If I were called on to testify on the role of hunting, I'd focus on sportsmen as a management tool. Witness the over-population of whitetail deer, snow geese and Canada geese, just to name a few critters that have reached problematic proportions. Hunters pay for the privilege of helping keep those populations in check. Last fall deer hunters in states like Wisconsin, Michigan, Texas and Pennsylvania harvested more whitetails per state than existed in the entire country at the turn of the century. It doesn't take a rocket scientist or a wildlife professor to recognize the threats posed by burgeoning whitetail numbers, and anyone who doesn't understand the problems associated with snow goose and Canada goose populations simply hasn't been paying attention.
Hunters play an invaluable role in maintaining the delicate balance of nature.
Without the intervention of sportsmen, Mother Nature would find her own way to resolve the problem, and her methods are usually harsher than the hunters' way. If the experts in the wildlife management fraternity had their way, there would be more hunters, but instead the percentage of people who hunt continues to fall at a steady rate, and that's bad news for wildlife. That's how I'd testify. We're not perfect. As is true in every avocation, a few of our rank and file break the rules from time to time.