At 02:58 PM 05/11/2000 -0500, you wrote:
>> I dunno. Doesn't seem all that tender when a
>> "sportsman" hunts down a five point buck, removes the
>> rack, and leaves the carcass behind for the buzzards.
>
>Hey, buzzards gotta eat too!  If more hunters did this, species like the
>California Condor would not be facing extinction.

...because people shoot them...

>If not for deer hunters, deer would have been exterminated as the
>agricultural pests they are.

Hmm, seems to me they are only "agricultural pests" because we have...
agriculture.

>Because of the political clout of deer hunters
>(licensed deer hunters in the U.S. out-number all the world's armies
>combined according to The Wall Street Journal) deer are protected from
>farmers.  Deer are now found in much greater numbers than before the
>Europeans arrived because farmers have increased their habitat by clearing
>land and eliminating their natural predators.

There's an important factor: "eliminating their natural predators", though it
should be "mostly eliminated" and then taken ourselves (for the most part) out
of that "predator" category by replacing deer eating with domestic
cow/pig/fowl
eating

>Of course I'm sure the deer would prefer to be killed quickly by a
>high-speed bullet than chased, tormented and slowly killed by a pack of
>wolves.

I doubt the wolves are particularly slow or that they give up and let an
injured animal get away to die a slow death (or maybe survive a
bullet)--though
a deer lost by a rifle-toting hunter may later be found by wolves, cougers,
other wild cats, and/or other scavengers.

>Population is also limited by starvation, predation by pet dogs,
>and auto accidents.  Even where deer hunting is allowed, these usually kill
>more deer than hunters.

I'm not exactly sure what you're arguing here... but I still like your book :)

Oh, and as for plants... they don't have legs, thus no way to escape, thus
probably don't feel pain or fear (even of fire). However, parts of plants are
poison (the green stalks of tomatos/potatos, etc) or covered with spines
(cactus, to protect water-storing flesh, though there are animals that consume
such plants, spines and all). But these are ways that plants to protect parts
of themselves. I suspect that the parts of a plant that are not poisonous or
protected by spines are "meant" to be eaten, that the plant uses this as part
of its procreation plan.

>Ray Audette
>Author "NeanderThin"
>http://www.neanderthin.com

Debby
[log in to unmask]
in toasty New Mexico
but away from any fires (at the moment)
...darn that National Park Service...