I hunt to kill.

It is the most direct and satisfying way to participate in the life-and-death drama that defines living on this planet. Hunting and killing require no justification, rationalization or apologies, and I give none.

I believe the tortured denials and moralizing from people like mmconcolor are bullshit.

*** REPLY TO INTERBOAT ***

-- Re : my post and position in contributing to this thread , -- it's my opinion and position , only .

I don't expect others to necessarily agree or disagree . --- I'm just having fun , and hope it adds to perspective on the subject .


When I read your post , -- it seemed to me you're rationalizing ( to support your own position ), -- denying ( my position ) , and denegrating other's positions ; -- which comes across to me as arrogance .

I've seldom heard a bigger rationalization that to torture the justification for killing an Animal as -- " . . . . to participate in the Life-And-Death -- DRAMA --- that DEFINES living on this planet !

Whew , -- give us a break . Tortured ? -- Over - intellectualized ?

I don't know , -- but to my view , it's just pulling a trigger , -- killing an Animal , -- TAKING A CHANCE of wounding and loosing that Animal ( that ain't nice ) ; -- and the only thing that " justifies " it, is to put meat on the table .

If you enjoy killing for killing's sake , I don't personally think that's healthy ; -- but , as long as you don't break the law , its your mind to deal with .


------------- MMCOUGAR .

I thought I would bring this topic up instead of starting a new one. I hunt because I am a predator I am a omnivore. It's a way to supplement the food in my household along with the garden that we put out and put up. I have a minimum wage job it it takes some pressure off when the freezer is full of game meat, vegetables, and fruit that has been grown and havested on are property. Y'all inspire me and make me dream of the day that I can walk through the grasses and moss of the Yukon to the Sanoran(sp) desert to the savannahs of Africa and the mountains of Kazakhstan. One day I keep telling myself. I am in the plans now to try and find a affordable wild boar hunt for me and my fiance so thanks everyone for inspiring me!

I don't need the meat, as my wife points out. I do need something of a quest periodically, and hunting is pretty nearly perfect. A nice road trip to Wyoming or Montana on a couple of the roads I haven't seen yet, a few nights by a campfire, and maybe a well-planned shot at an antelope. Did I mention Utah peaches at the peak of perfection? Put the goat in the freezer and we have a little variety in our diet, a little something unusual. Our old aunts say our family is part Indian, maybe this is baked-in.

I hunt because I like to and because it is part of what makes me be me. That is a good enough reason for anyone.

I hunt because I must, and I will hunt until I can't.

Bill Quimby

There is no way I am enough of a wordsmith to explain it well enough to do justice.

Hunting to me can at times be truly a spiritual experience, while at others an entertaining giggle. It can be as serious as any undertaking or as informal as a walk with the dogs.

It is one of the few things in my life that is never done enough to satisfy the desire. The time spent hunting flies by while the time spent waiting to go again is agonizing!

There is the highest level of personal satisfaction when looking at the faces of family and friends during a delicious meal of game that I killed, butchered, and cooked.

The time spent on top of a mountain in reflection makes me feel so peaceful and content there is no substitute. Nate

I love the outdoors and the solitude. I am perfectly happy to go hunting or fishing and not kill or catch anything, but the killing of a big game animal provides a feeling that can not be gotten anywhere else.
It seems like meat that you have killed, butchered, and prepared yourself just tastes better!
I also really enjoy the shooting sports and archery. What better way is there to test your skills than on live game?

Why? Because I enjoy it. That's really all there is to it. I like having the meat, but at the heart of it, I just enjoy my position as an apex predator.

Seeing Allen Day's post makes me think how the internet immortalizes us all.

I really, really enjoy the sight and smell of fresh blood.

"One does not hunt in order to kill; on the contrary, one kills in order to have hunted...If one were to present the sportsman with the death of the animal as a gift he would refuse it. What he is after is having to win it, to conquer the surly brute through his own effort and skill with all the extras that this carries with it: the immersion in the countryside, the healthfulness of the exercise, the distraction from his job."

Jose Ortega y Gasset, Meditations on Hunting

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"A peculiar virtue in wildlife ethics is that the hunter ordinarily has no gallery to applaud or disapprove of his conduct. Whatever his acts, they are dictated by his own conscience, rather than by a mob of onlookers. It is difficult to exaggerate the importance of this fact."

Aldo Leopold, A Sand County Almanac

Why do I hunt?
Because I like contributing over $100 per year to the state of California in license fees so they can turn around and use my money to pay welfare recipients to have more babies
That and I like backstrap.

I started hunting because it was a family tradition shared by all the young boy cousins and even a view of the nieces. It was unique in that most the boys took their first deer with a bachelor uncle that always had a nice young fat buck picked out before season on his ranch. Even though most of us lived in the country and our dads hunted, it was our tradition.
Traditions still have as much to do with my hunting as the meat or the kill. My own dad passed away many years ago and my best friend’s dad told me he would be my dad. He is now 88 and still gets his license and goes elk or antelope hunting with us.
I have for several years felt the best traditions are the new ones we start with new hunters of any kind. I have taken disabled and youth hunters on their first outings whenever possible and it actually what gets me the most excited each fall. It’s kind of like having a kid get his first present from Santa Claus on Christmas morning, the anticipation for the next year becomes a dream all year long.
Thank you olefish