Psychology of the Hunt

[Stumblebum]

Why do we still hunt? What's the big thrill about shooting a wild animal? I'm not against it, I know plenty of people who do hunt, its just that I never quite understood it. If I was ever in an extreme condition where I had to hunt to survive I'm sure I could. But when I really don't have to, why would I?

 

Is fishing any different? I like fishing. I am a catch and release guy. Why do I like it? I find it relaxing but I also find reading a book has the same effect. Maybe it has to do with outwitting wild creatures and getting some kind of pleasurable rush from it. If you watch those guys shoot a deer on TV you'd swear they're having an orgasm. Its almost primeval. Go out hunting for days, away from the little woman and substitute sex with a kill. Whatever the reason for hunting, it must be good.

 

Even the dinosaurs wouldn't have stood a chance, a challenge maybe, but I'm sure if someone ever invents a time machine to take us back, hunters would be lining up.

[-Demosthenes-]

Man used to have to hunt for food, therefore it was useful for man to enjoy hunting.

[reverse]

Well we live in a strange world,

animal muscle comes all nicely packed in plastic at the supermarket,

so we never think of the fully assembled creature.

 

We are quite removed from the killing that is done on our behalf.

 

As for hunters, I would like to see it a bit more even, send the heroes out with just a knife - to face a stag one on one.

that would be ok I think.

 

people that collect things fascinate me, it's almost like there is some need to hunt and hunt with some small possibility to find a rare item.

I also theorise that gambling is an offshoot of this instinct.

[YT2095]

I can only speak from my own experience here, I also enjoy hunting.

 

it also extends to collecting (elements, chemicals, electronic components, coins)

I class fishing as hunting too, as well as (and here`s the weird part) going through all the foliage on the vegitables I grow to find the biggests and nicest, my greenhouse in mid summer is like a tropical jungle and you need to cut your way in sometimes!

I "Hunt" for Chillis and Lemon grass etc..

I`ts important to me to "ask permission" from the plant or fish or bird (or whatever)that I want to take, while I have the Gun/Knife or Scissors in my hands though.

and also to give thanks to it when eating and enjoying it.

I never seem to do that when I buy a pack of bacon or a can of beans from the shop though?

 

by that evidence, I`de suggest the "Hunt" is also partly ritualistic.

 

just MY thoughts

[coquina]

Is fishing any different? I like fishing. I am a catch and release guy. Why do I like it? I find it relaxing but I also find reading a book has the same effect.

 

Relaxing? Have you ever been offshore and had a 100# tuna hit your line at 50mph while the boat is going 15mph in the opposite direction? Especially when you run into a school and get 4 hits on 4 different rigs.

 

Tuna fishing has been defined as hours of boredom interspersed with minutes of pure panic.

[Stumblebum]

Not many tuna in the lakes of Ontario, Canada.

I'm more of a 'you catch it, put it in a can, and I'll eat it" type of guy.

[atinymonkey]

I presume modern hunting is base around a need to control. Control over the hunt, and to an extent nature itself, is provided to the individual. The achievement of set goals, like the challenge of a hunt, will help to constitute a general feeling of fulfillment in life.

[Hellbender]

I love to fish, and I love looking for things and collecting things as well. I don't really hunt anymore, but it is really fun and exhilarating. It is a great evolutionary advantage to "like" doing these things. The same activities are involved in finding food. The most "primitive" societies of humans like African Bushmen still hunt and gather for their food. Just becasue we are domesticated doesn't mean we lose all our instincts. Look at dogs and cats. We feed them every day, and they don't have to, yet they still like to chase and hunt small animals and eat them.

[coquina]

I love to fish, and I love looking for things and collecting things as well. I don't really hunt anymore, but it is really fun and exhilarating. It is a great evolutionary advantage to "like" doing these things. The same activities are involved in finding food. The most "primitive" societies of humans like African Bushmen still hunt and gather for their food. Just becasue we are domesticated doesn't mean we lose all our instincts. Look at dogs and cats. We feed them every day, and they don't have to, yet they still like to chase and hunt small animals and eat them.

 

I used to hunt as well... with a bow and arrow as well as with guns. I didn't enjoy it much, I don't really like killing animals, but I have no objection to those who do as long as they only kill enough to eat and don't waste the animal.

 

Anyway - I think you're right. It is probably an evolutionary survival skill, it would certainly be a case of "survival of the fittist" some some great natural catastrophe occurred. It's not limited to hunting and fishing, but being able to survive with limited resources - find your way through a forest, find shelter, make a fire, etc.

[atinymonkey]

Slightly off topic, but I've got a question. Why is it that every other week there is a story about an American that had to chew off his hand/foot/arm/torso after getting it stuck under a rock?

 

Whats with that?

[coquina]

Maybe we've just got more rocks per capita than most. It's an obvious evolutionary link between humans, minks, and other valuable fur bearing mammals.

[Sayonara]

Personally, I'd much rather see deer, stags, bears etc being deer, stags and bears, and doing deer, stag and bear things, rather than seeing them falling down dead, struggling in traps, or bouncing around on the back of some guy's 4x4.

[Hellbender]

Me too. I love animals a lot, but I realize that where I live, in the Adirondack park, that settlers a long time ago killed of almost all the wolves and mountain lions. There would be a serious problem with deer overpopulation if all those rednecks dressed in orange didn't kill some of them every year.

 

I used to turkey hunt when I was younger. To tell the truth, I never got one, but I did enjoy the fact that I was hunting to kill and eat one, not to stuff it as a trophy.

[atinymonkey]

Er, deer don't breed like rabbits. They breed in the wild in the UK and control the population themselves.

 

Just incase you fear the onset of a deer rebellion if hunting declines.

[blike]

It seems to me to be a sort of a primal characteristic to find pleasure in exerting dominance over something; be it animals or humans.

 

As a side note, deer population in the states is out of control in some areas. This, of course, is due to humans eliminating or removing their natural predators in one way or another.

 

in the Adirondack park, that settlers a long time ago killed of almost all the wolves and mountain lions.

[Sayonara]

What you need is a wolf reintroduction program.

 

Then at least you may have a proper reason for hunting at some point

[Hellbender]

We have tried, but they are always localized. I believe that we should restore things to a natural order. But they would still come into conflict with people, and perhaps the same thing would happen again.

[Mokele]

What you need is a wolf reintroduction program.

 

There's serious debate about whether re-introduction programs truly work. I'm not really up to date on it, something to do with low success rate (especially with mammals) when simply introduced, as opposed to when simply naturally expanding from their remaining habitat.

 

Of course, in some cases, re-introduction is the only option, like when there is no native population left, but I just thought I'd point out that it's effectiveness in the long term is questioned by some.

 

Mokele

[Kelton]

It's hard to say why we hunt (actually, only a very small minority of people hunt). In reality, most of us watch TV and do other stuff, so why not ask questions about that? That's MY question! : )

 

People probably hunt because they were taught to do it and to enjoy it...no different than other people have been taught to play basketball or ping pong.

 

For those of us that don't care for hunting, we tend to judge it and ask pointed questions about it. For some, it's an easy way to grab the moral high ground by making comments about the hobby. Others tend to "read into it" like there is some deeper meaning about man's need to dominate or control things. That might be a bit much.

 

Given that so many of us don't have any interest in hunting (most of us, anyway), there is good reason to believe that there isn't much to this hunting instinct....it's just sport. Why do we engage in sport? hmmmm

[coquina]

We have a huge problem with it in Yorktown. The Colonial National Park is here, as well as the Yorktown Battlefields. All that area is protected from hunting. At night the deer leave the park and eat everyone's gardens and shrubs right down to the nub. Another problem is that they carry the deer tick, which in turn carries Lyme disease, so when they come into the yards, they drop the ticks.

 

Fortunately, I live far enough away that I am out of range. I see a deer occasionally - they come for the apples that grow in my dad's old orchard. I don't try to do anything with the apples because of all the spraying you have to do throughout the season to make them edible, so I'm happy for the deer to have them.

[Sayonara]

Of course, in some cases, re-introduction is the only option, like when there is no native population left, but I just thought I'd point out that it's effectiveness in the long term is questioned by some.

There are several such programmes underway in Europe right now, so give it a decade or so and there'll be some good population dynamics data.

[YT2095]

It seems to me to be a sort of a primal characteristic to find pleasure in exerting dominance over something; be it animals or humans.

 

I have to disagree there most certainly, although that may be the motivation for SOME, it is certainly NOT the motivation for others such as myself!

not by a Loooong chalk!

 

I get just the same "Kick" from digging up a home grown potato that`s large and perfect and un-blemished, as I do from catching a good well sized edible fish or shooting a nice fat bird, catching a good adult crab from under a rock with my hands, or netting a load of Prawns.

there`s no "Dominance" thing going on in my head, and it Certainly does NOT extend to humans!

 

I don`t cook or eat it and think "Got ya! ya lil` Ba$t" I actualy give thanks.

 

1. for the "hunt"

2. for the enjoyment of the eating.

 

and yes, where possible, I will Use the bones and skin etc...

[syntax252]

Here in SW Michigan, we are practically over run with Whitetail deer. These are marvelous little animals of about 125 lbs. to 200 lbs for an adult specimen. One of our problems is that deer/car accidents are a real hazard in Michigan. Chances are that if a person has been involved in 3 accidents involving autos, 2 of them will be deer/car accidents. Also, crop damage is a consideration to the point that farmers have sued the state for damages caused by deer.

 

In an effort to control the herd.....

 

We have about 3 monthe of deer season here counting the archery season. During the gun season, in the southern part of the state, one can get a doe permit for each day of the season, so it is not at all uncommon for a diligent huner to kill 6 or more deer a year. I usually get 2 and call that good enough for an old man.

 

Wolves have been reintroduced in the upper peninsula of Michigan and there have been sightings in the upper lower peninsula of wolves. The problem with wolves is that if they did bring the deer herd down to sustainable levels, then the wolves are not going to just lay down and starve to death, they are going to start taking dogs, cats, sheep, cows, and even in some cases--humans.

 

In California, Pumas were reintroduced and already they have taken human prey.

 

The real problem is that there are altogether too many people in the world to allow enough space for the number of animals that we used to have. Where would we put 6,000,000 American Bison today?

 

I see no moral problem in hunting. If one eats meat, one is responsible for the death of an animal. What is the difference, morally, between hunting and raising pigs and the like for the slaughter house?

[Guest ajhill]

Ran across this thread while researching the psychology of hunting for an essay. I was struck by the reasonable tenor of these postings compared to the rabid diatribes that so often concern this topic. If it's permissible to do so in this forum, I'd like to solicit additional information or opinions. For instance:

 

Reverse: The aboriginal hunters to whom modern "sportsmen" appeal hunted out of dire necessity using primitive weapons and, judging from an abundance of anthropological evidence, risked significant injury in the process. Today's hunters sit in heated blinds, attract their unsuspecting prey with sexual pheremones extracted from deer urine, and then blast the animals with high-powered rifles equipped with telescopic sights. But, what if they actually had to hunt in the manner of their distant forebears, as Reverse suggests? A 200# buck would be a formidable opponent for a human armed with knife or club (or, better still, restricted to his/her natural weapons!)

 

YT2095: The idea of "asking permission" or "giving thanks" to the creature one has just killed and eaten derives, I think, from the animism that informed many primitive religions. However, from a modern perspective, can we assume that animals or plants have "souls?" And, even if they do, are these really appeased by such ceremonies? Would you or I feel comforted, if someone who had slain us (whether for profit or for sport) offered this kind of retroactive propitiation to our "spirits?" From everything I've seen, animals have the same reluctance to die that we do, so why would they feel any differently about their killers?

 

On fishing: Fish don't command the same warm, fuzzy feelings in most of us that mammals do, but there is no reason to assume they experience pain any less vividly than "higher" animals. (In fact, lack of higher intelligence may mean they experience pain and fear more intensely instead of less!) I try to imagine biting into an apple with a concealed hook and suddenly being yanked into the water. After struggling to the point of exhaustion, I'm pulled under the surface, partially drowned, the hook is ripped out of my mouth and I'm cast back up onto solid ground. As I lie there retching and gasping, what do I think about "catch and release?" (At one time there was, in fact, a fascinating TV ad much like this.) How valid is this kind of reasoning? Do animals feel and respond as we do? Do we care?

 

On deer: As a twenty year resident of Northern Virginia, I experienced the deer population explosion at its worst. My son totalled my wife's Accura in a deer/car collision and everyone in the family experience numerous close calls! Like most prudent people in that region we also became accustomed to staying out of the woods during hunting season. That way the hunters mainly shot each other. Not a year passed without several "tragic" instances of this type. (My first experience in the operating room at the University of Virginia involved a man whose brother had mistaken him for a turkey on a Thanksgiving Day hunt.)

Hunting is by no means the only way to control wild animal populations. For instance, birth control hormones can be administered to deer through doctored salt licks or subcutaneous implants placed by game wardens. In many regions, these humane methods are actively opposed by hunting groups, who use the overpopulation problem as justification for their "sport."

As several postings noted, reintroduction of natural predators, like wolves or mountain lions, has problems of its own. A true "natural" balance cannot be achieved while humans, their livestock and pets are part of the environment.

 

Kelton: I would have liked to read more along the line of your questions: Since a relatively small minority of the population hunts, why do we put up with the problems they cause, like:

(1) Pollution of estuaries and lakes by lead shot

(2) Proliferation of firearms

(3) Endangerment of hunters and non-hunters alike by careless shooters

(4) Noise pollution

(5) Debasement of animal gene pools (Evolution depends on "survival of the

fittest," but hunters routinely try to kill only "prime" specimens.)

 

My bias about hunting is pretty obvious, but I'm interested in serious responses from both sides of the issue, especially those with references to further resources.

 

aj

[Hellbender]

very good points here. I never thought of all that. Even though I don't hunt, I used to appreciate the fact that it reduces their numbers. I never thought of the other points you mentioned. Thanks for changing my mind