From: jsemrad@ems.cdc.com (Joe Semrad)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals
Subject: Re: Why Hunters Quit
Date: 13 Apr 92 23:30:05 GMT
Article-I.D.: nntp_ser.5115
Reply-To: jsemrad@ems.cdc.com
Organization: Empros Systems International, a division of CDC

In article <altar.703144584@sfu.ca>, altar@beaufort.sfu.ca (Ted Wayn Altar) writes:
|> 
|>  
|>      What stated reasons do hunters themselves give for quitting?
|> Believe it not, not only a few quit, but quite a significant
|> number within a short period of time from first starting.  That

How does this correlate with other activities?  I would wager that you
could find a "significant number" of golfers (or insert any another activity)
who quit after shortly after starting for any number of reasons.  Ted, have
you ever tried a new hobby only to find, for whatever reason, it was not
for you?  In hunting and fishing literature aimed at beginners (as well as
many other activities) you often find words to the effect of "don't buy
extremely expensive equipment at first unless you are certain you will
continue in the sport."

|> was the question posed to 296 people who first hunted in New
|> Jersey in 1976 but who did not purchase a hunting licence in
|> 1981.
|>  
|>      Over the past decade there has been about a 30% overall
|> decline in New Jersey's hunting-licence sales.  You can be

Are you trying to imply that the ten reasons distilled from 296 ex-hunters
who bought licenses perhaps only once in a 5 year period is a valid
sample to deduce why there is a 30% decline in NJ's overall license sale?
That seems like a huge jump to make.  You are making a lot of assumptions
here that probably are not valid.

|> assured that the "wildlife management" officials are mighty
|> worried since the larger portion of their salaries comes from
|> these licence sales.  Such, is the weakness of a system of
|> wildlife "protection" that would make that system depended upon a
|> vested interest group (hence, we have not wildlife protection,
|> but "management").  The following results were compiled by

Oh get off this bit about the DNR's being the puppets of hunters.  Sure 
some of their budget comes from license fees and some of it comes from 
other places.  If they were totally beholden to hunters why would they waste
time on things like state parks, campgrounds, outdoors law enforcement,
research and publications that have nothing to do with hunting, tourism
promotion, and many others, when that same money could be used for more
deer production?  Also, hunters and fisherman are not one monolithic group.
Many disagree with the way the DNR handles certain situations.  Basically
the DNR has to deal with pressure from just about anyone who uses any
outdoor resource in the state including hikers, boaters, campers, farmers,
industry, environmentalists, birdwatchers, etc. and yes hunters and
fishermen.  This thing you have about DNR's being run totally by and for
hunters seems pretty weak.

|> trained interviewers at the Eagleton Instutite at Rutgers
|> University.  Based upon a content analysis of responses to an
|> earlier open-ended questionnaire, a set of 10 reasons for
|> quitting were educed.  A sample of 296 "deserters" were then ask

Only ten reasons for almost 300 people.  The short description of each
reason makes for easy questionaire tabulation but may not give accurate
results.  Was there an "other" catagory?

|> to rate each of the 10 reasons.  The following results are from
|> James Applegate (1989; Dept. of Horticulture and Forestry,
|> Rutgers University).  "Patterns of Early Desertion Among New
|> Jersey Hunters".  WILD. SOC. BULL., 74:476-481. (note their
|> obvious worry as expressed by referring to attrition as
|> "desertion")
|>  
|>  
|>            Reasons why former hunters did not purchase
|>             a hunting licence in New Jersey in 1981.
|>                                 
|> reason                                       very        not very
|>                                            important    important
|> -----------------------------------------------------------------
|> ----
|> 1.  Other things I like better
|>      than hunting .........................  54%            45%
|> 2.  Too many other hunters ................  35%            65%
|> 3.  No good hunting places ................  34%            66%
|> 4.  Hunting is more expensive
|>       than I thought ......................  26%            74%
|> 5.  Don't like to kill animals ............  21%            77%
|> 6.  Hunting not as much fun          
|>       as I thought ........................  20%            80%
|> 7.  Can't get anything while
|>       hunting .............................  18%            82%
|> 8.  Now one to hunt with ..................  16%            84%
|> 9.  Don't have equipment to hunt ..........  12%            88%
|> 10.  Some people I know disapprove
|>       of hunting ..........................  11%            89%
|>  
|>  
As already mentioned, #1 seems pretty meaningless unless you have similar
statistics for other activities.  I would expect reasons #2 and #3 to be high
in a place like New Jersey.  In case you haven't noticed we are becoming more
urban and habitat is being lost to development left and right.  These may also
apply to other activities as well.  I don't golf as much as I'd like partly
because its hard to get tee times on weekends.  #4 is a legit reason to quit.
I don't bowl in leagues anymore partly because of the expense.  The low
percentages of #5 and #10 say something about the huge public disapproval
of hunting claimed by the AR folks.  #6 doesn't seem like an unreasonable
percentage to me, and probably could apply to many other activities.  #7 is
definately a beginner's problem.  Most hunters I know get more game as their
experience level increases and don't feel too upset if they don't always
take something home.  Many fisherman intentionally don't take anything home.
#9 seems like the same as #4.  Some of these reasons seem influenced by the
fact that they survey is of people with only 5 years or less of NJ hunting
experience, yet you seem to want to universally apply then to the hunting
population at large.  But then I forget that you accepted the opinion of
one hunter as representative of the whole group when it was published by
that feminist author you were quoting awhile back.  As I said in an earlier
post, if this is valid then I've decided that I'll pick a violent ALF
member to be representative of AR folks.

|>      Now, the first thing that our inveterate hunters should note
|> is that it is not us AR folk who are threatening your so-called
|> "sport", but rather, it is that the activity of hunting

No, I think currently in most places the AR folks are minor irritants.  The
major problems are population growth, habitat loss, pollution, etc.

|> inherently is not all that interesting or challenging (I know,
|> you will noisily testify otherwise, but stop thinking about
|> yourself for a moment and keep in mind that we are talking about
|> those people who do quit, why they quit).  The most often cited

We are talking about a narrow sample of people who had their responses
constrained by having to pick from a list of ten reasons.

|> reason for quitting was simply that there are other more
|> interesting or meaningful recreational options to be preferred
|> over that of hunting.  Incidentally, residential proximity to
|> hunting had no relation whatsoever to this "desertion".
|>  
|>      The next most often cited reasons simply bear on what
|> hunters themselves are doing to themselves.  I regret to say that
|> you and your "sport" are your own worst enemies.  Too many of you
|> are stalking after that one Bambi.  It is crowded out there, and
|> it is no wonder that hunting firearm deaths and crippling are a
|> serious problem (see "Hunting Firearm Injuries" AMER. J. OF
|> PUBLIC HEALTH, 1988, 78(12): 1585).
|>  

It's crowded on golf courses too, Ted, especially on weekends.  Experienced
hunters either have better places to go (little known or private), avoid
opening days, and avoid weekends.  Other activities have safety risks as
well, Ted.  Actually I have seen very few people in the field that were
not handling their guns in a responsible manner.  Many states have gone
to mandatory gun safety courses.  I believe in Mn the number of firearm
injuries per deer season has actually trended down over the past few years
to a very small number.

|>      Note that only 1 in 5 chose ethics (5th on the list) as one

I wouldn't use the word ethics here, Ted.  These people just said they don't
like killing animals.  They didn't say they think it is wrong or unethical
for others to do so if they choose to.  Unless all 296 people also became
vegan when the quit hunting they can't be saying that.

|> of the reasons prompting their not bothering to purchase a
|> hunting licence.  Not very impressive, is it?  With respect to
|> social pressure, only 11% chose reason #10 as having any weight
|> in their decision (the least frequently chosen reason).  And what
|> might we conclude from this?  Again, it is not us AR folk that

Might we conclude that hunting does not have the public disapproval that
the AR types would like to portray it as having?  (Probably not from
this study, but is as valid a conclusion as some of the ones you're trying
to make.)

|> are your worst enemies, nor is it even your conscience, or even
|> social disapproval by friends, etc.  So why are you Elmer Fudds so
|> hostile to us harmless AR wabbit folk?  Looking for a scapegoat?
|> What the above results show is that according to ex-hunters
|> themselves, it is inherent to hunting that this killing of
|> harmless animals is simply less interesting than many other
|> things, and it is you yourselves and the loss of habitat that is
|> destroying the opportunity for easy kills and even its "pleasure"
|> (such as it may be for whatever cross-grained reason).  So guys,
|> don't blame us if your numbers are declining, blame this "sport"
|> for being uninteresting and yourselves for finding better things
|> to do.
|>  
|>                                               ted
|>  
See my comments above about taking a narrow, specialized sample of
ex-hunters and applying their responses to a questionaire to the whole
hunting community.  Hunting and fishing are not for everyone, for a
variety of reasons, certainly more than ten.  Nobody is forced to hunt
or fish, yet millions of Americans and Canadians choose to do so, again
for a variety of reasons.  We are hostile to you AR folks because at least
some of you would like to ban hunting for what we perceive as misguided
reasons, even in places where it is a needed management tool.  We are
hostile because at least some of you harass hunters and disrupt hunters
in the field.  We are hostile because some of you publish blatent lies
such as the Myths poster that Werling typed in.  There are millions of
people who either enjoy or make their living from hunting and fishing.
Many of these people feel that the priviledge of doing so is worth
defending against the threat of a small but vocal minority of misguided
activists.  Its really too bad that we can't all join together and fight
the real threat to wildlife, habitat destruction due to human activity.

Joe
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