BellaOnline Forums Sports Hunting Ethical vs. Legal

The big questions it seems lately to have a hunter's ethics pitted against state/federal laws. There are a wide variety of topics, for instance, how do you feel on the topic of baiting? While it is legal in most states, is it ethical? Is it ethical to bait the animal having it stop within the exact place and distance to guarantee a better chance at a kill ? Is sitting on a crop field considered baiting? What are your thoughts?

I feel that it comes to the difference between hunting as a sport and hunting for survival. I don't see much sport (or skill) in baiting, or hunting released captive animals, or even hunting with high powered guns with fancy optics. But if you are hunting to feed your family (and how many really need to do that?) then anything that can put the meal on the table is OK with me. I do have special respect for bow hunters, they are really hunting, not just playing with fancy toys.

I agree with you wholeheartedly Claybird and you bring up a really good point - very few actually need to kill their own food but good hunters may actually provide a more humane end to the animals that they kill to eat. Factory farming is an inheritantly cruel practice of keeping and killing animals for human consumption. Unless you are eating free-range - local meat, poultry, eggs or milk the animals from which these food sources come are kept in miserable conditions. That said canned and baited hunts and stocked hunting reserves are without question cruel and unnecessary activities. Also in question is those hunting proponents that wish to eliminate natural predators so that they don't compete with hunters for game animals - that's just crazy in this world where the balance of nature has been so distorted by human intervention.

As far as legal, hunters should stay within the law. Ethical? That's a different story. I agree with the above statements about inhumane practices. Members of my extended family and my in-laws all hunted although our immediate family did not. I've never known any of them to do anything unethical. From their conversations, sounds like they enjoy the sport of hunting and consuming what they kill, but they would not do anything inhumane.