the stag

[zazen999]

Just ignore her, OWG - she gets like that sometimes. 'Ormones, I reckon!

Too much ribena I reckons

OI!!!

Wotchit you two. Stop giggling there at the back.

[Glutton4...]

OI!!!

Wotchit you two. Stop giggling there at the back.

Bummocks! Fort we'd got away wiv it!


*Sniggers...

[buzzingtalk]

Nothing wrong with culling animals to support biodiversity within nature, or disposing of introduced animals and pests that have adverse effects on the food chain (grey squirrels, eugh) but killing animals whilst in their prime, for sport, is rediculous. What is sport anyway - its something humans made up to have fun. What could possibly be fun about killing animals that could have gone on to live productive lives?

If you want to have fun killing animals, then go grey squirrel hunting. Not only can you satisfy your pleasure at killing things, but you'll do the rest of nature a favour. Leave rutting deer alone.

[TEB]

Nothing wrong with culling animals to support biodiversity within nature, or disposing of introduced animals and pests that have adverse effects on the food chain (grey squirrels, eugh) but killing animals whilst in their prime, for sport, is rediculous. What is sport anyway - its something humans made up to have fun. What could possibly be fun about killing animals that could have gone on to live productive lives?

If you want to have fun killing animals, then go grey squirrel hunting. Not only can you satisfy your pleasure at killing things, but you'll do the rest of nature a favour. Leave rutting deer alone.

The best time to cull deer is at the rut, this is because the health of the animal is clarified, the animals are in one location and usually in the open and therefore the likelihood of a one shot kill is high compared to stalking an illusive beast through dense cover and the possible consequences of a wounding shot and all the horrors that entails. Deer are managed because they are a plague and a menace in certain situations/area's and they have no natural predators left in the UK. They are legally stalked either by a professional with a Deer license or in the presence of a professional/mentor/ghillie, it may not be nice but for the last god knows how many years it has been deemed necessary, of course their natural predators in the wild would gather during rut because they know that the males are exhausted and easy picking and their method of despatch is a lot bloodier than a person with a gun.
Lastly, there is no difference in the suffering between a squirrel and a deer and if you mean that a grey squirell is an invasive species then so are 4 out of the 6 species of deer currently found in this country.

[buzzingtalk]

I wasn't digging at culling the species for natures sake - I just can't understand people who do it for 'sport'. And of course there is no difference in the suffering of two different animals - a life is a life. Culling is done by professionals, and is done properly - whereas sport, can include people who don't know what they are doing. Which causes uneccesary suffereing on the animals part. I just don't understand the point of going out on a weekend to shoot some deer 'for fun', or to go fox hunting 'for fun'. I'd love to stalk and hunt down sport hunters and see how they like it

[piskieinboots]

....the males are exhausted ...

aye - was ever thus

[Hilary B]

I wasn't digging at culling the species for natures sake - I just can't understand people who do it for 'sport'. And of course there is no difference in the suffering of two different animals - a life is a life. Culling is done by professionals, and is done properly - whereas sport, can include people who don't know what they are doing. Which causes uneccesary suffereing on the animals part. I just don't understand the point of going out on a weekend to shoot some deer 'for fun', or to go fox hunting 'for fun'. I'd love to stalk and hunt down sport hunters and see how they like it

The 'sport' is in the difficulty (but not too difficult to achieve) and in getting it right. Not my thing, but I can see where the notion might come from.
The Red deer is certainly the biggest land-dwelling SPECIES in the UK but I suspect there may well be bigger ones in Scotland than ever grazed Exmoor.
At 12 years old he may well have been mating his own daughters. He could well have become successful at the rut by the time he was 7 (perhaps younger if he truly was the biggest around) and a doe will probably breed at 2, so it is not even impossible he had mated some of his grand-daughters (which may also have been his daughters), which would be serious in-breeding.
When numbers have to be controlled, either you pay skilled people to do the killing, OR you let people who want the challenge pay YOU for the privelege of doing it. There is a lot of economic sense to letting the trophy-hunters pay, as long as they can be managed properly.
I don't quite see why the meat wouldn't be useable, the modern obsession with underaged meat shouldn't apply to venison.

[Nicos]

buzzingtalk...can you imagine how we feel over here???...hunting is from end of Sept through til March.
You can constantly hear guns on sat/sun/mon- and often during the week
deer, bunnies, hares,foxes,wild boar,badgers, birds.......and occasionally cats, dogs and people if they are in the wrong place at the wrong time
we just try to do our bit encouraging as many farming neighbours as possible to put up signs prohibiting hunting on their land. If there isn't a sign then hunters have an automatic right to hunt across the land.
We even have to keep our pets in during daylight hours- just in case.
Dreadful.
Drunken amateur people who hold a license are a danger to themselves and any living thing within range.

[buzzingtalk]

Drunken amateur people who hold a license are a danger to themselves and any living thing within range.

And that is my main problem with hunting. I hate guns anyway, they are one of the worst things that could have been invented, and putting such dangerous things in the hands of anyone (it isn't that hard to get a gun license, lets be honest) is generally a foolish idea. Look at america for example!! At least over here, for the most part gun owners stick to animals and not to shooting humans like they do overseas. Still, its a disguisting waste of life for the most part and is dangerous at that.

I don't eat meat, but if I did I'd only eat something I'd hunted myself. That way, I know what impact I've had, and I would not be out hunting without lots of experience and doing so safely.

[rogesse]

What I meant Zazzen is that they didn't have young they were nursing and were shot whist pregnant but unemcumbered, cruel though it may be, it seemed the most 'efficient' method