Ethologist Dr.Valerius Geist in British Columbia is the former program director of Environmental Sciences at U. Calgary, and he is known world-wide for his studies and writings about large game animals. Val recently sent me an e-mail about something that hunters should be aware of.
What prompted Val’s e-mail is that he had just received a newspaper article from Germany http://wolfeducationinternational.com/wolfe-am-hochstand-auf-der-lauer-wolfe-at-the-high-stand-in-wait/ reporting that German researchers, analyzing photographs of traps, animal feces, tracks, and other traces, found 60 wolf packs are now living across the country,13 more packs than a year ago. Overall, there are now between 150-160 adult wolves in Germany.
In Val’s research on wolves and their relationship with people, which I described in an earlier article, http://www.theoutdoorwire.com/features/230658 he found that in countries where most people don’t hunt with guns or own them – Siberia, India, Kazakhstan, etc.– wolves are more likely to attack people. Whereas in North America, where firearms ownership is greater, when people fire shots toward wolves, typically they keep their distance.
The German article, however, reports something different.
German hunters are reporting that when they’re out in the woods, and they shoot a red deer, fallow deer, roe deer or wild boar, wolves immediately show up. It’s common knowledge that predators like wolves, coyotes, and bears will feed on the remains of game animals. However, in Germany the wolves don’t seem to want to wait until the downed animals have been dressed, they aggressively approach the carcass and the hunters.
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According to Val, “This is the first report I have ever heard about wolves being drawn to hunter’s gunshots. However, that bears can and do attack hunters is definitely known in North America.” A number of those we contacted agree.
These are some of the responses.
Jim Low, a retired Alaskan game warden, says, “A gunshot on Kodiak Island attracts bears. Many deer hunters have killed deer on Kodiak Island only to have a Kodiak brown bear show up and want to dine on venison.”
Joe Hosmer, former Pres. of the SCI Foundation, agrees. Joe says: “I have seen this black tail hunting on Kodiak Island. When a deer is shot the bears come running! The hunter needs to give up the deer and move on,” unless you also have a bear license.
Be careful out there. A good dog will give his or her life for you. And I’ll give mine for my dog. After all, a man can’t live forever, and it matters how he dies.
Around these parts, a Coywolf doesn’t howl. When I’ve been out with my dog at times, I just see their eyes. They don’t announce their presence. That’s why I carry a gun with me wherever I go. I intend to make sure neither of us has to give our lives for the other. I think General Patton had something or other to say about that.
Maryland already has the toughest gun laws in the country, but it is clear to me that an effective, nationwide, universal background check system to keep firearms out of the hands of criminals and the dangerously mentally ill is a tool police need to stop more shooters. That’s just common sense and it is something I will continue to support.
You folks up there in Maryland have yourselves a piece of work, yes?
Listen here, big jowls. I have to fill out form 4473 if I buy from an FFL. I have no choice. But as for buying and selling only through FFLs because of your felt need for power and control, and as for never doing another person-top-person transfer, here is my answer.
ATF could provide one or more 90-day periods of amnesty for the registration of bump fire stocks. While there are some additional complications due to the lack of markings on bump fire stocks, Congress has delegated broad discretion to determine the scope and requirements of any amnesty. ATF already has experience with firearms marking issues for individuals who are not federal firearm licensees. (Every time a non-licensee makes an NFA “firearm,” the maker must mark the firearm in compliance with federal law.)
In addition to providing amnesty for bump fire stocks, ATF should consider a broader amnesty for “machinegun[s].” When Congress delegated the authority to provide for additional periods of amnesty, there was a clear legislative understanding that amnesty generally serves the purposes of federal firearms laws by bringing “machinegun[s]” and other NFA “firearms” that are currently contraband, and therefore likely to eventually end up in the wrong hands, into the legal market where they have value and are extremely unlikely to be used in crime.
How do you like that? The same gun control organization that suggested the bump stock ban to Trump to begin with is now suggesting that the ATF allow amnesty to register these things as NFA items. And not only that, if there are any extant machine guns out there, we should get those registered as well.
The NRA. The largest, most powerful gun control organization on earth.
GROTON, N.H. — New Hampshire’s Fish and Game Department says a 71-year-old woman suffered serious head injuries from an encounter with a bear in her home.
The department says the bear somehow got inside the woman’s home about 1:15 a.m. Tuesday in Groton, a rural community in the central part of the state. The woman, who uses a wheelchair, was hospitalized. Authorities haven’t been able to talk to her yet.
WMUR-TV reports evidence suggest the bear was trapped in the kitchen area before its encounter with the woman. The bear managed to get out of the home afterward.
Fish and Game officers said they are searching for the bear. They are concerned the bear may have rabies.
The moral of the story is that you’re not safe anywhere, and not just from two-legged threats. How close do you have a gun in the house?
The loyal pup risked his snout to protect his owner from being bitten by a rattlesnake.
Paula Godwin, from Anthem, Arizona, was on a hike Friday morning when she almost stepped on the dangerous viper, she wrote in a Facebook post.
But Todd swooped in and saved her, she said.
“He jumped right in front of my leg where I surely would have been bit,” she wrote.
Todd, who is less than a year old, tackled the rattlesnake but ended up getting bitten on the nose.
I’m shocked that this dog is alive, but since my Heidi has been bitten by a Copperhead I know that dogs do better with snake bites than humans. Still, this is a rattlesnake.
While the congressionally mandated close-air support tests between the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter and A-10 Warthog wrapped up this week, lawmakers may not be satisfied with the results as questions continue to swirl about how each performed.
“I personally wrote the specific provisions in the [Fiscal 2017 National Defense Authorization Act] mandating a fly-off between the F-35 & A-10,” Rep. Martha McSally, an Arizona Republican, tweeted Friday. “It must be carried out per Congressional intent & direction.”
McSally, a former A-10 pilot whose home state includes Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, said she had reached out to Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Goldfein to “ensure an objective comparison.”
The requirement that the two aircraft go up against each other was included as a provision in the bill amid congressional concerns over plans to retire the A-10 and replace it with the F-35. McSally was one of the architects of the bill’s language.
Her comments follow a Project on Government Oversight report that slams what it calls skewed testing techniques, saying the flights overwhelmingly favored the F-35.
Well of course it did. The effeminate fly boys must have their drones and 5GW electronics and sexy air frames to impress the other effeminate boys. But if you ask me, there is nothing sexier looking than an A-10. Any country that would give up such a magnificent air frame deserves what’s coming.
I had missed it until this article, but there is a very nice video – well worth watching in its entirety – of the distinction between A-10 pilots and everyone else. They are grunts in the sky. But before we get there, watch the devastation that 30mm gun can bring down on the enemy. Fast forward to the 6:24 mark. The caption says it takes a while to call in an air strike.
Maui police were looking for three suspects after several shots were fired during a home invasion robbery in Haiku.
Police responded to a report of shots fired at a Haiku home at about 10:35 p.m. Thursday and found three adult victims who said three males wearing hooded sweatshirts entered their home with one of them brandishing a shiny handgun.
The bandits forced one victim into a bathroom, then walked through the house. A second victim armed himself with an AR-15 rifle and fired a round at the robbers, nearly striking one.
The three suspects fled, firing four gunshots on the way out.
No one was hurt during the robbery, police said. One victim reported the suspects took $3,000.
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Police said a firearm was recovered at the scene.
How ironic. Simply rolling out an AR-15 and missing with it was enough to thwart the home invasion, and this in the state with the most onerous gun control in the nation (perhaps with the exception of New York).
Hey, with all of that gun control, how did these perps manage to get a firearm anyway? I thought gun control was supposed to assure us this kind of thing wouldn’t happen?
Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) said on Sunday that President Donald Trump’s advisers should consider leaving the White House if Trump continues to publicly disparage the nation’s intelligence community and cast doubt on the evidence that Russia interfered in the 2016 election.
“The president either needs to rely on the people that he has chosen to advise him, or those advisers need to re-evaluate whether or not they can serve in this administration,” Gowdy said on Fox News Sunday, referring to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley. “But the disconnect cannot continue. The evidence is overwhelming and the president needs to say that and act like it.”
Well, I’ll say it if Trump won’t. Hey Trey, are you listening?
The NSA and CIA are among the most wicked organizations on the planet, and cannot be trusted. You can throw the DOJ and FBI into that mix as well.
As for Gowdy, what do you think the chances are of Trey having been method-actor this whole time, working for the deep state, always outraged, never bringing anyone to justice, and always preventing the need to take anything to court or hold anyone accountable for their illegal actions?
Public access to an outdoor pistol range near Rankin Lake Park has officially been shot down after a five-year run.
Gastonia leaders say low interest in the amenity, combined with the cost of staffing the facility, led to the decision at the city’s Firearms and Tactical Training Center. Cutting off public use of the pistol range will maximize the use of all the amenities there, including a neighboring rifle range, said City Councilman David Humphries.
Humphries chairs a public safety committee that reviewed recent trends at the range before making the recommendation to do away with public pistol range access. City Council members voted unanimously in favor of that decision this month.
The facility at 1000 Tulip Drive features a public skeet and trap range, as well as a pistol and rifle range that are heavily used by law enforcement officers for training purposes. In 2013, the city opened things up and began allowing residents to fire handguns on the range from 8 a.m. to noon, and rifles from 1 to 5 p.m. Saturdays. The fee for 30 minutes of handgun time was $5 for Gastonia residents and $10 for non-residents. Rifle rates were the same, though on an hourly basis.
The public access to the pistol and rifle ranges has never been advertised on the city’s website, relying mostly on word of mouth for people to know about it.
Minimal public use of the pistol range prompted the city to cut back the hours of operation there beginning in 2017. Humphries said at the time that maintaining time for public use of the range had taken away opportunities for law enforcement officers to train on the grounds. And Gastonia Police Chief Robert Helton said keeping track of handgun users requires more oversight, because it’s easier for a careless person to inadvertently point a loaded handgun in an unsafe direction.
After the cutback, the pistol range was generally only open to the public for four hours a month – generally on the first Saturday of each month. Humphries and Councilman Jim Gallagher said at least two city staff members had to man the pistol range during those times, and few people ever showed up.
“I think the average was one to two (people) per session,” said Humphries. “With rifle shooters, a lot more of them show up at different times of the year.”
The change will enhance the more popular public use of the rifle range, he said. Because of the 90-degree configuration of the training center, the rifle and pistol ranges cannot safely be used at the same time.
Maybe if the ranges were open more often than they are – both of them – and maybe if the folks who run them weren’t jerks, both would be more popular and well used.
Here’s the thing, officer. I’ve shot at so many ranges I’ve lost count and couldn’t name them all. At every one of them, folks managed to shoot pistols without pointing them in an unsafe direction, whether we had ROs with us or not. Some of the safest shooting I’ve ever done is when shooters were self-policing. I don’t buy your argument.
As for your rifle range, the folks who run it are obnoxious. I won’t go back there again. And I’ll have to say that South Carolina has North Carolina beat by ten miles on this front. South Carolina has free ranges associated with the DNR. North Carolina doesn’t.
8 years, 1 month ago
