Vermont Regulations

Market Hunting Era – 1858 to 1896

Exploitation of Wildlife

Visionary People Put a Stop to Market Hunting

Class Conflict

Landowner vs. Non-landownerState resident vs. Non-residentRural vs. UrbanNorth vs. South

The Gentleman Hunter

Uncontrolled Exploitation

Unregulated Hunt Techniques

Sink Box

Other Techniques

• Deer Hounding

• Netting

• Mating Season

• Night Hunting

• Passenger Pigeon

• Railroad Hunts

Where?

• Cape Cod• Great South Bay, NY• Currituck Sound, NC• Chesapeake Bay, MD• Marsh Island, LA• Sunk Lands, AR• Klamath Lake Region, CA• Anywhere in the Upper Midwest

National Wildlife Refuge System

What Markets?

Other Markets

• Millinery Trade

• Pot Hunters

• Fur Market - but only a minor market

1858 - 1896

• What Started It?– Railroad Land Grants– Augustus Swift– Swift Meats

• What Stopped It?– Geer vs. Connecticut– Lacey Act

Visionariesor

Elitists?

Theodore Roosevelt

“…the hardier and manlier the sport is the more attractive it is, and…there is [no] place in the ranks of true sportsmen either for the game-butcher, on the one hand, or, on the other,for the man who wishes to do all his shooting in preserves,and to shirk rough hard work.

George Bird Grinell: Editor of Forest and Stream

1874 - “The known fact that all the best measures for the protection of game…must always emanate from those who shoot and fish for their pleasure.”

1881 - “Game legislation is too much in the hands of know-nothings, and know-nothings are…a class of man who are concerned not to preserve the game, but to squeeze the almighty dollar out of it as it goes.”

1894 - “Game laws can benefit the community only as, and insuch degree as they are in the interest of the sportsman.”

William T. Hornaday - Director of Smithsonian

1913 - “Italians are pouring into American in a steady stream…Toward wildlife the Italian laborer is a human mongoose.Give him power to act, and he will quickly exterminate everywild thing that wears feathers or hair. To our songbirds he isliterally a ‘pestilence that walketh at noonday’.”

“[The] army of black hunters and their dogs cross field afterfield, combing the country with fine teeth that leave neitherwild animal nor bird behind.”

Objections

• Ballistics• Big Guns• Swivel Guns• Punt guns

• Efficiency• Snares• Traps• Fire Hunting• Crusting

• Unfair Advantage• Boats• Night Hunting• Water Hunting• Deer Hounding!

Rules of the Game/Rules of Fair Chase

• Ensuring an Uncertain Outcome

• Limited Hunt Seasons

• Limiting Technological Advantage

The Gentleman Hunter

“A grouse which gives a man a holiday afield is worth more to the community than a grouse snared or shot for the market stalls.”

Pinnacle of “Manhood” Rugged Independent Wise in the ways of nature Restrained/Refined

Legacy

• Stopped waterfowl exploitation

• Set us on the route to contemporary wildlife management

But…

• Urban interest won out over rural interests?

• Dispossessed rural and ethnic peoples?