The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1922-11-29

! Is the annual open season on deer in
| Vermont, formerly looked forward to by
many ardent huntsmen as the culmina-
/ ton of the sportsman's year of recrea-
| ton in pursuit of the elusive creatures
of the wild, to degenerate into a. CONNER
| cialized slaughter of those beautiful ami
mails, affording the true sportsman about
as many thrills as the annual fall kill
/ ing of fat hogs on the farm?
/ Do Yermonters now go deer hunting
! for the sport there is in matching their
| individual wits against the Unborn craft
and cunning of Iordly buck. or do they
| so forth in crowds sufficiently large TO
/ drive" the woodlands, section by sec
/ ton, and then pour a fusilade of cold
! lead sufficient to annnhilate an army
! corps into the deer that are forced into
| the open, shooting first and looking
afterwards" and then selling TO out-of
| the-state buyers the riddled carcasses of
what legal deer fall before their fire,
i leaving the dead does and fawns TO rot,
unless rescued by some representative of
/ the law
! Thanks to the innate spirit of fairness
| still living in the hearts of all true
| sportsmen, and there are lot of them,
/ a large proportion of Vermont hunters
are still hunting in n sportsmanlike man
ner and in conformity with the law, but
| the hard hunting the past season, the
difficulty in getting close enough TO 4
/ deer TO tell whether or not it had legal
horns, together with a liberal amount of
natural born ''cussedness" in their
makeup, has caused some hunters to re-
| sort to lacking" or Illegal hunting at
night by the aid of automobile spOtlights
/ or other bright lights, which seem to
I hold the deer in a thra1 while they are
/ shot down by these miserable apologies
/ for men. Some are just ''Ornery' fell
/ lows, others are men higher up in their
4 respective communities, but in reality
/ they are, under their cloak of seeming
/ responsibility, simply petty criminals
with none of the attributes Of the true
4 sportsman.
/ Time was, not long ago, when nearly
/ everyone went deer hunting for the sport
i there was in it. coupled legitimately with
I a chance to get one or two hundred
I pounds of excellent meat for family use
/ but today large per cent of the deer
/ shot in Vermont are shipped out of the
1 state for sale TO marketmen in the large
/ cities, not only in New England but also
I in the Middle West.
Those who looked into the express
4 cars on the various railroads leading out
| of Vermont during the past three weeks
| were astounded at the number of deer
/ carcasses being shipped To market. The
I buyers have been very active, and have
I been paying biz prices, from % cents a
casses, that is, with head, hide, horns
and hoofs all on. 1t means a lot of
money for the man who got a heavy
/ buck. weighing 200 pounds or over, but
| it also means that Vermont deer hunt
ing is degenerating from sportsman's
legitimate and highly valued pastime
into the market hunters grab fOr Il few
filthy dollars.
The final figures on deer shot in the
state during the open season just past,
794 for the whole state, make il very ap-
parent that the wholesale slaughter of
1920, when anything in the shape of a
deer was legal. together with the fair
number of bucks killed in 1921, caused
the 1922 bag to be rather slim, and most
of the venison was shipped away and
sold. To be sure, Nermonters got quite
/ Il number of dollars out of it, but the
wild life resources of Vermont should be
figured on the basis of their value to the
people of the state in the pleasures of
4 outdoor recreation, not in the cold dol
/ lars and cents they will bring when
parcelled out on the tables of the rich in
1 other states.
i Some states prohibit the sale of ven
ison, and some prohibit the shipping Of
venison outside. except that the holder
| of a nonresident hunting license may
/ he has legally taken under the provisions
of his license, but Vermont permits the
sale of venison during the open season
| on deer ''and for reasonable time