birding-aus More 2 c worth re: duckhunting

["Paul McDonald" <>]

birding-aus
Hi all, 

I find it hard to believe arguments that justify the banning of duck shooting on  the belief that it is cruel. "Nature is cruel", e.g. being eaten alive by a raptor  would I imagine be much more painful and distressing than having 20 grams of  buckshot pass through your lung.

This "cruel" argument has given rise to recent examples of animal activists etc  influencing people/gov bodies making in my belief, the wrong choice. Others  spring to mind.
1. Not shooting every deer in Royal National Park when they were easily  accessible (ditto applies for brumbies elsewhere)
2. The recent fuss about a roo shooter killing a joey by stamping on its head,  sure, it won't be approved by any ethical committee, but death is  instantaneous. This uproar lead to a significant reduction in roo meat sales in  England when Mad Cow disease should have seen sales increase and our  farmers profit.

I am not an advocate of duck hunting, I simply disagree with the argument that  it is cruel and should be banned. It is ecologically negative in regards to lead  buckshot, disturbance and increased mortality to threatened species and this  is the argument that should be used to lead to the conclusion to ban this sport.  How many people cry when they run over ants, or kill a native cockroach in  their house, or "clean" the microbes in their kitchen? The cute and cuddly  factor obviously applies here, but the principle being advocated is the same and  should apply to all organisms, did you get ethics approval to torture your lawns  and allow it to look pretty?

In saying this I am not a shooter and would rather have duck season banned,  but surely fishing and the above examples must also then be banned, e.g.  suffocating a fish in air is not a pleasant way to die, surely. Logical arguments  are needed and are more important to people such as Jeff than saying it's a  bad thing that is terrible. (Remember the trumped up COrella remark?) 

Back to the birds:

Saw a White-bellied Sea Eagle over Ryde Bridge and a Brown Goshawk in  suburban Wiley Park, both Sydney suburbs, on the way to work. Not a bad  traffic distraction.

Cheers, paul


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Paul McDonald
Department of Biological Sciences
Macquarie University, Sydney NSW, 2109
Australia
Phone: (02) 9850 8191 Fax: (02) 9850 8245

http://www.bio.mq.edu.au/ecology/
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