BTBowhunter,
I didn't come here to lie to anyone, and I'm sorry if you don't like what I have to say, but we are talking about ethics. Are we not? You ask about what if I had to pay a fine? I would have gladly paid any fine. I never said I didn't have any money. We were trapped. The nearest store is fifteen miles away, and guess what - none of the stores were open! Gas stations weren't even open. They'd already ran out of fuel anyway, so what is the point of opening? People were catching their homes on fire trying to burn gas from their automobiles in kerosene heaters. All of the neighbors had gotten together and put their food into one garage to figure out how to get by. There were a total of five families staying in our inlaws home, since some had gas fire places that no longer worked. We were lucky enough to have a wood stove insert and the generator to run the blower. We were taking gas from the vehicles in the area to run the generator. Five inches of freezing rain takes down trees all over the place. Roads were shut down all over thestate and there wasn't anyway to travel. You couldn't even make a call on a cell phone. So YES - I poached a deer. Do you want to know a secret? I would do it again! Obviously you've never been unfortunate enough to compromise your own morals, and I hope that you never have to. I never thought of it either, until the future was looking pretty grim. I could have hunted that property any time that I wanted with a shotgun andat the time, I own a few shotguns. I wasn't there to hunt though, so I didn't bring my shotgun! But I ended up hunting anyway.
So, mister I'm so ethical, you mysteriously didn't respond to my other point...
Since you must agree that firearms are more suitable for taking an animal quickly (which is only fair to translate to ethically), why do you continue to walk into the woods with your bow????? Why don't you wait until firearms season? Maybe it is that you really like bow hunting? And that is great! So do I. Maybe you don't want to miss out onthat big buck? That is great too, I don't want to miss him either, but if ethics truly came first...

Don't get me wrong here - I do it too! But I'm not claiming to be "mister ethics"! I am just capableof thinking logically for myself, and am choosing not to put myself up on a higher than thou ethics pedestal. I said on my first postin this thread that shooting a deer in the head with a bow is a very badidea. And I talked about being absolutely sure about your abilities when using a firearm.

If you were going to be shot to death... Would you prefer to be shot in the head with a 30.06, or would youchoose the bow through the lungs?