Wildlife habitat.

[buff]

I just read an article in "Outside" magazine about deep sea fishing and the pressure it places on marine animals. That article, combined with wcoyote's post wanting to get a bang stick to blow some gator's head off makes me sick. If people keep marginalizing this planets waters where will we dive?? Does anybody give to a group that helps support the conservation of the earth's water systems and the animals that live in them???

 

[Swamp Rat]

By being a hunter and a fisherman I give 11% of all my sporting goods. I dont believe money is the answer here education is.

 

[buff]

If hunting and fishing help preserve the wildlife areas and its inhabitants then why do countries establish marine parks?? why not let people fish and hunt in these parks and the money that is collected goes to rejuvination of the animals and their environment??????....Cause it don't work!!!
Education....it takes 12 years before a Mako shark is old enough to breed. At one time off the coast of New York, it was common to catch swordfish and huge tuna. Then, as fishing pressure increased all they could catch was Mako sharks(a beautiful looking fish-like a torpedo in the water). Now, they can't even catch Mako sharks- none of those left either and if you just left them alone it would be another 12 years before their population begins to grow back. I am willing to bet that those fishing boat operators believe that they pay plenty in fees already-more than 11%. So how where does the education come in??

 

[buff]

There are 300 Wright whales in the whole world(probably not enough of a gentic pool to maintain a population-they are doomed to extinction) and 6,000,000,000 people - which is more valuable??

 

[Rick Murchison]

Now one of those Wright Whales may be more valuable than you, buff...
But not me, or any of my family.
No, on second thought, I wouldn't even sacrifice *you* on the whale altar, buff.
And while I'm all for doing what we can to save Right Whales, I'm afraid I have to fall firmly on the side of my own species should it ever come down to "us or them."
Rick

 

[buff]

"Us or them" -that is the typical attitude....the animals or us. God did say "be fruitful and multiply" but he didn't say "be fruitful and multiply, and trample every bush, fowl every ocean, and wipe clean from the panet all livig creatures other than yourselves". I too would not exchange ONE human life for a whales life but I would exchange the overpopulation of this planet and the destruction of its environment for the betterment of all things living. Wouldn't you do that too Rick??

Mike

 

[large_diver]

Perhaps we should all adopt the recent stance of the radicals at PETA (People for the ethical treatment of animals) who now say that fishing is a cruel sport and should be discontinued.......

 

[Warhammer]

There is a difference between managed hunting/fishing and over hunting/fishing. Commercial fishing may very well overfish and kill off a population, but there is no way that a man with fishing pole will ever overfish the ocean. They establish marine reserves to protect fish. Same as they establish wildlife reserves to protect wildlife. The difference is you can usually hunt on a wildlife reserve. It's more controllable and their are no commercial hunters trying to supply the world with deer meat.

 

[buff]

I don't suspend myself from buildings to protest vivesection-or walk around saying "meat is murder". But, you probably wouldn't think it humane to place a hook in a bundle of hay, wait for a cow to chomp down on it and then "try to land that sucker"....so where does it end...how do we know how much pain one animal feels vs. another?? isn't that part of human compassion-to be empathetic to another's pain?? perhaps even if it isn't human??? I just think about this sometimes.

 

[buff]

And it was never felt that we could possibly polute the oceans but now the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists recommend pregant women not to eat ocean going tuna due to the high mercury content. So as a single human you don't think that you have much impact but multiply your actions times 10,0000-representing the number of people that are also doint the same thing and saying "I'm only one person"....and now you have the true ecological impact...