Thousands of Prairie Dogs Killed ... Just For Fun!

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You guys have inspired me to do more research on this prairie dog issue. I'm sure the posts about the natural balance of predators being destroyed is true, and reposnsible for fast-growing dog #'s.

I personally don't have much desire to hunt/kill that which i don't eat. Trophy hunting or shooting 'dogs included. That's just me.

We have friends who've been ranching for 40 years in MT... I've never seen many dogs there, and they don't complain about them or hunt them (the damn beavers are another story). Other ranchers hate them, but I wonder if some of that animosity is something that's reflexive, because it's been handed down over the years from father to son. That sort of amateur game management based on opinion has caused a lot of animals to get exterminated.

Lest you think i'm a PETA member (!), I'm darn sure NOT. They're a bunch of wacko true-believers. Ingrid Newkirk, their leader, has said on the record that she equates the Nazi extermination of Jews in WWII with people eating commercially raised chicken. Same thing, to her. What a loser.

[This message has been edited by Covert Mission (edited June 26, 2000).]
 
I've always been a bit dubious about cows breaking a leg by stepping into a PD hole or breaking down one of the tunnels. None of my cows ever broke a leg from holes made by armadillos or skunks, etc., and those holes don't have the bare-dirt pile around them. Now, a guy on a running horse, maybe, but why is he running his horse through a PD town? They're readily visible.

However, just like jackrabbits, they compete with cattle for grass.

Back around 1950, Texas A&M released a report which claimed that seven jackrabbits eat as much grass as a cow. I found that a bit hard to believe at that time, but it provided a wonderful excuse to go bunny-hunting at night. Since that was the time of one of the worst drouths to ever hit Texas, little excuse was needed. Bunny-hunting didn't really help; lots of folks went broke, anyway, including my parents.

I hunted jackrabbits in northwest Nevada, some 20 years back, during a gigantic population explosion. My buddy and I shot over 100 without moving from one location, and none over 200 yards! We got bored and left. I think I'd have trouble staying with PDs all day long, "just shooting". Maybe that's why guys go for the ultra-long range shots: More challenge.

Regards, Art
 
Anybody ever eat PD's?I ran across a reciepe
for them in a game cook book and was wondering if anyone had tried to eat them.


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beemerb
We have a criminal jury system which is superior to any in the world;
and its efficiency is only marred by the difficulty of finding twelve men
every day who don't know anything and can't read.
-Mark Twain
 
OK, here's the plan: I want everyone who posted to come up here to Pennsylvania. We have so many groundhogs (same as prarie dogs, or at least near 'em) that we have no bag limit, no special permit required. That's all. Most farmers would be happy to take anybody with a gun out to a nice field full of the buggers!

(oh, P.S. My theory.... the only reason fishing hasn't been attacked yet is because nobody thinks 'trouti' would be as cute as 'bambi'.)

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To ride, shoot straight, and speak the truth.
 
Young Buck, I hate to blow your bubble, but anti-fishing is already on the agenda. There was an interview with one of the HSUS guys a few years back ("Sports Afield", I think) wherein he stated that after they got rid of hunting, fishing was next.

Art
 
I'd sure *love* to have those `prairie dog huggers' to reimburse me for the $42.75K that those little `buggers' cost me in income over the last few years! A couple neighbors of mine, trying to be `sensitive', decided to try to `hunanely?' get rid of the `pasture poodles' they had on their properties. Wanna guess where those `pasture poodles' moved out to and `set up shop' at!? Yep! Right in the middle of two of my best alfalfa fields! Within a month or so I had almost *no* alfalfa left worth cutting! Those little buggers clear approximately a 25' *radius* around their holes. Both to keep things `clear' to be able to see and predators *and* for food. It's been a hard fought battle and while I may *appear* to have them `under control?' for the time being I was out and about around a week ago and discovered that it looks like they are `setting up shop' in another one of my fields. (Unfortunately it is also a field where I don't have quite as good a `range' as I have in the ones they started in and I'm a bit, well actually really, leery of doing any `serious' shooting like I was able to do before. I guess that I am going to have to try and come up with some sort of `blind' so that I can set up to shoot in a safe, or at least safer, direction?)


Anyway... Those danged `prairie dog huggers' can just go take a hike to someplace that is warm and rhymes with swell! (And *if* they *did* come up with the money it's cost me so far I'd take it and *still* tell them where to go just out of `general principles'!)
 
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