by Ron Spomer
The elk were “devastated” by hunting and settlement that cut off migration routes, according to a recent Washington Post report on Chronic Wasting Disease and winter elk feeding in Jackson Hole.
Nothing says “Pulitzer Prize nominee” like inaccurate reporting right up front.
Forgive me if I’m over-reacting, but as a lover and protector of wildlife and wild places, I’m fed up with half-truths and lies that blame hunting and hunters for serious wildlife declines. It’s a misconception that contributes to more declines in wildlife and wild places because modern, regulated, sustainable use hunting benefits and increases wildlife numbers.
I repeat: modern, regulated, sustainable use sport-hunting increases wildlife numbers.
Yes, yes, millions of people labor under the simplistic assumption that insists “you can’t protect or increase populations of living things IF YOU KILL THEM?” But Nature is adamant, not simplistic. And She insists on killing them. Annually. Regularly. Essentially.
The natural truth is that hunters have been hunting elk for as many hundreds of thousands of years as elk have been hunting grass. Dire wolves, Arctic wolves, black bears, grizzly bears, lions, saber-tooth cats, eagles, Inuit, Blackfoot, Sioux… Hunters hunting, killing and eating elk for tens of thousands of years with no diminution in elk numbers. But the author of this East Coast urban newspaper discovered that hunting devastated elk herds in Jackson Hole “more than a century ago.”
Is it too much to ask that these professionally trained gatherers and reporters of truth, justice, and the American Way get their facts straight? It isn’t difficult. Take a bit of basic biology as outlined above. Add a grasp of pioneering history. Flip through a thesaurus to find “exploitation, market hunting, poaching, and over-harvest.” Pick one. Use it. And shock the newspaper reading population with something wildly different — accurate reporting.
Based on a half-century of similar slights and outright attacks on hunting in the press, this latest Post story shouldn’t shock us. But it should re-remind us that we must be ever vigilant. If we hunters who daily fight and pay for wildlife protections and restorations don’t defend our programs, we will lose them. And the wildlife that depends on them. And our ancient, honorable tradition of hunting. We must call out inappropriate and blatantly inaccurate depictions of hunters and hunting decimating wildlife. Poachers, market-hunters, perhaps vandals are the accurate descriptors.
The other reason the imprecise use of the noun “hunters” threatens wildlife is because it deflects from what are usually the real causes of wildlife declines. With “hunters” so handy and easy to scapegoat, vegans and farmers and wealthy home owners and golfers skate. Off the hook. Innocent. So wildlife devastation continues.
Lovely. Row after row of wine grapes. But there will be no elk feeding on these valuable vines. Some consider this as proof that there are too many elk for the available habitat. Similar situation in downtown Los Angeles, Boston, Denver, Chicago… And they want to blame sport hunters? 
Conveniently, this is revealed in this same Post story. The author, who overall did a pretty solid job of reporting on the Jackson hole elk feeding/CWD problem, invoked hunting to deflect from the real reasons for this unnatural elk feeding frenzy — habitat conversion from wild to human.
“It has since morphed into a tool to keep the animals… away from ranches and roads…” the author wrote. She then quoted the National Elk Refuge feed grounds manager saying “If you skip a day, they go to the neighbors. They go looking for food.” And then she mentioned “a gold course and horse farms across a busy highway.”
Bingo! Here is the real story, the real reason we have a National Elk Refuge and winter feeding program in Jackson Hole. We aren’t feeding 11,000 elk there because herds were devastated by hunters 100 years ago. We’re feeding them there because farmers and ranchers and townspeople and golfers and bikers and everyone else who wants a piece of the Rocky Mountain high have usurped elk wintering habitat.
Grazing hundreds of domestic livestock on range that was critical elk winter forage 200 years ago doesn’t leave much for today’s elk herds. Gosh, just too many elk for the available habitat, I guess.
The solution is simple. We can stop feeding and concentrating elk where diseases such as CWD can more easily spread IF we tear down fences, build highway-crossing overpasses, and allow elk to freely forage on golf courses, ranches, farms, and yards throughout the area. Just keep them off my yard, please. I’ve spend several thousand dollars planting trees, shrubs, fruit trees, grass, and garden vegetables for our family and the wild birds we love.
I’m being a bit facetious here to make a point. We all want to have our elk. Just not at any inconvenience to ourselves. Yet, we and our selfish desires really are at the heart of this and most wildlife “problems.” In the Rocky Mountain West farmers and ranchers usurped wildlife wintering habitat during the pioneering era. Anyone who eats shares responsibility for this. These land managers aren’t taking all the vegetative growth for their own consumption. They sell it to us. Are each of us willing to exchange a few loaves of bread, a few bottles of wine, and two or three beef steaks a year to give back some ancient elk wintering meadows?
Do you eat? Chances are you’re creating demand for land that used to feed wildlife. Like elk. 
Similarly, do we really need to convert acres and acres of critical elk wintering grounds so we have yet another playground on which to hit little dimpled balls into holes? Shooting an elk and cutting it up for the grill might look violent and destructive, but compare that to starving the same animal on the outside of a golf course looking in.
Similarly, will a thousand more 10,000 square-foot “summer cabins” in the beautiful valleys of the Mountain West prevent CWD, brucellosis, and hoof disease? The author of this Post report noted that some say “If the landscape can’t support the current elk population, then the population is too big.” Oh deer. And after a few more housing developments are carved into the hills, the elk herd will be that much bigger again!
Finally, there is the classic “environmentalist” viewpoint. A Sierra Club member reportedly said “So we’re hoping there’s still time to allow these animals to move back to their natural movements.”
Move back to their natural movements? Even if you rephrase that to clearly define the speaker’s intent, I’m afraid that train has left the station. They can’t return to the productive old days of yesteryear because our developments prevent it. Are we prepared to remove highways, dams, fences, towns, ranches, and crop fields?
See any elk? 
Much threatens elk herds in the West, especially those wintering in Jackson Hole. Solutions will involve a host of changes. They might work. They might fail. The herds may indeed die out. But one thing is certain. They will not be devastated by regulated, sustainable-use sport hunting.
Source
Jackson Hole Elk Devastated by Hunting? is written by Ron Spomer for www.ronspomeroutdoors.com
