A MUST READ!! Written by Jim Hackett Commercial Hunting - someone ask just what was commercial hunting? In Virginia, I guess the best way to define it is When one or more persons, organizations, groups or companies lease property within the Commonwealth for the purpose of charging clients for the privilege to hunt for the sole purpose of making profit from the Natural resources that belong to the citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia I guess it could probably be written better but you should be able to understand that. Some of you say, thats B.S. O.K. -- Here we go. In 2012-2013 and 2014, bills to legalize Sunday hunting were presented in the General Assembly to legalize Sunday Hunting. the VaHDA fought a hard battle in an attempt to stop this. we stood on the position that Sunday hunting would have a negative impact on hunting with dogs. We actually did a poor job in getting the message out on how that was going to happen. We even had disagreements within our own ranks on how this would come to pass. In late January of 2014 I stumbled across a website Sunday Hunting Coalition I was shocked to discover that the homegrown push that we thought we were fighting was actually a national organization. Cabelas, NRA, Bass Pro shops, U.S, shooting Sports were just a few of a long list of sponsors to that organization. Upon finding that, it finally hit me that our fight was much bigger than what we had originally thought. It explained where the millions of dollars came from that was being spent in lobbying fees in an attempt to get SH legalized. But why? Why does Cabelas or Bass Pro shops care if we are hunting on Sunday in Va? Do you think that they will sell that much more stuff because of 1 extra day a week? I hope your smarter than that. Then I realized that this was falling right into step with what happened in Georgia in 2003. When I was on the Hound study for VDGIF in 2008, we studied what had happened in Georgia, S.C., Alabama, Arkansas, and Texas. This had a similar foot print. Their hunting has been under relentless attack by Commercial hunting interest. I gave deeper thought on this and finally came to the conclusion that made sense. S.H. was only the first step of several in order to get C.H. into Va. They would need to legalize baiting year around to be successful. So, last year I took the position and predicted that baiting would be presented in the G.A. in 2015. Then, once that was achieved, the next focus would be RTR. Once RTR was removed, the next step is to implement the infamous Georgia rule. (requirement of 1000 contiguous acres and $250 fine for each dog that gets off that tract) Anyone that supports the Georgia rule is ANTI-DOG HUNTING! They want you to loose your rights so they will clearly have more. When it was implemented in Georgia in 2003, 30% of organized hunt clubs folded within the first 12 months. Keep in mind that Georgia only had 56,000 hunters that hunted with dogs, Va. has 186,000, what will be the impact to Vas economy when deer and bear hunting with dogs is strangled out of existence? I assure you it will be very bad. But lets look at this another way. History always seems to go full circle. In the old world, hunting was reserved for the Dukes, Earls and Kings because they owned all the land. The peasants were killed if they even thought of trying to hunt for food to put on the table. So, America was settled with the promise that the natural resources of the land belonged to the people. Many generations flourished because they had the freedom to hunt in order to live. As fate would have it, commercial hunting came on the scene and practically decimated the hunting in the new world. All for the sake of profit they slaughtered the waterfowl, the buffalo, the wolf, coyote, deer bear and anything else they could kill and sell. Before long, Americans had hardly anything left except for small game. Virginians recognized at the beginning of the twentieth century that commercial hunting had seriously endangered wildlife populations. Deer, bear and turkey had all but disappeared across most of Virginia and serious conservation efforts were needed to save remaining populations. By 1916, the General Assembly recognized that adoption of the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation (NAWC) was essential to successful restoration. Theodore Roosevelt was a leading proponent of the universal adoption of this model. The North American Model of Wildlife Conservation is anchored by a Supreme Court decision that decreed that wildlife belongs to the people, and not government, corporations or individuals. Again, the Natural Resources of Virginia belong to the people. US! It was our money spent on hunting licenses, ammunitions and hunting apparel that went to the restoration project of reintroducing the deer, turkey and bear back to the commonwealth. It was our management of these restored resources that has brought us to populations never seen before in the history of this state. But now, we have those greedy for the all mighty dollar scheming to slide in the back door and take it away from you and I-AGAIN!. I beseech all of you to listen, we (including myself) allowed S.H. to divide us. We were mis-focused and fought each other while the enemy was digging trenches right around us. Now we see, this is not about hunting with dogs, this is about all Virginians allowing a common enemy to take the privilege of hunting away from us ALL! You think this is B.S.? I have a good friend in Texas who hunts deer. In order to hunt there, he and his family had to come up with big money and lease a ranch in order to be able to hunt in the state. Five years ago they were paying over $30 an acre to be able to hunt. You still hunters think that this will not affect you? Thats what they want you to believe. Once the dogs are gone, there wont be enough people or strong enough organizations left to defend your rights in Va. This fight belongs to all of us. Get on the phone and call the delegates on the House Agricultural Committee and tell them NO to H.B. 2345 and H.B. 2343. Virginias hunting privileges belong to its citizens!!!
Posted on: Tue, 27 Jan 2015 23:02:47 +0000
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