Backyard Pesting Dilemma…

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Age is a funny thing. When I was young I was an ardent big game hunter. If I was tagged out I would go with friends to help if I could and nobody turns down help packing an elk out.
My wife and kids lived on wild game for years.
for the last ten years I have not wanted to shoot any big game animal. I have. Nothing against it and encourage anyone who hasn’t to try it. Just not something that I am still interested in doing. It isn’t the work involved that has turned off my drive. It is just that the desire to kill a deer or elk is gone. My dear old dad warned me it would happen and in my mid 30’s when he told me I thought he was wrong. When I hit about 50 the dive started to wane and now it is gone.
Oddly, I still hunt upland bird hard and have no misgivings about it.
I think we grow more sensitive to our activities and more civilized in our endeavors to interact with the creature nature surrounds us with.
I have not killed a fish in decades. However last year I had a hankering for a shore lunch of wild trout and fried potatoes with onions. Had no issue with killing that 16” trout and it was as I anticipated, delicious.
 
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Ranchibi said:
Luis I understand and applaud your thinking! As we get older, we are supposed to get wiser and hopefully out hearts soften too, yours has aged gracefully!
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The wiser thing to do is eliminate invasive species whenever you can, have you ever watched a Starling drag a woodpecker out of its nest in a tree and peck its eyes out while doing it I have. Seen English sparrows kill baby bluebirds to take over the nest.. Im 64 so Im about as wise as Im ever gonna get.I enjoy seeing woodpeckers and bluebirds around my house. I have a soft spot for all animals but some dont belong here and do a lot of harm.. Why are people wanting to kill all the iguanas/pythons in Florida because they are upsetting the eco system. Mother nature keeps its own balance except when we screw it up by adding something in the mix that doesnt belong.
L.Leon in no way should you feel guilty or bad, if we dont do it no one else will because there's less and less airgun hunters/pesters every year. Your just doing the local song birds a big favor.
I deer hunted for 33 yrs killed a lot of them sometime 6-8 a year, kids were at home and we ate a lot of deer. No kids anymore and significant other doesnt care for deer anymore so I quit hunting them 2 yrs ago, if we were going to eat them Id still hunt them. I dont kill animals just to be killing if its not a valid reason then I dont do it.
 
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DeanB said:
The wiser thing to do is eliminate invasive species whenever you can, have you ever watched a Starling drag a woodpecker out of its nest in a tree and peck its eyes out while doing it I have. Seen English sparrows kill baby bluebirds to take over the nest.. Im 64 so Im about as wise as Im ever gonna get.I enjoy seeing woodpeckers and bluebirds around my house. I have a soft spot for all animals but some dont belong here and do a lot of harm.. Why are people wanting to kill all the iguanas/pythons in Florida because they are upsetting the eco system. Mother nature keeps its own balance except when we screw it up by adding something in the mix that doesnt belong.
L.Leon in no way should you feel guilty or bad, if we dont do it no one else will because there's less and less airgun hunters/pesters every year. Your just doing the local song birds a big favor.
I deer hunted for 33 yrs killed a lot of them sometime 6-8 a year, kids were at home and we ate a lot of deer. No kids anymore and significant other doesnt care for deer anymore so I quit hunting them 2 yrs ago, if we were going to eat them Id still hunt them. I dont kill animals just to be killing if its not a valid reason then I dont do it.
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I was applauding his choice whatever his actions nothing else. I pest rats for MY reasons which we all have and I don't tell people what to do because they have their reasons.
 
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The squirrels haven't found my bird feeder filled with sunflower seeds. They are pretty nervous when they visit. But the deer sure have. I was wondering why the lid kept coming off until I saw a deer at the feeder early one morning. I work to not shoot any birds unless I am sure I know what they are. I am not very good at identication so I shoot very few birds. But as long as it's the right birds I see nothing wrong with it.
 
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Just to show that I still have the killer in me… Went to my permission, three hours, six birds. I could have scored thrice that in my backyard. But the ones at the permission were caught in the act of stealing… The schwack at impact never gets old… Shots from 25-33 yards, they simply crumple when hit by the CPHPs…
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L.Leon said:
Just to show that I still have the killer in me… Went to my permission, three hours, six birds. I could have scored thrice that in my backyard. But the ones at the permission were caught in the act of stealing… The schwack at impact never gets old… Shots from 25-33 yards, they simply crumple when hit by the CPHPs…
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So if only we could find a market for free range, grain fed sparrow, starling and pigeon, the sport would be complete.
 
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I feed the birds 50lbs of chicken scratch every month or so, 20 bucks, A few years ago I wiped out all the sparrows , I had noting to shoot but paper targets and a few cow birds,,, I kept the feed out and gave all the good birds a pass, After a year or so the sparrows started coming back, In one of my big brain farts I just started shooting the male sparrows , The more I shot the males the more came, LOTS of hens ,, I have shot a few males through the winter not a lot one or two a day,,, March is almost here so I am going to start the experiment all over again... Sure need to find a close feed lot ...
Mike
 
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