[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 23 (Wednesday, March 6, 2002)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E275-E276]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           HUNTING MADE EASY

                                 ______
                                 

                             HON. SAM FARR

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, March 5, 2002

  Mr. FARR of California. Mr. Speaker, I encourage you to read the Time 
Magazine article entitled ``Hunting Made Easy'' which describes the 
``slaughter'' of ``captive animals to mount their heads on a wall.''
  It is a very disturbing article which also raises the question, 
``Should Congress step in?'' The answer is a resounding yes. You can 
step in by cosponsoring H.R. 3464, the ``Captive Exotic Animal 
Protection Act of 2001'', a bill to combat the unfair and inhumane 
practice of ``canned hunting.'' Even hunters are objecting to this 
gruesome practice.

                           Hunting Made Easy

                          (By Jeffrey Kluger)

       The exotic Corsican ram trotting about the 100-yard-long 
     pen in central Pennsylvania paid little mind to the men 
     approaching across the field. People were always walking in 
     and out of the pen, as often as not with food for the flock. 
     So the ram didn't resist when the men drove all the animals 
     toward one end of the enclosure. It was only when the first 
     arrow--fired from just yards away--struck it in the haunch 
     that it realized something was up. The ram hobbled off and 
     was struck by a second arrow, then a third. It stood for a 
     moment staring beyond the fence line and then settled onto 
     its haunches, bleeding. A gunshot to the abdomen finished it 
     off--preserving its head as a trophy.

[[Page E276]]

       It has never been easy being an animal at the business end 
     of a hunt, but these days it's hard being the hunter too. 
     Dwindling ranges and herds make the ancient business of 
     stalking prey an increasingly difficult proposition. The 
     answer for many Americans is to shift their shooting grounds 
     from the wild to one of the country's growing number of 
     hunting preserves.
       By almost any measure, hunting preserves are enjoying a 
     boom. Up to 2,000 may exist in the U.S., with 500 in Texas 
     alone. Many advertise on the Internet and in hunting 
     magazines, and all offer the same thing: the chance to bag a 
     trophy, with none of the uncertainty of hunting in the wild. 
     ``No kill, no pay'' is the promise many make.
       Of course, making good on that guarantee requires bending 
     the prey-and-predator rules. Animals at some preserves are so 
     accustomed to humans that they wander into range at the sound 
     of a rattling feed bucket. Elsewhere they're confined to 
     small patches of woods where they can't elude hunters for 
     long. At others they may never even make it out of their 
     cages before being shot.
       Most troubling, it's not just prolific-as-rabbits deer and 
     other common prey that are being killed in such canned hunts, 
     as they're sometimes called; it's rarer creatures too. All 
     manner of exotics--including the Arabian oryx, the Nubian 
     ibex, yaks, impalas and even the odd rhino, zebra or tiger--
     are being conscripted into the canned-hunt game and offered 
     to sportsmen for ``trophy fees'' of up to $20,000.
       Not surprisingly, these hunts have their critics. A handful 
     of states ban or restrict the practice, and a pair of bills 
     are pending in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives 
     to prohibit the interstate sale of exotic animals for hunts. 
     Supporters of the hunts object, arguing that exotics are bred 
     in sufficient numbers to support the industry and that many 
     surplus zoo animals could not survive in the wild anyway. 
     Even to some outdoorsmen, however, canned hunts are beginning 
     to look like no hunt at all. ``I started hunting when I was 7 
     and didn't kill my first deer until I was 16,'' says Perry 
     Arnold, 52, of Lake City, Fla. ``What they got going on now, 
     that ain't hunting. That's a slaughter.''
       A slaughter is precisely the way canned-hunt foes frame the 
     practice, and the killing of the Corsican ram is not the only 
     horror they point to. The Humane Society of the United States 
     tells stories of its own: the declawed black leopard that was 
     released from a crate, chased by dogs and shot as it hid 
     under a truck; the domesticated tiger that lounged under a 
     tree and watched a hunter approach, only to be shot as it 
     sat. ``Canned hunts are an embarrassment,'' says California 
     Representative Sam Farr, sponsor of the House bill.
       What makes the problem hard to police is the sheer number 
     of exotic animals for sale. There are about 2,500 licensed 
     animal exhibitors in the U.S., and only 200 of them belong to 
     the American Zoo and Aquarium Association, which condemns the 
     sale of exotics to hunting ranches. Even unaffiliated zoos 
     might be reluctant to wade into the canned-hunt market, but 
     many do so unknowingly, selling overflow animals--often 
     products of too successful captive-breeding programs--to 
     middlemen, who pass them into less legitimate hands. The 
     crowding that can result on the ranches leads to animals' 
     being killed not just by hunters but also by diseases that 
     occur in dense populations.
       If zoos have trouble keeping track of exotic animals, 
     Washington doesn't even try. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife 
     Service can intervene only if animals are federally protected 
     or if the hunt violates a state law and interstate commerce 
     is involved. Since many cases don't meet those criteria, the 
     animals are essentially orphaned by the feds.
       Still, not all hunts on preserves provoke an outcry. Many 
     ranch owners keep exotic animals out of their collections or 
     conduct hunts on grounds that give prey a sporting chance. 
     The Selah Ranch in Austin, Texas, is a 5,500-acre spread 
     covered by Spanish dagger and prickly pear, often with no 
     sign of the elusive animals that live there. ``There are a 
     lot of exotic animals on this place that die of old age,'' 
     says Mike Gardner, owner of San Miguel Hunting Ranches, which 
     runs Selah.
       Here too, however, the odds can be stacked in the hunters' 
     favor. Deer are often lured to feeding stations, where they 
     are serenely unaware of the men in the stilt-mounted tin 
     shack 75 yards away. Such lying in wait--or ``shooting over 
     bait''--is legal in Texas and defended by hunters. ``It 
     promotes a clean kill,'' says Gardner. Other sportsmen are 
     troubled by the practice. Stan Rauch of the Montana 
     Bowhunters Association believes that fed animals are tame 
     animals and should thus be off limits. ``Animals become 
     habituated to people when they depend on us for food,'' he 
     says.
       Even preserves with no baited killings and lots of room to 
     roam may be less of a square deal than they seem. ``If a 
     ranch advertises itself as having 3,500 acres, you need to 
     know if that space is open or broken down into pens and 
     whether there's protective cover or the ground is clear,'' 
     says Richard Farinato, director of the Humane Society's 
     captive-wildlife protection program.
       Concerns such as these are promoting governments to act. 
     More states are being pressed to ban or restrict hunting in 
     enclosures. The House bill, which parallels one introduced in 
     the Senate by Delaware's Joseph Biden, would not drop the 
     hammer on the hunts but would give Washington a way to 
     control the animal traffic.
       But the new laws could come at a price. In Texas alone, the 
     hunt industry brings in $1 billion a year; a crackdown could 
     hurt both good ranches and bad. ``Cattle prices have stayed 
     the same for 40 years,'' says Gardner. ``To hold on to 
     acreage, you've got to have other sources of income.'' Safari 
     Club International is worried that since hunting areas are so 
     different, it may be impossible to pass a law that covers 
     them all. ``There's no standard to say what is and what isn't 
     fair,'' says club spokesman Jim Brown. ``You know it when you 
     see it.''
       But there may be a deeper standard than that. If the 
     hunting impulse is as old as humanity, so is the sense of 
     what it truly means to chase and bag an animal. Nature may 
     have intended humans to hunt, but whether it meant to toss 
     ranches, pens and feeding stations into the mix is a question 
     hunters must ask themselves.

     

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