Dean, of course I am referring to only "legal" methods of road hunting.

Double post

well, it is a doubles board

When we first started hunting grouse in Minnesota we encountered quite a few folks in vehicles that would drive along and either hop out and shoot a grouse when they saw it, or shoot it from the window. The latter method is illegal in Minnesota.

Over the years as four-wheelers became the norm, they replaced the vehicles (I think the rise in gas prices also had an effect)...and we started running into them on the trails far from roads. While I don't like this "method," I live with it, knowing that every license bought brings in Pittman-Robertson funds into the State for conservation work. Minnesota has responded to the four-wheeler issue by setting aside land that is for walking hunters only. As good a compromise as I can imagine. I must admit the four-wheelers make the trails easier to walk after they push down the grasses and ferns.

As for "ground swatting" that's a state-by-state situation. It is not unusual in quail states for there to be explicit laws against shooting upland game birds on the ground (turkeys not considered an upland bird, but either "big game" or game unto themselves). I just cannot see a justification for shooting a wild Bobwhite on the ground. To me, even if it's not legal, I think it's dangerous, unethical, and just wrong. If you are killing a winged bird, shooting on the ground is another matter. Shooting ducks on the water -- only to kill a crippled bird. Shooting a turkey on the roost -- illegal in all the states I hunt in, and unethical in my book.

There are too few birds to not have the highest standards for their taking. It's called sport hunting not because it's a game, but because there are rules. Those rules can be written into law, or held by the hunter's own conscience and ethical sense.

" It's called sport hunting not because it's a game, but because there are rules".

Times are changing and so is the perception of the the term "sport hunting". It does not carry the positive connotation than it once did. Anti hunting groups are using it to paint hunters as non-caring thugs who kill for "sport". A group here in New Hampshire who call themselves the "New Hampshire Wildlife Collation" are broadcasting this term in a negative way to the general, non-hunting public to discredit hunting in general.

From the NH Collation " We also agreed that sport hunting (killing for the sake of killing) has no place in modern society. "

This is becoming a slippery slope and we must be aware of that as a hunting community. I am not saying that it is right, but as the old song said, the times they are a changing.

Steve, I could not agree more. I no longer like to use the term sport hunting because most folks don't know its origin. When a few
American writers, many years ago, advocated for elevating hunting to the same plane as other sports, they were calling for a more ethical approach in a time when wanton slaughter was the norm. Guys like Herbert (Frank Forrester) and Grinnell made good cases for there to be rules of conduct for hunters. It seems our own hunting community of today has lost track of why ethical hunting became known as sport hunting.

I also do not care for the term "blood sport" for similar reasons. Steve, you are so correct about anti-hunting strategies manipulating the meanings of both terms.

I developed and taught a course on hunting and conservation in my last years teaching. I learned a great deal in doing research for the course, but even more from my interactions with students. I came away from that course afraid for the future of hunting, but with a sense of how it could be perpetuated even if there were non-hunters (big difference from anti-hunters) who only barely understood what happens afield.

Language matters. Just look around at how we describe things in our world and our interactions with each other today.

Garry, oh do I long for the days of Kurt Gowdy and the American Sportsman show on Sunday afternoons, when hunting was an honorable pastime.

Amen! Like so many other things that Time has taken away.

The term "sport hunting" was originally coined to set what we do apart from market hunting or subsistence hunting, where it is expected that the hunter take birds or game by any means and method that was the most economical to the hunter.... Punt guns anyone?... or grouse snares... or ground swatting or shooting birds out of trees...





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Steve thanks for the Kurt Gowdy FLASHBACK. My brother and I spent many wonderful times together watching the different guest each week hunting game in so many areas.