Deer Hunting Laws: The Lacy Act

This could lead to them wondering into cities and highways causing car accidents. Without some type of deer control, they multiply. Since deer have lost some land areas due to cities growing, they do not have enough food and start to slowly starve. Thus hunting is a good choice for deer management. Coyotes and bears are a common sight in the woods.

He says, "rare orchids and the hardwood and hemlock forests have failed to reproduce for fifty years(85)." He tells about botanist, William Alverson of the University of Wisconsin who has studied old growth forests in Wisconsin for many years. In his studies, Alverson found that the dominant hemlocks and white cedars have failed to reproduce. When asked what was causing the problem he stated, "the deer simply eat up all the seedlings that emerge. The changes due to deer are so slow that it's not obvious to someone driving by in a car, but at the regional level, hemlock forests are becoming rarer and rarer(85)."

Because of the efforts of these concerned people the whitetail population has risen to around 20 million. The deer population has increased so much that in many areas, they suffer from chronic starvation. “Bucks only” laws passed years ago to help in re-establishing the dwindling deer herds now work against the deer by resulting in an overabundance of does. Even with the overabundance of does many hunters refuse to shoot a doe. They believe in the old saying, “It takes a doe to yield a buck.” This is entirely true but it ignores the basic law of nature that any piece of land, and the food and cover in it, can support only so much game.

Deer feeding is a very important to not only the deer but to outdoorsman, game commission, hunters, and really everybody. Everybody that operates a vehicle should be concerned about the deer and how they travel, hunters really want to know when and where they are going to be at different times of the day, or if the sight of a deer prancing through the woods while out on a hike is interesting it is good to know about where there going to be. There are many things that affect deer. One of these things is how the deer feed in different times of the year. Another thing is what type of food they eat and how it affects them.

This may lead to deer walking on roads and causing accidents. A study showed that it was estimated that 1.23 million deer-vehicle collisions occurred between July 1, 2011 and June 30, 2012 (Insurance Journal). In that small time frame, those accidents cost more than 4 million dollars. During mating and migration season, those numbers rise. One could tell from experience that deer collisions are very dangerous not only for the driver, but for the deer as well.

Bow hunting worsens this problem. About fifty percent of animals shot with arrows are only wounded, not killed. PETA also states, that a study of 80 radio-collared deer found that of the twenty-two deer that had been shot with arrows, eleven were wounded and not gathered by hunters.3 Some hunters even believe in shooting animals in the gut or in the face, which is a dreadful way for the animal to die . Hunting puts an enormous amount of stress on animals. This stress limits the animals’ ability to eat sufficiently and store the fat and energy they need t... ... middle of paper ... ...act, a fraction of the wild animal population is specially directed to be killed.

Before Mayflower Landed, Indians had a Saying "you only killed what you can eat, so that you can eat tomorrow', the forest itself did not provide the optimum habitat necessary to maintain the deer population. The Deer’s were abundant, in areas were forest fires, lightening fires and other catastrophes had started to destroy parts of the forest canopy. Natural enemies of the predators of the deer like the cougars, wolves, coyotes also played a big part in regulating the population and keeping the herds relatively balanced withe habitat. As the south grew, The farmers began the grow crops, and then the war started, the need for cotton began the escalate, so land became a dire need, so the deer habitat once again was threaten, with no food to eat the nutrition stopped the production of the population, so the declining the herds once again was falling. Men hunting deer for meat was still a necessity for most families for survival was still prevalent.

Another reason wolves are bad for our society in the southwest, is a good piece of income and food is raised from hunters every year; with wolves being in the wild, hunters would feel afraid to go into the back country looking for a good deer or elk, the best animals would be eaten by wolves thus reducing the number of permits that are being given out, reducing the money generated by hunting permits. Every year hundreds of people purchase hunting licenses and tags for elk and deer. All of that money goes to the forest service’s fund for improving trails, roads, and safety systems in the national forests. With reduced tags being sold, that revenue is lost. In addition to that money being lost, the best animals will be taken down by wolves, leaving the hunters to go for small, sick, injured, or extremely old animals.

Without a doubt, the white-tail deer should be hunted. First, the population of the white-tail deer is entirely too big. In fact, there is a total of twenty-five million white-tail deer in the United States alone.1 Because of this enormous number of deer, they are constantly on the move. This means that they go straight to the roads. Ten thousand white-tail deer get hit by cars and die each year while they try to find new eating grounds.2 Not only is this wasting meat, but it causes severe damage to cars.

Due to the large number of elk eating the grass and trees, the grass has been eaten, and the soil has become loose due to the lack of grass to hold the soil in place (Hannibal 2012). The exposed soil makes the land more susceptible to changes in the weather (Hannibal 2012). When wolves were reintroduced into the Yellowstone National Park, the willow trees grew back, the Aspens grew more abundantly, and the grass managed to regrow(“In the Valley of the Wolves”). The elk still ate the grass, willows, and trees; however because the wolves were now preying on the elk the elk had to keep moving and stay in areas wher... ... middle of paper ... ...valley-of-the-wolves/reintroduction-of- the-wolves/213/>. "Living With Wolves - About Wolves - Questions About Wolves."