One of my U. S. Army field artillery buddies, during the
Korean War, was a rice farmer from Louisiana. One day when the
cannons were silent and we had a chance to rest our ears and
nerves, we got to talking about birds. I brought up the subject
that the state bird of Wisconsin was the robin, to which Jim
responded, "Heck, we eat robins back home. Every fall
thousands of them invade our rice fields and we use shotguns to
keep them away. One of our favorite meals at that time is robin
pie made fro m the dark breast meat of the birds."
Fortunately my friend didn’t elaborate on the subject, but
what he had told me could never be forgotten. After all, it was
the school children of Wisconsin who, many years ago, chose the
American robin as our state bird.
The reason I’ve had robins on my mind for the past few days is
that someone at one of the Wisconsin Conservation Congress
"dove hunting" meetings elsewhere in the state
commented, something to the effect, that if robins are about
three times more abundant than mourning doves, why not allow
robins to be shot too?
Obviously the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service would never allow
this to happen. Bear in mind that this government organization
has put the OK on hunting doves in Wisconsin quite a few years
ago, but it has never been approved by the proper state agencies
and officials.
Charlotte and I were among the minority, statewide, last
Monday who voted to not allow dove hunting in Wisconsin. Most of
the 120 in the over-crowded room, and some out in the hall, who
voted against dove hunting left immediately after the issue was
voted upon. We also agreed, along with everyone else at the
hearing, that there be no testimony from either side of the issue
in order to shorten the hearing.
As I read in the newspaper a few days later, one of the
delegates of the Conservation Congress said, "The people who
walked out weren’t interested in the biology of the bird as much
as they were their own personal feelings about shooting a
mourning dove, and I respect that."
Had testimony been heard from all of the 120 people opposed to
the hunt I am positive that many of our comments would have
reflected a very deep interest in the biology of the doves. I
have been brought to believe that one of the reasons being given
for having a dove hunting season is that there is a high
mortality among mourning doves, so why not shoot them rather than
simply have them die. We might as well make use of these birds.
I handled and studied many songbirds, including a few mourning
doves, during the 27 years I did bird banding on a voluntary
basis for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. One of the papers
presented to us banders at a national convention one year by
Chandler Robbins of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service had to do
with fluctuations of songbird populations from one year to the
next.
He told us that it was possible for there to be a 50%
mortality rate among some species of songbirds one year and for
that population to nearly return to their former natural
population level by the end of the following year. With this
point in mind I return to the American robin that has roughly the
same size breast muscles as the mourning dove. I’m sure you see
the point I’m driving at. Why let all those robins, that are
going to die anyway, go to waste.
I still contend that there is no more sense in having a dove
hunt than there would be to have a robin hunt. My hunch is that
there are far more people in Wisconsin, children included, who
would oppose hunting doves than who would vote to allow shooting
them. Yes, children should be included. After all, they were
respected enough to have chosen our state bird!
Our good friend, Bill Volkert, who works for the DNR as a
naturalist at Horicon Marsh, said that the proposed mourning dove
hunt is a very contentious issue – a verbal struggle, dispute, a
quarrelsome controversy. Based upon all I have heard and read,
including around 75+ e-mail messages, there is bound to be
extreme difficulty in dealing with a sensitive, highly polarized,
ecological problem in the public arena. In order to prevent the
gap from widening between hunters and non-hunters there will have
to be developed agendas that meet the needs of both hunters and
non-hunters.
Everyone realizes that the recreational business is one of
Wisconsin’s largest industries. Is the proposal to allow dove
hunting in the state being pushed by the DNR to provide yet
another species of animal to be hunted, to continue beefing up
the state’s recreational offerings, to kill a bird that presents
no environmental problems whatsoever, and realistically neither
has to be shot nor managed?
Wisconsin has been known as a progressive state of high
standing. Let’s keep it that way!
Mourning dove.
Also see:
This column appeared in the Door County Advocate on 04/21/2000.
© Copyright 2000 Roy Lukes. All rights reserved.
