James Schmidt II
Dragoon, Ariz.
In Vermont, wildlife is managed and supported by the sportsmen and women each year. In fact, all across America, wildlife management is paid for by the hunters, trappers, and fisherman directly.
Actually wildlife depend on those sportsmen to survive every day; to be free every day. Bird watchers, hikers, kayakers, campers, and similar pay little to nothing to directly support wildlife in Vermont.
Like all citizens of Vermont, they have a right to enjoy the outdoors and can chose to support wildlife by purchasing a hunting license and never hunting or a fishing license and never fishing either — few if any ever do. Ask an animal activists if they have a hunting or fishing license next time you meet one.
If the Vermont wildlife population including deer, bear, quail, trout, hawks, bass, owls, coyotes, foxes, and more depended on support from the non-hunters, trappers, or fisherman they would be in great trouble today!
There would be no professional and trained caring management. There would not be a monitoring system, habitat protection, restocking and replenishing programs, and enforcement of laws on illegal killing of wild animals …basically nothing. There would be no support money.
Vermont senators hold in their hands the fate of wildlife in Vermont right now. The coyote is an aggressor that is necessary in the ecology of wildlife. But like any aggressive and destructive creature, whether it be termites, cockroaches, rabbits in a garden, birds in a dairy, or coyotes killing deer, they must be monitored and controlled at all times by someone one … humans.
America has selected the federal government and each state government to do the wildlife management, right or wrong. Each state has selected a wildlife department to then hire professional managers, researchers, and biologists to oversee the welfare of wildlife, right or wrong.
So those 30 publicly elected senators in Vermont now hold the fate of wildlife management in their very hands. The decision about coyote hunting events is a critical one, perhaps far more than they know or have considered.
We can only hope that the senators will see the huge flaw in all this, the truth in all this, and say “no” to animal activists looking for a big win and a way to raise more money to take their cause to other states. Vermonters only want to enjoy hunting, trapping, and fishing as they always have.
James Schmidt II
Dragoon, Ariz.
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