[TN-Bird] Re: KTOS's Wayne Schacher's Op Ed article in today's Knoxville News Sentinel
- From: <innisfree22@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "TN Birds" <tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 22 Aug 2013 21:15:56 -0400
Thank you. Well stated.
The same vilification was spewed out against well-informed biologists who
recommended wolf hunting in interior Alaska. Today, that pack is one of the
healthiest on the planet. No-kill is not always the best option. Real
naturalists can discuss maintenance of any species without emotional overtones
such as “big ugly vultures are eating the cute, fuzzy bunny.”
Jean Obrist
Cocke Co, TN
citizen scientist, nature-lover and observer, and hunter
From: viclcsw@xxxxxxx
Sent: Thursday, August 22, 2013 8:46 PM
To: tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [TN-Bird] KTOS's Wayne Schacher's Op Ed article in today's Knoxville
News Sentinel
http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2013/aug/22/wayne-schacher-cooperation-needed-in-sandhill/
Wayne Schacher: Cooperation needed in sandhill crane-hunting issue
a.. Wayne H. Schacher lives in Clinton.
b.. Posted August 22, 2013 at 3 a.m.
I have followed with interest the process leading to a decision on whether to
pass or deny the proposed sandhill crane hunting season in Tennessee. Some
factions and statewide and local media have portrayed this process as pitting
hunters against nonhunters.
By Tennessee statute, all wildlife species are owned equally by all citizens,
their management and conservation the responsibility of the Tennessee Wildlife
Resources Agency and governing bodies. No faction has a greater voice in this
deliberation than any other.
I stand with a foot solidly in each camp. I am a firearms owner. I have
participated in and will always support appropriately conceived and regulated
sport hunting. I have degrees in natural resource and wildlife management. I
have a professional background as a wildlife biologist and worked in wildlife
law enforcement, commissioned on state and federal levels, for 18 years.
As the sandhill crane hunting proposal proceeds, there are legitimate questions
and issues that are open to scrutiny by any Tennessee citizen. Again, by
statute, “whenever the supply of game ... shall become adequate to allow ...
hunting thereof without material danger of extinction or undue depletion of
such game. ... ” This “biological justification” threshold must be met as a
precondition to enabling hunting. What methodology is used on the federal level
to estimate the sandhill crane population? Have enough replications been
conducted to confidently arrive at this estimate? To overestimate the sandhill
crane population would skew the harvestable surplus to the high end,
threatening “undue depletion.” Has good science been conducted to support the
proposed hunting framework?
For more than a decade, I have been an active member in the Knoxville Chapter
of the Tennessee Ornithological Society, the oldest conservation organization
in Tennessee. In those years of involvement, I have never heard anti-hunting
sentiment, let alone seen it advocated as policy. I have never met a group of
conservation advocates more actively engaged in their passion for conservation
of wildlife resources, both game and nongame species.
Members spend thousands of hours before and following sunrise on weekend
mornings, not just birdwatching, but participating in birding surveys and data
collection in multiple state and national projects. The Knoxville chapter in
the past few years has developed and purchased educational activity books,
donated them to interested elementary schools, then gone to those same schools
to lead nature outings. Members buy federal waterfowl stamps, not to hunt, but
realizing that those funds are used to buy wildlife habitat to the benefit of
game and nongame wildlife alike. Hundreds of dollars per year from limited
budgets is given to educational institutions, programs and individuals to
pursue avian research projects.
The sandhill crane deliberations are a process, not a controversy. There is no
winner and there is no loser. The disparagement of one faction by another has
no place in natural resource deliberations. We don’t need pages torn from the
popular political playbook where if you can’t prevail on the merits of your
position, you vilify those opposed.
We need the process to be free of bias, based on good, sound science, presented
fairly with all sides heard and respected. The conservation of our natural
resources needs to be the ultimate bottom line. The closer we approach that
ideal, the better we’ll serve our natural resources and our chosen forms of
recreation.
Consumptive and nonconsumptive outdoor recreationalists are natural allies.
Mutual understanding and cooperation will serve our natural resources much
better than wedges driven between factions.
© 2013, Knoxville News Sentinel Co.
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