While I don't feel the need to go out and kill something, at least not animals, I don''t mind that there are people out there that do, and here's why -- With the increase in US population, areas have consequently become more and more developed. People have moved out of the cities and into the suburbs, and now the exurban areas, areas which are neither fully suburban nor fully rural. In short, development is pervasive - it extends far beyond cities these days and mixed in with rural areas. Nowhere is this more true than along the east coast. At least on the west coast you have densely populated areas and areas further inland are sparsely populated. LA, San Diego are densely populated but outside of these areas it is relatively undeveloped. You can thank the ocean and mountains for that. However, on the east coast there are no geographic features that tend to corral people into an area, so it's less dense but development is a lot more spread out over a much larger area. So what's happening is a lot of habitat is being encroached upon, displaced, or isolated in small pockets of woods between developed areas. With deer, I've seen small herds living right in cities, such as Frick Park in Pittsburgh, PA and in Austin, TX. However, in exurban areas that have been part of the recent housing boom of the last few years, such as New Jersey, the deer are all over the place, and frequently meeting their demise in encounters with giant SUVs and other vehicles. The issue is one of needless suffering. Hunters should be allowed to reduce their populations by relaxing some of the rules such as number, age, and gender requirements.

However, that is merely taking care of the symptom of the problem. The real cause is overdevelopment. Which goes back to why I like hunters. It's because they appreciate the outdoors and understand what a valuable resource it is. Or hikers, cross country skiers or anybody else that takes advantage of the benefits of being outdoors. They understand the need for managing and taking care of our natural resources, and that having more of it is better than less. Also, they understand the benefit of large areas of contiguous land rather than small piecemeal chunks - or what I like to refer to as isolated tree museums.

Unfortunately, it is private land ownership that creates this piecemeal haphazard development and isolated forests. A single wealthy landowner may actually increase our chances of saving the forests. It is easier to negotiate with a single owner than with hundreds of landowners, some of whom end up selling out to the highest bidder which tends to be a developer. I find it surprising that more billionaires don''t donate or sell land to create parks. Cities don't care - they'll bulldoze anything for more tax revenues. Parks? How about a casino? It remains only an act of Congress that has the power to create places where humans can go and experience what the country was like before we had nearly 300 million people living here.

And here's another related thought that people tend to overlook: trees produce oxygen. It just doesn't come out of the ground. Keep cutting down forests, and you literally cut off your oxygen supply. More and more people, less and less trees - you'll get the picture. At the same time we are adding more and more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. It just doesn't go away. After all, trees and plants releasing oxygen into the atmosphere is the main mechanism we have a 21% partial pressure of O2 in the first place. At one time the earth only had trace amounts of oxygen. My biggest concern is the slaughter of the rain forests in South America. More than 10,000 square miles of forest is chopped down or burned annually so that people there can raise cattle and plant crops and earn a living. This is because the world-wide demand for beef is soaring, as with oil, and is mainly being driven by China (and indirectly by America because we are addicted to cheap Chinese made junk that we don't even really need) now that they are becoming a major superpower and its citizens with their newfound wealth can now afford beef. Cutting down the rainforest will have enormous long term consequences. The question is, can we solve every problem with technology? So far this has been true. But I don't really want to find out.