read more here>

Hunting: Point made on High-Fence Pen-Killing facility issue.

I found this article written by my fellow outdoor blogger Ron Reddon on Ron's Personal Journal

I have nothing to add to this article other than, that ir perfectly states my own view on high fenced hunting and what the World Hunting Association is all about.

Point made on High-Fence Pen-Killing facility issue.
By Ron Reddon

Someone brought up a decent point in a comment that I should be careful of labeling "high fence" canned hunt facilities "pen-killing facilities" when referring to the canned hunts engaged in on those facilities. So, as a matter of clarification, what do I consider to be a high-fence, pen-killing facility? I consider any facility that has high fences that prohibit free egress and ingress of big game wildlife, for the purpose of isolating and selling the opportunity to kill farm-raised game animals that are specifically farmed for the purpose of killing, to be a high-fence, pen-killing facility. When these canned hunts are not under the direct legal auspices of their particular state's Game and Fish Departments' / Department of Natural Resources' hunting regulations with set seasons, quotas, etc. (regulations and laws all public land hunters are expected to abide by), and are instead placed under "Agricultural Department" regulations for farm livestock, then that pretty much sums up what that facility is about. That to me, is what I consider constitutes a high-fence, pen-killing facility.

Read more here!

Misc.:Firearms Save Lives

United States justice statistics show Americans need firearms for defense of life and property, says gun law expert. Washington, DC 20036 August 7 2006 “An analysis of crime figures released Sunday by the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics indicates that law-abiding Americans should continue to enjoy legal access to the possession and use of firearms,” gun law expert John M. Snyder said here this morning.

“If anything, this access should be strengthened for the good of citizens and the safety of society,” he added.

According to the justice report, 56 percent of the violent felons convicted in the nation’s 75 most populous counties from 1990 through 2002 had a prior conviction record, 38 percent had a prior felony conviction and 15 percent had been previously convicted for a violent felony.

Thirty-six percent of the violent felons had a least one active criminal status at the time of their arrest, including 18 percent on probation, 12 percent on release pending disposition of a prior case and seven percent on parole.

“What these numbers show, for the umpteenth time,” observed Snyder, “is that there is a violent criminal class in our country. Law-abiding people have to be able to protect themselves and their families and their property from these thugs. In order to be able to do this, they need access to the tools with which to do it. There is no better self-defense instrument than a gun, in particular a handgun.

“People who seek to deny citizens this access, no matter how well-intended they may be, and whether they come from political, academic, professional, business, media or ecclesiastical backgrounds, in reality work against the true interests of law-abiding citizens and in favor of the nefarious interests of the criminal class. To be blunt, they are allies of the violent criminal class. At some point, they’re bound to get what’s coming to them.”

Snyder pointed out that, “at present, there are a number of proposals in Congress and in state legislatures to loosen current legal restrictions on the individual Second Amendment civil right of law-abiding American citizens to keep and bear arms for lawful purposes. One of the most significant of these is a congressional proposal to free law-abiding residents of our Nation’s Capital from the draconian gun control system to which they have been subjected for 30 years. It’s time to overturn the D.C. gun law and allow law-abiding citizens in Washington, D.C. to own and carry handguns to protect themselves and their loved ones from the reign of violent crime that hand-wringing local officials seem incapable of effectively confronting.

“There are a number of other proposals on deck at various stages for congressional consideration, including more than one to prohibit the use of federal funds for confiscation of guns from law-abiding citizens during times of public disaster. Congress should act favorably on them.”

“Guns save lives,” Snyder said, “and a number of scholarly studies, such as one conducted by Gary Kleck of Florida State University, and another conducted by John Lott of the American Enterprise Institute, clearly demonstrate this. Easing legal access to firearms for law-abiding private citizens correlates with precipitous decreases in rates of violent crime. It’s time public policy reflected this truth.”

A former Associate Editor of The American Rifleman, official monthly journal of the National Rifle Association, Snyder is Public Affairs Director of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, Public Information Officer of the American Federation of Police and Concerned Citizens, Treasurer of the Second Amendment Foundation, and Chairman of the St. Gabriel Possenti Society, Inc.

News: Hunters' memorial to be dedicated

Nearly two years after a dispute over a deer stand that left six western Wisconsin hunters dead, a new Rice Lake park dedicated to the hunters has been completed.

Hunters Memorial Park will be dedicated at 1 p.m. Monday.

The park, at Whitetail Drive and Linden Avenue, was built with private donations and will be given to the city of Rice Lake.

North Builders Association donated labor, one of the two lots needed and some of the building materials. It also raised funds to cover other park expenses. Aspen Creek Services donated the second lot.

The cost of the park is estimated at about $250,000.

The 26,670-square-foot park will include a playground, covered patio, kitchen, grilling areas and a memorial to the hunters.

Chai Soua Vang, of St. Paul, was convicted of fatally shooting Robert Crotteau; his son, Joey Crotteau; Al Laski; Mark Roidt; Jessica Willers; and Dennis Drew on Nov. 21, 2004. Fellow hunters Lauren Hesebeck and Terry Willers were injured in the confrontation, which occurred after the hunting party discovered Chai Soua Vang trespassing in a tree stand.

Chai Soua Vang, a Hmong immigrant, testified at his trial last year that he shot the hunters in self-defense, alleging that one of them fired a shot in his direction after they shouted racial epithets and cursed him. The two survivors testified the defendant had begun walking away from the confrontation when he turned and opened fire.

After his conviction last September, Chai Soua Vang was sentenced to six consecutive life terms plus 165 years in prison.

Source: Twin Cities.com St. Paul Pioneer Press

News:Trial of anti-hunt activists begins in Vernon

Vernon - The trial of four animal-rights activists arrested last Dec. 7 in Wawayanda State Park opened last Thursday in Vernon.

Vernon police arrested the four, who were protesting the week-long bear hunt during which hunters shot 297 bears, including 89 in Wawayanda.

During the five-hour court session, four witnesses for the prosecution testified and were cross-examined about the events that led to the arrests of Angi Metler, 49, of Vernon, director of the New Jersey Animal Rights Alliance; Terry Fritzges, 57, of East Windsor; Albert Kazemian, 49, of Vernon; and Janet Piszar, 52, of Millburn. The four face a total of 17 charges. A fifth activist escaped arrest by running deep into the woods, according to the police report.

After the prosecution rested its case, the trial was adjourned to an unspecified future date.

Testifying for the prosecution about the events of the day were N.J. State Park Police Officers Walter Sanford and Kelly Gottheiner and hunters William Devine and his son-in-law, Jon White. Devine said that having killed his quota of one bear on Dec. 6, he had come to hunt deer. White was still hoping to bag a bear.

Sanford testified that he was under orders from his superiors to work undercover, pulling hunter’s clothing over his uniform and accompanying Devine and White, who had complained to police about being berated on Dec. 5 and Dec. 6 by activists wearing orange T-shirts adorned with “wounded bear rescue.”

Sanford testified that on Dec. 7, he and the hunters encountered five or six protestors on Pump House Trail.

Sanford said that although the activists were singing and shouting, they claimed to be on a bird-watching expedition. When the hunters approached the activists, they began to utter accusations and threats.

Sanford said that he tried to make peace and suggested that the hunters move in another direction, while the hunters had entreated the activists to leave them alone.

Source: Straus News
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