Where have all the hunters and trappers gone?

[miss_thenorth]

It is depressing to me, but it is a new world. We dinosaurs will be leaving it to the next group

This is exactly why my husband and I teach our kids a different way. We hunt, we fish, we wild forage. At our home, my kids know where their food comes from. They have helped us raise our animals and butcher our animals, and my son has harvested his own wild rabbits. They have worked the soil in which their vegetables have grown in, and they harvested those same vegetables. In the home, they are shown how things are made from scratch--not a box. They are taught the nutritional and medicinal value of certain foods. They are taught to look at a packaged food source and read the ingredients, so they can figure out whether it is good for them or not. They are taught that there are alternatives for everything. I think it is our duty to the "next group" to educate and enlighten them, that they don't have to follow the status quo.​

 

[ChickenDogDuck]

Too many Disney movies with wild animals trained to do cute tricks for the kiddies and too many folks with this kind of mentality:

 

[Judy]

Quote:
Now this just CAN'T be for real.

 

[lickskillet]

No way! Lol Duh!!!

 

[Imp]

That is too funny!

Imp-Eats Soylent Green

 

[Iowa Roo Mom]

The truth is, PETA has ruined the trapping business. I hear stories from my grandpa about how back when he used to trap, a person could get upwards of $40 dollars for a good coon hide. Nowadays you're lucky to get $10! I still trap for my own reasons, mostly because I enjoy getting out in nature. But I gotta tell ya, PETA has burned alot of the old timers right outta the sport

I also bowhunt (and occasionaly gun hunt) and dearly love it. Not PETA or ANYONE else will ever take the love for hunting and trapping outta me!

 

[Judy]

Quote:
I think there is a lot more involved than one organization, or even a few of them. This is so complex. Look back at the newspaper thing above, about no animals being harmed in making store bought meat. Horrifying as it may be, it is actually possible that this person believed what he said. The implications are far-reaching and staggering. We are SO removed from our food sources. Wonder what would happen if all kids were required to spend a year on a real farm as part of their education....

Meanwhile, if you take an extra deer, I have some room in my freezer....

 

[saddina]

I do think a chunk of it is that wearing real fur is now frowned upon as "cruel", so less demand for pelts. I don't know that I would wear it either, but then again it's bikini weather here 10 months of the year.

 

[Boyd]

not up here Still sweater weather

This year has been a revelation of sorts for me, putting in a larger garden to accommodate the increase in my household and I've started trapping again to get the predator population under control.

I guess I am going to go through my grandpa's cookbook and figure out how to make possum crisp, and something with raccoon meat

Anybody know where you can sell the pelts now a days?

 

[Ridgerunner]

I fully agree with ddawn. A frightening number of people don't know that dirt is involved in agriculture. I have no doubt the person believed what they said about getting the meat from the store. I personally consider PETA more of a symptom than a cause of the attitude change but that may just be me.

As far as the price of fur, I suspect a big change away from fur was the cost of cheaper synthetics driving fashion as much as anything. The mountain men trapped out a lot of the easy beaver, true, but the mountain man era really died when the beaver hat was no longer fashionable. I've no doubt saddina is right as far as a chunk of why fashion changed, but I suspect cost had a lot to do with it also.