Siskiyou Daily News (Yreka, CA): U.S. Humane Society CEO Weighs In On Hound Hunting
June 05, 2012
I'm submitting this letter on behalf of Wayne Pacelle, president and CEO of The Humane Society of the United States.
Californians have twice made clear their opposition - in two statewide ballot measures (Prop 117 and Prop 197) - to allowing hunters to chase down mountain lions with packs of dogs so they can be shot at pointblank range for trophies.
Applying that same reasoning, it's equally wrong to deploy dogs against bears or bobcats.
Same unsporting, inhumane, unethical practice; same terror and pain for the animals; same hazards for the dogs asked to chase and attack potentially lethal predators; same flawed motivation for the entire escapade - killing a beautiful animal in a head-hunting exercise.
The only difference between them is the type of predator targeted for torment.
You may recall the firestorm of outrage when Dan Richards, president of the California Fish and Game Commission, sent a photo to the hunting press displaying a bloodied mountain lion in his arms that he'd chased down with a pack of dogs and then shot and killed on a trophy hunt in Idaho. His lame defense was that the "hounding" of mountain lions is legal in Idaho.
I say lame because Richards is a state official and he has a responsibility to uphold the values of this state - and there can be no mistaking the home-state attitudes about hounding. What Richards had no way of knowing, however, is that his self-indulgent trophy hunt would remind Californians that some forms of hounding are still legal in the state. To rectify this problem, Sen. Ted Lieu , D-Torrance has introduced a bill to ban the use of hounds against black bears and bobcats.
The bill, SB 1221, is expected to come before the full Senate soon.
The Humane Society of the United States is working overtime to remind lawmakers that the public doesn't have tolerance for this sort of grisly undertaking, in which a small number of practitioners affix radio transmitters to the dogs' collars and then follow the signal with a hand-held directional antenna until the quarry takes refuge in a tree or is otherwise cornered. Both quarry and dogs can be horribly mauled in these encounters, which sometimes amount to little more than state-sanctioned animal fighting. At the end, pulling the trigger on the gun becomes the moral and sporting equivalent of shooting in an animal tapped at a zoo.
Last year, we surveyed the California electorate on the issue, and 83 percent of voters oppose hounding.
And that number includes many hunters who hold to the fair-chase ethic.
The dogs also wreak havoc by traipsing over private property, chasing all manner of wild animals and even harassing and sometimes killing domesticated animals. "Last year hounds killed 14 deer near my house that I know of and chased a horse into my back yard injuring the horse," wrote one landowner in Shasta County.
During the last two years, a Yosemite National Park ranger has cited houndsmen in four different incidents of hounds running illegally in the park. He said that "some of the dogs are really skinny" and that houndsmen may keep their dogs hungry to encourage their prey drive.
The time for action in California is now. Montana and Pennsylvania already prohibit using dogs.
Colorado, Oregon and Washington voters banned this hunting method by ballot initiative.
If legislators here don't heed the views of the people, you can count on a ballot measure in the next election cycle. State lawmakers can avert that expensive proposition and do what's right for animals, not punting the issue to voters. Hounding has no place in our shared wild lands.
Wayne Pacelle is president and CEO of The Humane Society of the United States, and is author of the New York Times bestseller "The Bond: Our Kinship with Animals, Our Call to Defend Them."
- Stephanie Twining PR specialist, The Humane Society of the United States
Californians have twice made clear their opposition - in two statewide ballot measures (Prop 117 and Prop 197) - to allowing hunters to chase down mountain lions with packs of dogs so they can be shot at pointblank range for trophies.
Applying that same reasoning, it's equally wrong to deploy dogs against bears or bobcats.
Same unsporting, inhumane, unethical practice; same terror and pain for the animals; same hazards for the dogs asked to chase and attack potentially lethal predators; same flawed motivation for the entire escapade - killing a beautiful animal in a head-hunting exercise.
The only difference between them is the type of predator targeted for torment.
You may recall the firestorm of outrage when Dan Richards, president of the California Fish and Game Commission, sent a photo to the hunting press displaying a bloodied mountain lion in his arms that he'd chased down with a pack of dogs and then shot and killed on a trophy hunt in Idaho. His lame defense was that the "hounding" of mountain lions is legal in Idaho.
I say lame because Richards is a state official and he has a responsibility to uphold the values of this state - and there can be no mistaking the home-state attitudes about hounding. What Richards had no way of knowing, however, is that his self-indulgent trophy hunt would remind Californians that some forms of hounding are still legal in the state. To rectify this problem, Sen. Ted Lieu , D-Torrance has introduced a bill to ban the use of hounds against black bears and bobcats.
The bill, SB 1221, is expected to come before the full Senate soon.
The Humane Society of the United States is working overtime to remind lawmakers that the public doesn't have tolerance for this sort of grisly undertaking, in which a small number of practitioners affix radio transmitters to the dogs' collars and then follow the signal with a hand-held directional antenna until the quarry takes refuge in a tree or is otherwise cornered. Both quarry and dogs can be horribly mauled in these encounters, which sometimes amount to little more than state-sanctioned animal fighting. At the end, pulling the trigger on the gun becomes the moral and sporting equivalent of shooting in an animal tapped at a zoo.
Last year, we surveyed the California electorate on the issue, and 83 percent of voters oppose hounding.
And that number includes many hunters who hold to the fair-chase ethic.
The dogs also wreak havoc by traipsing over private property, chasing all manner of wild animals and even harassing and sometimes killing domesticated animals. "Last year hounds killed 14 deer near my house that I know of and chased a horse into my back yard injuring the horse," wrote one landowner in Shasta County.
During the last two years, a Yosemite National Park ranger has cited houndsmen in four different incidents of hounds running illegally in the park. He said that "some of the dogs are really skinny" and that houndsmen may keep their dogs hungry to encourage their prey drive.
The time for action in California is now. Montana and Pennsylvania already prohibit using dogs.
Colorado, Oregon and Washington voters banned this hunting method by ballot initiative.
If legislators here don't heed the views of the people, you can count on a ballot measure in the next election cycle. State lawmakers can avert that expensive proposition and do what's right for animals, not punting the issue to voters. Hounding has no place in our shared wild lands.
Wayne Pacelle is president and CEO of The Humane Society of the United States, and is author of the New York Times bestseller "The Bond: Our Kinship with Animals, Our Call to Defend Them."
- Stephanie Twining PR specialist, The Humane Society of the United States
Memo: LAST YEAR, WE SURVEYED THE CALIFORNIA ELECTORATE on the issue, and 83 percent of voters oppose hounding.
And that number includes many hunters who hold to the fair-chase ethic.
And that number includes many hunters who hold to the fair-chase ethic.