Porcine Press – Texas One Step Closer To Allowing Sport Hunting From Helicopters

Home > Porcine Press – Texas One Step Closer To Allowing Sport Hunting From Helicopters

According to this piece from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, it looks like Texas is on the verge of making it legal for landowners to sell “helicopter hunts” for hogs and coyotes.

Some folks may remember a little while back, when Texas made it legal for landowners or their agents to use helicopters to depredate hogs on their own land. However, if this new ruling is passed, it will allow them to sell the hunts for a profit (or at least to cover the expenses).

While I completely supported the original law with the understanding that aerial shooting was about pest control and not “sport” hunting, I’m mildly ambivalent about this new development.

On the one hand, it sounds like a pretty exciting outing. I mean, what kid never dreamed about leaning out of the door of a flying helicopter and shooting things? OK, maybe every kid didn’t daydream about being a door gunner, but still… it’s kind of a cool thought, especially since no one is on the ground shooting back.

I can also see some of the arguments in favor of the rule, which include the fact that the wild hog population is out of control in Texas and growing fast. Traditional hunting methods offer limited success when it comes to depredation goals, and aerial shooting will increase the number of hogs killed. According to the Texas Dept. of Agriculture, over 3/4 of the state’s terrain is suitable for aerial gunning, and they agree that it is an effective, low-cost method of control. Not only that, but the fees that hunters pay will help to offset the cost of operating a helicopter… costs which, otherwise, may be too high for the landowner to handle the shooting himself. It will probably be a lot more cost effective than hiring professionals to do the same work.

At the same time, while I struggle not to be rash about moral judgements, this whole things flies in the face of every ideal of sport hunting.

First of all, the whole thing boils down to using live animals for target practice… plinking at pigs. No matter how else you try to couch it, the fact is that guys are going to be paying for the opportunity to buzz around in a helicopter and try to shoot every pig they see. While I’m not opposed to varmint shooting in general, the majority of varmint hunts involve shooting highly accurate firearms from stable, terrestrial positions. Most varmints thus hunted are smaller-bodied and significantly easier to kill than a wild hog.

While I realize that a lot of this kind of shooting is done with shotguns and buckshot at unexpectedly close range, the odds of consistently clean kills are stacked against the shooter. It’s tough shooting for the experts. I don’t mean to be, well, mean, but from what I’ve seen of the average sport hunter’s marksmanship, when you put those guys in a wobbly, surging and swaying, airborne shooting platform there are going to be a lot of wounded pigs running around the Texas countryside.

To a lot of Texans, especially those whose property has been destroyed by feral hogs, that’s fine. Pigs, to them, are lower than rats… just big, fur-covered cockroaches. A clean kill is not really a requisite part of the equation, in their minds. Just shoot them. If they die on the spot, great. If they wander off and die slowly, who cares… as long as they die.

Me, I have a hard time taking that perspective. I know I can’t necessarily claim the moral high ground here. I have resorted to poisons and traps to kill mice, rats, and insects… and those methods are often slow, excruciating killers. Is it really any different with the wild hogs? Logically, I think not… but I don’t always operate from a logical base. On an emotional level, it just seems wrong.

Again, though, it’s not the depredation aspect I have an issue with. It’s the idea that people are going to go down there and pay someone to take them up in a helicopter to do this… for fun. They’re going to do it for the thrill of it. If that idea makes me a little uncomfortable, I can only imagine the uproar it’s going to cause in the anti-hunting community. (And ya’ll know I don’t go in much for trying to appease the anti-hunters, but something like this is going to be tough to overcome. In the eyes of someone who knows nothing about us, one hunter is no different than the next. If one will go shoot from a helicopter, then any of us would do the same.)

All in all, I have a pretty hard time getting behind this one. At the same time, I’m not really ready to take a firm stand against it either.

What do you folks think?

Reply

Arthur

Posted April 6, 2011 at 2:40 PM

I can totally relate to the farmers, and see why this would be a welcomed addition to the means by which pigs can be controlled. But, like you, Phillip, I’m a little leary as to how this is going to be viewed by the public – not even necessarily the anti-hunters, but the non-hunters specifically.

And, same as you, if I’m a little uncomfortable with it, how would a non-hunter feel.

Hmmmm….something to ponder and discuss today, I guess.
Reply

NorCal Cazadora

Posted April 6, 2011 at 4:35 PM

I think this is fraught with public relations risk.

What’s the first thing out of the mouth of everyone who hates Sarah Palin? “She shoots wolves from helicopters.”

Combine that with the inevitable increase in wounding and you’ve got a whole new pack of poster children for the antis.

Oh wait, pigs aren’t cute. Maybe not. I don’t think I’ve ever seen them defend pigs! Regardless, I see potential for more harm than good. Coming from the state whose hunting agency was quick to stamp out incipient Internet hunting, that seems weird.

Is there any data driving this? Studies that suggest definitively that aerial hunting is an effective way to deal with a rapidly spreading invasive species?

What about noise – how popular will it be to have a bunch of helicopters hovering overhead?
Reply

J.R.

Posted April 6, 2011 at 5:37 PM

Seems like a timebomb ready to go off. There is a lot of risk involved in many parts of this. Noise, guns, defying gravity, shooting guns in a noisy environment while defying gravity.

That said on the surface it seems like there could be potential benefits. Landowners can can get a huge swing in costs by having someone pay to deal with it. Helicopter pilots can have a successful side business outsite what I would guess would be tours or possibly pesticide spraying. Hunters could potentially travely from far and wide to participate injecting modest amounts of money into local communities.

I won’t be participating. But, there is a small image in the back of my head with me hanging out the side of a helicopter, shooting pigs while listening to Fourtunate Son by CCR.
Reply

Mark

Posted April 7, 2011 at 5:01 AM

This is just another greedy lobby getting a special law passed in their favor. Helicopters failed in Hawaii to destroy the pig populations. The only thing that is working are special porcine low fences and trained hunting dogs.

Actually the best pig killer is a breed of dog called the Dogo Argentino. The Dogo was bred to hunt large boar on the pampas of Argentina, and they are a special breed that is fearless, with no pain threshold, massive jaws, excellent tracking ability, and the instinct to track and lock onto boar pig until they kill it, or their master intervenes or the boar kills the Dogo.

A Dogo with a radio collar will track down any wild pig within a days running distance and lock onto them for destruction. There are videos on YouTube of professional pest control using Dogos and catching 3-4 boars within hours and taking them down without killing the boar/pig or injuring the dogs.
Reply

mike

Posted April 7, 2011 at 6:07 AM

i live in Texas. and pigs get shot from helicopters all the time (legal and illegal). for the most part no one cares. 3 of the areas where i do my hog trapping, hunting, and guiding get hunted by helicopter (legally) at least once or twice a year. usually right before corn gets planted. these areas are 10min outside of austin (the most liberal place in Texas). i’ve never heard any complaints. in Texas you can kill pigs all day long, as many as you like, any method is legal. you could strangle a hog with baling wire and it would be a legal method of take. you can leave the pigs dead in the field legally. and you don’t need a license as long as its for depredation (resident or non-resident). Philip makes a good point with “on an emotional level, it just seems wrong”. if a person feels this way about something, they themselves should not engage in such activities. NorCal makes some good points as well. but that last line is a bit misinformed. there is so much big ranch land out here in Texas that hovering helicopters and noise would not be an issue. there just arent any subdivisions, strip malls, costcos, or chili and cheeze dog carts out where the hog hunts take place. Texas is 92-94 percent private land. for me personally, i’m afraid of flying. so i would not be comfortable doing this. in regards to non hunters and anti-hunters? they both need to be informed that shooting pigs from a chopper is not hunting. its shooting. shooting birds off my bird feeder does not make me a bird hunter. with that said, i don’t really see shooting deer off a feeder as true hunting. but thats how it is done here in Texas. to each his own.
Reply

Phillip Loughlin

Posted April 7, 2011 at 7:44 AM

Thanks for the input, Mike.

I know there’s been a lot of aerial shooting going on already, as you mention… some legal and some not. The rule, if it passes (and it probably will), probably isn’t going to lead to a whole new cottage industry. I’m pretty sure we’re not going to see the Texas skies busy with choppers.

I also agree that, because of my feelings about it, I won’t be participating. But I don’t think I’m gonna worry too much if other people do it.

Holly, the Texas Dept. of Agriculture is strongly in support of the aerial shooting program, as it works very well in the flat, open terrain that makes up most of the state. Mark may be right that it didn’t work well in Hawaii, but consider the difference in terrain.

And Mark. Dogs are already heavily used in Texas, and they are very effective in relatively small areas.

When it comes to Texas, Mike’s point about the amount of private property is completely valid. It’s not like any other place I’ve ever been, with huge ranches and tons of open space… but almost every inch of it is privately owned and managed. Private property rights have a very literal meaning in Texas, and the folks there take it seriously. Ranchers see the hogs as a threat to their property and their livelihoods. It creates a mindset that tempers their attitudes toward the hogs, and (to them) justifies extreme actions.

I’ve heard people in CA and SC curse the hogs, but I’ve never seen such a widespread and deeply embedded hatred of an animal as I find in Texas. Not saying it’s right or wrong, just that it is.
Reply

jamie

Posted October 12, 2011 at 9:55 PM

At that point its kindof hard to even call it “sport hunting”
Reply

Phillip Loughlin

Posted October 13, 2011 at 8:27 AM

Jamie, you’re exactly right IF your definition of Sport Hunting revolves around the widely held, Fair Chase ideal. Personally, I see little of the “hunt” in the affair. It’s more of a shoot, like a rat shoot at the local dump.

But still, if someone is excited by the idea and wants to participate, the opportunity is now available. I still think it’s a win-win, because the shooters and adrenaline junkies get their opportunity, the depredation guys get a little help paying for their expenses (and a little profit if all goes well), and the ranchers get rid of lots of pigs.

Sure, there’s still the PR aspects of this, but the more I think about it, the less critical I think this is going to be. I guess we’ll find out, now that the law has been in effect for a couple of months.

Porcine Press – Texas One Step Closer To Allowing Sport Hunting From Helicopters

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