It’s Survival of the Weak and Scrawny

This is one of the most inaccurate articles I've ever read. Do your research somewhere other than a walk through Central Park! I'll use Cape buffalo hunting in Africa as an example: A true trophy is an old "dugga boy" which is a fully mature hard-bossed bull. By the time a bull reaches full maturity, he has passed his prime breeding years, been kicked out of the herd by the new herd bull, and is heading toward the end of his days. A responsible, knowledgable hunter (which most of us are) realizes this, and will only take such an animal. You're WAY off base here. Go get yourself another Starbucks & do a little more unbiased research.

I have to agree with annie, when we removed strict education requirements, society rules and expectations, we saw and are still seeing a prolferation of uneducated, immoral and useless people who are pirrahnason society. We are now seeing third and fouth generation welfare receipients who have been raised on welfare and feel that is their profession in life as well. Meanwhile, the wealthy, educated, and, or hard working, ethical, moral upholding individuals are producing fewerchildren but paying higher taxes to support the offspring of the losers. The world is not doomed to be populated by the losers because when the working and or educated population is extinct the losers will prey on each other until they too become extinct.

This article is obviously ill-informed. There are various record keeping systems out there, such as Boone & Crockett; Safari Club International; etc., and they all show an ever increasing size of trophies. Many have had to raise the minimum record entrance standards for species because there were too many entries being filed. Whitetailed deer, for example, are exponentially larger in body and antler size than ever before. This is all due to the conservation ethic and herd management. Hunters nowadays routinely allow animals to mature prior to harvesting. This insures the propagation of the best and usually largest genetics. The record books for trophy animals are being rewritten at an unprecedented pace. Check the numbers and you will see that overall, the big ones are greater in size and number than ever.

This argument is insain science. Saying that taking the biggest, strongest males is killing a species is one sided. There are females born of the latest generations also that carry the same exact genes as the males would have. These females are not mentioned. If they are bread then these genes continue on. Could this argument actually hold credit? Not as much as other factors such as environment, disease, etc. This seems to be someones argument for an alternative agenda.

Almost all hunting seasons for large game such as elk, deer, moose, antelope etc. are scheduled after the majority of rut is complete so that the breeding cycles are not interupted. The whole premise of this article is that the mature animals are shot before the rut which is a falsehood. The resulting overmating by undesireable animals or the so called weaker of the species therefore soes not happened as is suggested. Hunting patterns and traditions have changed as well and many hunters are waiting for animals to fully mature before shooting them. This usually takes 3 seasons or more for big game. The genes are passed on by the desireable animals during this time as well. Lastly, in many places herd management has hunters shooting the scrawny and weaker animals to take them out of the gene pool. This is called culling and is widely practiced as well. This leads me to believe this entire article based on incorrect information and false assumptions is just a thinly veiled atack on hunting.

The wildlife in the western United States are producing recorded trophy animals almost every year in most species, proving that through well managed hunting practices and conservation Darwin theories are still holding true. It is true that in many parts of the world the weakest animals are prevailing, but it is my belief that through well manage programs (like the Division of Wildlife Resources) hunting can produce healthy wildlife populations for all to enjoy.

This is the biggest crock of bull I have ever read. In hunting the fittest do servive through adapting to the eviroment and evasion from the hunter. The smarter and more wary of the species survive. Even if the younger animals do breed they carry the same genes as their parents they are just younger specimens. Alowing game animals to reach maturity leaves them in the herd for breeding until they are close to the end of their life span anyway. This is just another anti hunting propaganda article.

As both a hunter and former genetics instructor I would definitley agree. Education followed by a change in hunting ethics is needed to reverse this trend. We need to stop hunting the trophies, but select out the inferior animals just as we would do in a commercial cattle operation, or randomly without regard to size or sex reduce the population. My own practice has resulted in no trophies taken in a lifetime but a lot of selective harvesting. The quality of the outdoor experience and prpper management of the environment is most important.

The author is looking at this problem from the wrong angle.

It is not evolution but instead an unintentional breeding.

If you were raising any animal and regularly removed those of a certyain characteristic from the breeding pool, you would eventually wind up with a stock of animals displaying the characteristics of those which were not culled.

The author is looking at this problem from the wrong angle.

It is not evolution but instead an unintentional breeding.

If you were raising any animal and regularly removed those of a certyain characteristic from the breeding pool, you would eventually wind up with a stock of animals displaying the characteristics of those which were not culled.

How can you print story's that are so inacurate.Just the oppisoite is true. You should do a little reasearch before you print such a false story. Fact and backed up by every game dept in the USA is that the older males are the ones to target because they have already spread their DNA to females for years. If you target younger males that have that superiour DNA you will loose that DNA. Every outdoorsman knows this. As for the readers that are against controlled hunting, I suppose they would rather animals stave to death instead of doing what controlled hunting does in that per biologist only so many acres can supprt so many animals. A horrible way to die starvation. We as humans are more carring and smarter than that.
R Gabriel

The last line is essentially true of the human population as well. The strongest "wealthy and educated" want more for their children and so have fewer, while the weak, "impoverished" see no need to hold back on reproduction. It is as if they are trying to have better odds of one succeeding. I would not be surprised to find and adaptaion in animals that would cause the weaker to have a larger number of multiple births, or large litters on average for this same concept, of trying to beat the odds. Basically the world is doomed to be eventually populated by the losers.

If this were true then why would a new world record white tail deer haave been harvested in WI this past year? Good hunters do look for that animal that is in its prime. By taking the animal in its prime, it will have passed on the genetics that it possessed. When the animal is past prime, it breeds less anyway and will likely befall death to a natual preditor or freeze to death in colder climates. Brutal isn't it?

Well how did the record elk bull in Utah come to be?
you can see it @slctrib out doors the biggest ever

The last line is essentially true of the human population as well. The strongest "wealthy and educated" want more for their children and so have fewer, while the weak, "impoverished" see no need to hold back on reproduction. It is as if they are trying to have better odds of one succeeding. I would not be surprised to find and adaptaion in animals that would cause the weaker to have a larger number of multiple births, or large litters on average for this same concept, of trying to beat the odds. Basically the world is doomed to be eventually populated by the losers.

"When you take them systematically out of the population for several years, you end up leaving essentially a bunch of losers doing the breeding." This sounds like what our military system is doing to homo sapiens.

Larger antlered and horned animals are the eldest mature animals who have lived many years and placed there genes into the younger smaller racked animals who are the future of the species because they will have the vitality to survive the winter to the next breeding season. The oldest and yearlings are the first to go over harsh winters.
What truly concerns me is people who have never seen an animal or understand it's life in the wild making decisions about what is best for them.

That,s funny this year in Utah there was record Bull elk
that is the biggest ever taken you can see it on slctrib out doors

Most hunters do not take trophy animals. The Canadian rams studied are hunted only by a small number of enthusiasts who can afford the expense of giudes and exclusive permits. Average hunters are pleased to take more common animals and females. Game management authorities on the Apache Reservation encourage this by charging more for trophy animals taken.