Excellent thread and most revealing of a herd mentality.

Can we talk?

The author of the thread is a thinker and admits his bias right up front but for most on this thread that is not enough, he must bow down to the Gods Of Hunting...unconditionally.

What nonsense.

I also bow hunted Sunday evening as a last chance sort of thing before the masses descend upon the lands with orange and scopes and slugs and drives.

Stay with me here...if you can.

The bow hunter says, "That's not hunting in my mind." And he has every right to say that because he is simply expressing a "feelings" about a diversion that intrigues him...just as you are when you condemn him for less than unconditional support of your version of hunting...and then go on to liken him to some jerk from PETA (very deep stuff).

The bow hunter says guns make it too easy...
The spear hunter says bows make it too easy...
The knife hunter says spears make it too easy...
The hunter with nothing more than a rock...looks at the "rock" thrown by a gun and says, "Now thats how to hit 'em with a rock."

The point is that no matter who you are and how "open-minded" you think you are, you find yourself on that chain of "progress" in one way or another...and you have an opinion about all of it...and you are entitled to that opinion...because you are human, if for no other reason.

No, perhaps you are not "elite" because of your choice of weapon, yet some weapons clearly represent more challenge, a higher degree of difficulty than others. How could any thinking person deny that?

Yet, somehow at the end of the day, hunting is like fishing...if you're legally doing it and having fun, you're doing it right.

Having said that:

Gun hunting sucks. Its for woosie boys that cannot stand the adrenaline that is inherent in a 20 yard kill with a primitive weapon...





...like a well-hurled stone.
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And if you might happen to be curious about how I "feel" about the subject...(and I am reasonably certain that most are so close-minded about how hunting should be/can be performed "properly," that their feelings will not allow for such curiosity)...I feel the same way as silentassassin and the author of this thread.

Countless feelings produce countless questions, endless debate.

Example:

If you can kill a doe for the meat, because the tags are readily available in your area, why would a well-informed experienced hunter choose to kill a raggedy young fork instead? Wouldn't logic dictate that you'd let them walk and take a doe for the meat? Yet yearly, on the first day of gun season across this nation, countless forks and other less-than-mature bucks go down.

And on and on it goes...