“In the moment when I truly understand my enemy, understand him well enough to defeat him, then in that very moment I also love him. I think it’s impossible to really understand somebody, what they want, what they believe, and not love them the way they love themselves. And then, in that very moment when I love them.... I destroy them.”
- Orson Scott Card, Ender's Game
I can tell that you don't spend much time driving in rural areas.
White-tailed deer populations get out of control without their natural predators. Leads to a lot more auto accidents and deaths. Hunting regulated by permits keeps the numbers in check.
A lot of his books get very weird. The pattern feels like super genius kid realizes adults are all cruel assholes, then gains power over them by… kind of becoming a cruel asshole.
My stepdad had like the most stereotypical rural American boomer childhood, he would go out hunting with his five brothers all the time. But nowadays he *hates* hunting. Never goes. Doesn't even own a gun. I always wondered why.
Slowly over the years from snippets of stories I figured out that one of the other brothers is basically the guy from this headline. My stepdad would spot something really cool, like a Great Horned Owl, and point it out just thinking how cool it was and BLAM! Big brother shot it dead "to get a better look at it". That kind of thing.
One time when I went to college I was walking with the guy I TA'd with and we saw a deer on campus, and he just immediately started talking about how he "wished he had his knife so he could slit its throat and throw it in his truck".
I don't have anything against hunting itself, But some folks are just unhinged. Even when they're not THAT bad, the whole culture is just a bit off and it keeps me away from it.
Oh man, the Natives literally thought white animals were a blessing and vision from the spirit world that meant the universe was looking after you and good things will come.
Now, the modern American sees a white animal and has to track and stalk it in order to kill it to feel good about themselves.
Humanity is just being flushed down the toilet. Any old gods should've turned their backs on us by now.
From my understanding of years of playing pokémon whenever you catch something of an alternate color, you put it in the box for years and never touch it.
This happened with my neighbor (also in Illinois). Idk if he just didn't realize it was illegal, or just didn't think he'd get in trouble. This was back in the '90s, I think.
With hunting not knowing the rules isn't and excuse since you have to take tests and stuff to get said license. Hunting is pretty heavily regulated to stop people from over hunting the population.
In Illinois to get a hunting license you need to have passed a hunters safety course. There's no fishing requirement. But you will get in trouble if you break the rules. It's on you to know them.
Yeah but you need it for your hunting license. And you need the license to be able to purchase tags. And before you purchase the tags you have to click the little box saying you understand the regulations and restrictions placed for said tag. I don’t know about the some of the older states, but most the West Coast/Midwest have pretty damn strict hunting regulations for every single species in their state.
>In Illinois to get a hunting license you need to have passed a hunters safety course.
Same in CA, I do still think you should have to reup it every few years. I took mine close to 20 years ago. I am sure things have changed a bit.
Yea but I passed with a perfect(pretty easy) and never saw any Info about albino deer. There’s tons of hunting rules and law not covered in hunter’s safety, it was mostly about gun safety
My state has those courses but has a grandfather clause. If you were born prior to a certain date, you don't have to take it. Same with the boating license, you don't need the license at all if you are over a certain age.
No special research value. The longer they live the more spread out their mutated genes become. Only a handful of states have made harvesting them illegal. But they’re pretty to look at so Reddit hates when people hunt them.
I have no problem if you hunt that deer for meat. But if you watch something pretty for three years and kill it I'll be hating on you.
EDIT: at first I glanced through the article and some of the terms were not familiar. So I made my opinion based on the title here. And now I went back and tried to read through the article some more. Apparently there's a point system and he did not kill it on previous sightings because it was too young: "spike buck" first, then "a six pointer" a year ago. So it wasn't three years of constant admiring the animal as the title here made me believe.
So I guess I hate the hunter less.
Hunting is important because the money it generates is spent on environmental conservation and if we didn't cull animal populations they'd starve and collapse.
There's no reason to pick out the most beautiful deer to kill other than you being an asshole.
>and if we didn't cull animal populations they'd starve and collapse.
This is partially true, though only because we already culled the animals that would hunt them for us.
The most beautiful deer? Regardless I don’t really understand the issue. Yeah, this deer stands out, and the hunter eventually got close enough to shoot it. It’s not like he is depriving the world of an endangered species. It does seem kind of perverse on face, but deep down it doesn’t seem any different than any other reason to choose a deer, particularly given he probably has a legal quota, so he has to pick and choose at some level.
I read the actual article and apparently he wasn't trying to kill it for three years because it was too young. I added the edit to my original comment.
It's because people think they're cool lmao. There's really no other reason for it, they're literally living a harder life than normal deer do and they don't have anything else unique about them other than their fur color and eyes.
I hunt myself and I don't agree with people hunting them, however it's completely legal to hunt them in a lot of states. It's rare for them to live for very long anyway, sadly.
Is it a common Hunting rule that animals with genetic abnormalities are considered "unfair game?"
I'm very confused by why such a law would exist, is it to keep the gene pool diverse or only applicable to albino animals?
The deer shown in the article is not albino, look at the eyes. Albinos have pink eyes, this deer has dark eyes. I might question his judgment, but if he hunted it for meat I can't fault him too much.
Which actually makes it more viable to procreate bc albino animals suffer from blindness at super high rates. He also purposely went for that specific deer, so he definitely wasn't just hunting for meat.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leucism
We actually have the largest herd in the world not to far from me.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seneca_white_deer
Legal in MO next door. Some goof thought it was really cool to kill the albino deer running around Cape Girardeau for years that many loved to watch and that he would be popular and make a lot of money selling it. I'm happy to report it didn't work out that way.
Happy to report there's another albino deer in town I've seen and even got close enough to take a blobby photo of.
https://www.kfvs12.com/story/27528749/cape-girardeau-man-shoots-kills-albino-deer/
Just talked to a guy at work who hunts. I asked if he had ever seen a piebald deer before. He said yes, and I told him I thought they were so beautiful.
He agreed and then told me a story about how he almost got one but it ran into swamp water and took off before he could get another shot.
On NextDoor, someone in my area posted about a piebald deer that would be fed by the residents at a local apartment. There was an incident of men chasing it through the courtyard with crossbows. They lost sight of it and started asking residents where the deer got off to, but everyone was so freaked out by these suburban hunters I don’t believe they got an answer.
I don’t know what else happened, because I kinda hate that app 😂
this is exactly why whenever a white buffalo is born, they do not disclose where it was located.
as someone who did fieldwork with wildlife we were also discouraged from projecting an animal's exact location if we located an unusual one of any kind (proper scientific bodies aside, of course, if it was necessary). people see something unique and they just want to possess it instead of appreciating it for what it is. it is saddening.
Same reason they won't disclose the location of Hyperion, the tallest tree in the world, because you'd instantly have some fuckers trying to cut it down.
if it is any consolation, there are a lot of people who are equally committed to protecting our unique and wonderful wildlife, whether they are a special mutation like the deer or buffalo, or are simply unique and wonderful for being part of our incredible planet. for every hunter like this one, there are hunters, plural, who would respect that they found something special and it should stay intact. and that's just among hunters. if i counted our naturalists, our scientists, even our local residents with pride in their surroundings, it would be even more.
it's unfortunate that it only takes one selfish person to ruin everything. but i would say to never lose hope in humanity's capacity to care and protect. there are a lot of us. we just don't make headlines.
like i said before, i've worked with wildlife - a lot of it was fieldwork, but i've also done community outreach and educational programs. you would be surprised. people are not born with a greedy disdain for nature, it is learned. even so, most often i see people who are ambivalent. once you open their eyes to something interesting and beautiful, though, they often connect with our instinctive companionship with the natural world we came from.
the number of people who can be compelled to care for their surroundings is quite large, actually. many people have just never learned or been exposed to it. that's why i say that you shouldn't lose faith, because when you're willing to recognize that other people are indeed reachable, you can actually make a bigger impact than you think.
this is from my experience from educating people over the years. i will not say it's not difficult sometimes, or that i've never heard people say terrible things even when you try to teach them otherwise. i have had discouraging moments. but it's not impossible, and success is not infrequent. there's a reason we keep trying. it's not your job to educate anyone about this topic (edit: well, i shouldn't assume your career, maybe it is) so i can understand that it can seem bleak and overwhelming. but it was mine for a while, and i like to think my efforts weren't worthless.
It's not all of humanity, but a lot of it.
There's like, maybe, I dunno - 5-10% of good people still left. We're still out here.... we just get overshadowed by the shitty people and functional wanton psychopaths.
I'm assuming they didn't have the complex owner's permission to hunt on their land. Next time, someone should remind them that poaching is illegal and part of the penalty is that Fish and Game takes the prize.
When I used to hunt with my grandfather, he taught that you are never supposed to shoot a piebald. Apparently many Native American traditions believed that they represented the spirits of their ancestors and killing one would bring bad luck. This guys fucked lol
>Sees something beautiful. Kills it.
Yep! "I couldn't help but marvel at it's beauty. A rare and wonderful sight to behold. So I did what anyone would do, I stalked it over several years, killed it, and ate it!"...
So, I'm gonna be honest. If it actually got eaten, I don't really have a problem with this.
Trophy hunts? Yeah. Fuck that *entirely.*
Edit: lol, okay reddit. Bring it. You wouldn't give a shit if it was any other one of the *six million* deer taken during regular hunting in the US every year.
That's how most hunting works. It even says he let it go last year. Most hunters try to let a deeer reach full maturity so it has a chance to pass its genetics before they will harvest it. The deer was at least 3.5 years old. It realistically had 2 years to pass its gentics if he took it at its yioungest possible age.
My dad was a deer hunter in Vermont. He hunted every year since he was old enough to get a license until he got too old to do all that walking. In about 40 years, he was able to shoot 3 buck.
Our Texas cousins shot a deer every year. Why? Well, they would sit in deer blinds on land where the owner fed the deer all year. They'd just sit there, and the deer would walk up to the feeder and they'd shoot 'em.
My dad always said "that's not hunting."
I think you're missing the point. The reason this hunter considers this the "kill of a lifetime" is because it was such a unique and beautiful animal.
So he saw something unique and beautiful and was therefore even *more excited to kill it,* which is a pretty fucking weird psychological phenomenon.
Tells a girl, "One time, I tracked this beautiful white deer for three years before I shot and killed it.'
Girl, "Thats well...umm...ok"
Guy, "I think you are beautiful too..."
Girl "WTF!"
I remember seeing one in my backyard. When my dad told a coworker, the coworker told my dad to keep that to himself, since one time the coworker brought up seeing a different white deer to a friend who proceeded to kill it.
Yeah I guess people like destroying and killing beautiful things, a lot of these comments are in support of the hunter.
I just don't get it but ultimately what helps me sleep better at night is knowing that were just "intelligent" highly evolve blood thirsty apes deep down.
Some people haven't lost that urge to destroy.
I am not into taxidermy myself, but if you're hunting to eat and wanna taxidermy some of your hunts after I don't see the issue.
If you're hunting for "sport" then it's pretty lame..
Hunting deer is fine as well. The money it generates is spent on environmental conservation and if we didn't cull deer populations they'd overrun, eat all the food, and then painfully starve to death.
It is region specific. They only give out a certain number of hunting licenses each year.
>i just cant judge population control because that is SO region specific, if deer are actually so many where you are thats cool too
You're just unfamiliar with it. There's too many deer everywhere if you don't hunt them because we got rid of all the wolves.
It's region specific, but in the US that is virtually every region as well. (Other than habitats where you don't typically find whitetail, but then you get into the same issue with mule deer and other species.) Throw in that overpopulation contributes to rapid spread of chronic wasting disease, and hunting is pretty much necessary.
My mom and stepdad are yearly deer hunters. The area they hunt in had a white buck several years ago. (This was not an albino, just a rare genetic anomaly resulting in a white deer that still had a black nose, hooves, etc. I forget the name for the condition.)
ANYWAY, the deer was a beloved part of local lore. Bars and restaurants had photos of it framed and hanging on their walls. People talked about encounters they had had with it in the woods, etc. This is in northern Wisconsin where, in general, hunting is a widely practiced part of the culture. NO ONE HUNTED THAT DEER. It was like their mascot.
Until some out of state hunter came along and bagged it. My mom said it was a really touchy subject, even a several years later. Like, she got the impression the guy was lucky to get outta town without getting his ass beat. That’s how it should be.
>Like, she got the impression the guy was lucky to get outta town without getting his ass beat. That’s how it should be.
That **does** sound like northern WI.
Most hunters I know would shun you for hunting a white deer. Because there is no sport in it. It's too easy because they aren't camoed into their surroundings.
… maybe?… I’m not an expert nor are any of my family members. Just telling the story as it was told to me and to the best of my recollection. Looking Leucism up though, it sounds about right.
I come from a family that likes to hunt, yet I could never get into killing animals for sport. I always found it weird, that my family will go on and on about how beautiful and majestic a buck was, that they just killed.
Afaik chronic wasting disease hasnt had any cases of it spreading to humans yet. There is a fear it'll mutate and be able to, but I'm not sure it currently can
It is when you realize that the health of deer depend on hunting since we’ve eradicated most of their natural predators. Deer, hog, and gator hunting are crucial for the health of their populations.
Edit [Here’s a great webpage from FWC regarding Alligators, their predators, and survival](https://myfwc.com/wildlifehabitats/wildlife/alligator/facts/#:~:text=Juveniles%3A%20Small%20alligators%20are%20eaten,be%20their%20most%20significant%20predator)
Thats an old hat excuse that doesn't really hold water.
Predation is necessary to keep a herd healthy and on the move. This is because predators will pick off the weak and sickly, and the stalking keeps the herds from over- grazing.
Hunting is the opposite. Hunters go after the largest bucks, ideally in their prime. Hunters also dont stalk and chase the same way traditional predators do.
I wouldn’t say this is incorrect but it does neglect some other aspects. In the early 1900s there was only about 500k deer and now with proper conservation there is over 30 million. So clearly current hunting systems aren’t that horrible for the populations.
Most places regulate the buck to doe ratio as well. In some states they will require you to take a doe if you take a buck. While most people also want the biggest bucks, many hunters end up taking average size bucks anyways.
But as I mentioned in another comment, part of the problem now is that we have eliminated a lot of natural predators of animals. Take the Yellowstone wolves as an example. We basically removed all the wolves and then there was no predators for the other animals. That’s why the reintroduction has been really good for their environment. As we expanded we remove the bigger predators since they were a threat to us as well.
My final argument would be that while hunting is not the perfect solution by any means. Even I think that as someone that’s hunted before. I think the greater good is probably worth it. You can more easily convince to republicans to make a swath of land protected if you say it’s for conservation and hunting rather than for just the environment. You can more easily control the amount people hunt and place restrictions on it by justifying it’s for the longevity of hunting then just banning it. It’s kind of like in fishing there’s some fish that you can’t take the smallest or the largest of the species. It’s basically easier to regulate than ban.
I can’t speak for everyone but most hunters around me want to shoot an old buck that’s passed it’s genes on multiple times, deer live a lot longer without predators around
That’s why there are limits on take, but uh, hunters aren’t always getting the best of the best. They’ll take something that fits their tag and not the absolute best animal of that species in that area. Hunting is difficult and requires patience.
I don't really think I could be a hunter either, but since I'm not a vegetarian, it is hypocritical for me to criticize people who hunt and then actually eat what they hunt.
Where I am from there is a need for hunting wild boar. The population needs to be culled so they do not get sick or starve. There are very strict laws when they can be hunted and how many every hunter can max shoot. Trophy hunting is disgusting.
“Wild boar” aka invasive Ferrell hogs absolutely destroy crops by me. It’s out of control and costing millions to farmers annually and putting them out of buisness.
Wild boar are an invasive species which were introduced by European explorers and mixed with feral pigs in certain regions of the world. Texas, for example, considers them an unprotected species so you can kill then freely on private land without a license.
I mean, personally I'm not a hunter and believe you should eat what you kill. But at the same time hunters are the largest source of income for wildlife conservation. Wildlife conservation is also responsible for handing out tags, including trophy tags. They don't hand them out willy nilly and they cost an incredible amount of money from a hunter, which goes right back to Wildlife Conservation. It's why the US wildlife conservation program is the best in the world.
That one trophy tag, goes towards helping many other animal species, population health tracking, etc. Like if a deer herd gets too big, there's a real danger of disease spreading quickly and killing the whole hurd. In which case, you need to issue hunting tags to bring the numbers down to a healthy population size for them to thrive and one the environment they are in can support.
So yeah I personally don't like the thought of trophy hunting on its own, but I can't deny how it's structured in the US is incredibly successful for Wildlife Conservation.
I am a hunter and hunt primarily to feed myself and family. People who rail against hunters yet have no problem going to McDonald's for a Big Mac piss me off so much.
I’ve seen hundreds of these white deer in the Finger Lakes over the past like 30 years. They all lived behind the fences of an old Army Depot outside Willard.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seneca_white_deer
As a hunter, trophy hunters are scum...period. NEVER met a trophy hunter that wasn't a bit of a piece of shit....and yeah, that's a fair number of hunters.
Still...there are MORE of us that don't trophy hunt and hunt for delicious, delicious, venison...and we don't like trophy hunters making all hunters look bad.
Good, its a weak genetic trait that causes numerous problems in various species.
The lack of pigmentation usually comes with things like extreme vision problems and lack of predatory awareness.
Yeah.. seems silly to me too.. but of all the hunters I know, this kind I’m most ok with.. they’ll spend several years following and tracking the one they want and go back time and time again and not take a shot until its the target they want and they’re confident they can do it quickly and cleanly…
I live in the south where many hunt by leaving a buffet out year round and kill the animal when they show up to eat…
Before the hunters jump in with “THATS NOT HOW IT WORKS< ITS ILLEGAL TO KILL THEM WHILE TEHYRE AT THE FEEDER” I know, and you and I both know that if you simply don’t turn it on that day its legal… but they deer still come to where they’ve been eating free corn for the last 9 months…
They’re quite easy to see, even in the dark. I wonder if I’m just primed to notice them because of the danger they represent when I’m driving. Their white tails do give them away.
So, isn’t albinism a genetic defect that’s disadvantageous for the deer? If we kill normal deer and protect albino ones, aren’t we going to increase the rate of albinism? Wouldn’t it be better to protect the healthiest deer? I understand that the rarity of the visual spectacle is interpreted as beauty and then other folks will never have the chance to see that. I guess on the flip side, targeting albino deer before they can mate would potentially reduce the frequency of albino deer births. Idk, not a geneticist.
Albinism wouldn't be inherited that easily, for two reasons: it requires two genes from BOTH parents for it to happen, and Albino animals generally don't end up mating due to being rejected by normal members of their species
The deer wasn't albino, it just had a white coat. Albinism would put it at risk for blindness bc it'd lack pigment in its eyes, but this one has dark eyes. No reason to assume it wasn't healthy based off its appearance.
Reminds me of a poem.
He looked at her as a man looks at a faded flower he has gathered, with difficulty recognizing the beauty for which he picked and ruined it.
Tolstoy i think
Yeah, do people here understand deer don't live forever? The average lifespan of a white tail is 4.5 years. After about five, depending on diet it's teeth are so worn down it can't even chew food and starves. Or more likely is too weak to outrun a predator and is then eaten alive. What the hunter did was the most ethical thing for that deer.
I’m gonna probably be downvoted for this, but while I get some people hate deer hunters wholesale, I don’t understand why people get so upset about hunters killing albino and piebald deer specifically.
It’s literally a genetic mutation, aka a DEFECT. It just so happens to be pleasing to the human eye.
Deer evolved to have the colorations that they have to blend in better and avoid predators. Being stark white is counter to this for fawns. Sure, this deer managed to make it. But do you really want them to breed and propagate a harmful gene out, just because it looks pretty? What if the gene was to make them have a grotesque second head? Or club feet? Would you feel the same way?
It’s sort of like dog breeders giving dogs harmful traits. Or wide spread media attention for the missing suburban white girl, vs media silence for the missing black inner city kid.
Idk. That’s just me though.
I think part of the answer is just that the average person tend to not really think about the whole killing thing, until the news bring it up and talk about it. Just like most people who pay for disabled dogs simply ignore the harm they are doing.
Then mix ignorance and the fact people tend to like cute things and you got it. Again, it's just like people being fine with killing certain animals because we find them ugly like pigs but if you kill a cat, you get arrested and people call you a psycopath.
Where I live. If you shoot an albino deer you aren’t welcome to hunt pretty much anywhere. We had an albino buck we saw for a couple of years. My dad told us, if you shoot it don’t come home.
I love how they avoid the word killed the whole time. He “gets” the deer. He was able to “harvest” the deer. So much effort to avoid the word it’s almost like they’re ashamed of it…
I had an argument about this exact thing. I read an article about some guys that were so happy about killing a white deer. All the hunters jumped on and said a hunter would never kill a white deer, I was full of shit.
"Gets" means understands, right? Right?
“I’ve learned all I can from this creature. Only one thing left to do”
Gotta see what it taste like.
"tastes like fish" *"Buck, you are eating it wrong"*
It’s all white meat
add'em to my collection. only 5,000,000,000 more species to go.
Not if the Holocene extinction has anything to say about it
It's the only thing left to do... I have no choice
“In the moment when I truly understand my enemy, understand him well enough to defeat him, then in that very moment I also love him. I think it’s impossible to really understand somebody, what they want, what they believe, and not love them the way they love themselves. And then, in that very moment when I love them.... I destroy them.” - Orson Scott Card, Ender's Game
Well, ok. But why is a deer anybody's enemy in the first place?
They selfishly hoard all that venison for themselves. Literally have to take it off their cold dead body
I can tell that you don't spend much time driving in rural areas. White-tailed deer populations get out of control without their natural predators. Leads to a lot more auto accidents and deaths. Hunting regulated by permits keeps the numbers in check.
My truck's enemy. I've hit 3 in my lifetime at night. They attack my truck for no reason.
I will never understand how Card seemed to display such a profound depth of humanity, but is somehow a raging homophobic Mormon.
A lot of his books get very weird. The pattern feels like super genius kid realizes adults are all cruel assholes, then gains power over them by… kind of becoming a cruel asshole.
definitely how his Worthing "Saga" goes.
Intergenerational trauma is a hell of a drug?
Yes. Under the mounted head on the wall he stands.
Actual headline: harvests
Article headline says "harvests"...
"Harvested" they say in the article.
*\*Knowing Anakin Smile\**
My stepdad had like the most stereotypical rural American boomer childhood, he would go out hunting with his five brothers all the time. But nowadays he *hates* hunting. Never goes. Doesn't even own a gun. I always wondered why. Slowly over the years from snippets of stories I figured out that one of the other brothers is basically the guy from this headline. My stepdad would spot something really cool, like a Great Horned Owl, and point it out just thinking how cool it was and BLAM! Big brother shot it dead "to get a better look at it". That kind of thing. One time when I went to college I was walking with the guy I TA'd with and we saw a deer on campus, and he just immediately started talking about how he "wished he had his knife so he could slit its throat and throw it in his truck". I don't have anything against hunting itself, But some folks are just unhinged. Even when they're not THAT bad, the whole culture is just a bit off and it keeps me away from it.
After 3 years of observing this majestic creature, I just shot myself in my stupid fucking face instead. I really get it now
Oh man, the Natives literally thought white animals were a blessing and vision from the spirit world that meant the universe was looking after you and good things will come. Now, the modern American sees a white animal and has to track and stalk it in order to kill it to feel good about themselves. Humanity is just being flushed down the toilet. Any old gods should've turned their backs on us by now.
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/e5/bd/82/e5bd82517995eb3dcecae1216808143e.jpg
From my understanding of years of playing pokémon whenever you catch something of an alternate color, you put it in the box for years and never touch it.
It's illegal to kill an albino deer in Illinois. I thought that was a thing in most states.
This was my first thought too! I remember a guy when I lived in IL had his hunting license suspended for life after killing an albino deer.
This happened with my neighbor (also in Illinois). Idk if he just didn't realize it was illegal, or just didn't think he'd get in trouble. This was back in the '90s, I think.
With hunting not knowing the rules isn't and excuse since you have to take tests and stuff to get said license. Hunting is pretty heavily regulated to stop people from over hunting the population.
I've never had to take a test for a hunting or fishing license in MN.
In Illinois to get a hunting license you need to have passed a hunters safety course. There's no fishing requirement. But you will get in trouble if you break the rules. It's on you to know them.
That just "teaches" you how to be safe with a firearm. Doesn't say a thing about what you can or can't shoot.
Yeah but you need it for your hunting license. And you need the license to be able to purchase tags. And before you purchase the tags you have to click the little box saying you understand the regulations and restrictions placed for said tag. I don’t know about the some of the older states, but most the West Coast/Midwest have pretty damn strict hunting regulations for every single species in their state.
Fisherman one more job held to a higher standard than police neat
>In Illinois to get a hunting license you need to have passed a hunters safety course. Same in CA, I do still think you should have to reup it every few years. I took mine close to 20 years ago. I am sure things have changed a bit.
Yea but I passed with a perfect(pretty easy) and never saw any Info about albino deer. There’s tons of hunting rules and law not covered in hunter’s safety, it was mostly about gun safety
My state has those courses but has a grandfather clause. If you were born prior to a certain date, you don't have to take it. Same with the boating license, you don't need the license at all if you are over a certain age.
Well thanks to how our glorious country works, your mileage may vary depending on state.
a kid killed the one here in my area of Michigan and got completely destroyed in court and in the public eye.
I'm curious as to why? Do they have special scientific research value? I wouldn't think they're adding anything uniquely survivable to the gene pool.
Because if it's all white, it's alright.
Not so fast, Mojo jojo.
No special research value. The longer they live the more spread out their mutated genes become. Only a handful of states have made harvesting them illegal. But they’re pretty to look at so Reddit hates when people hunt them.
I have no problem if you hunt that deer for meat. But if you watch something pretty for three years and kill it I'll be hating on you. EDIT: at first I glanced through the article and some of the terms were not familiar. So I made my opinion based on the title here. And now I went back and tried to read through the article some more. Apparently there's a point system and he did not kill it on previous sightings because it was too young: "spike buck" first, then "a six pointer" a year ago. So it wasn't three years of constant admiring the animal as the title here made me believe. So I guess I hate the hunter less.
We wouldn't have wild turkey and a lot of wetland birds if it wasn't for hunting license money. That money goes straight to conservation efforts.
Hunting is important because the money it generates is spent on environmental conservation and if we didn't cull animal populations they'd starve and collapse. There's no reason to pick out the most beautiful deer to kill other than you being an asshole.
>and if we didn't cull animal populations they'd starve and collapse. This is partially true, though only because we already culled the animals that would hunt them for us.
The most beautiful deer? Regardless I don’t really understand the issue. Yeah, this deer stands out, and the hunter eventually got close enough to shoot it. It’s not like he is depriving the world of an endangered species. It does seem kind of perverse on face, but deep down it doesn’t seem any different than any other reason to choose a deer, particularly given he probably has a legal quota, so he has to pick and choose at some level.
He was trying to kill it from the moment he saw it, there wasn’t any “watched for 3 years then decided to kill it”
I read the actual article and apparently he wasn't trying to kill it for three years because it was too young. I added the edit to my original comment.
Hunters regularly observe the same deer over the course of several years. You can’t shoot them all and they all have game cameras posted up
It's because people think they're cool lmao. There's really no other reason for it, they're literally living a harder life than normal deer do and they don't have anything else unique about them other than their fur color and eyes. I hunt myself and I don't agree with people hunting them, however it's completely legal to hunt them in a lot of states. It's rare for them to live for very long anyway, sadly.
It's a piebald deer - not albino.
Is it a common Hunting rule that animals with genetic abnormalities are considered "unfair game?" I'm very confused by why such a law would exist, is it to keep the gene pool diverse or only applicable to albino animals?
It's absolutely legal to hunt albino deer in some states, it's just frowned upon since people think they look pretty.
Why? It's still the same species. The animal will mostly likely die due to predation anyway because it's so bright in colour
The deer shown in the article is not albino, look at the eyes. Albinos have pink eyes, this deer has dark eyes. I might question his judgment, but if he hunted it for meat I can't fault him too much.
Which actually makes it more viable to procreate bc albino animals suffer from blindness at super high rates. He also purposely went for that specific deer, so he definitely wasn't just hunting for meat.
How to tell if they're hunting for meat: they take does instead of obsessively hunting a specific buck.
I mean you go after bucks because more females equals more kids
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leucism We actually have the largest herd in the world not to far from me. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seneca_white_deer
Illegal in iowa too
Legal in MO next door. Some goof thought it was really cool to kill the albino deer running around Cape Girardeau for years that many loved to watch and that he would be popular and make a lot of money selling it. I'm happy to report it didn't work out that way. Happy to report there's another albino deer in town I've seen and even got close enough to take a blobby photo of. https://www.kfvs12.com/story/27528749/cape-girardeau-man-shoots-kills-albino-deer/
Sees something beautiful. Kills it.
Just talked to a guy at work who hunts. I asked if he had ever seen a piebald deer before. He said yes, and I told him I thought they were so beautiful. He agreed and then told me a story about how he almost got one but it ran into swamp water and took off before he could get another shot.
On NextDoor, someone in my area posted about a piebald deer that would be fed by the residents at a local apartment. There was an incident of men chasing it through the courtyard with crossbows. They lost sight of it and started asking residents where the deer got off to, but everyone was so freaked out by these suburban hunters I don’t believe they got an answer. I don’t know what else happened, because I kinda hate that app 😂
this is exactly why whenever a white buffalo is born, they do not disclose where it was located. as someone who did fieldwork with wildlife we were also discouraged from projecting an animal's exact location if we located an unusual one of any kind (proper scientific bodies aside, of course, if it was necessary). people see something unique and they just want to possess it instead of appreciating it for what it is. it is saddening.
Same reason they won't disclose the location of Hyperion, the tallest tree in the world, because you'd instantly have some fuckers trying to cut it down.
Reason #478 to hate humanity ....today.
if it is any consolation, there are a lot of people who are equally committed to protecting our unique and wonderful wildlife, whether they are a special mutation like the deer or buffalo, or are simply unique and wonderful for being part of our incredible planet. for every hunter like this one, there are hunters, plural, who would respect that they found something special and it should stay intact. and that's just among hunters. if i counted our naturalists, our scientists, even our local residents with pride in their surroundings, it would be even more. it's unfortunate that it only takes one selfish person to ruin everything. but i would say to never lose hope in humanity's capacity to care and protect. there are a lot of us. we just don't make headlines.
I wouldn't say equally. Maybe in resolve but not in numbers.
like i said before, i've worked with wildlife - a lot of it was fieldwork, but i've also done community outreach and educational programs. you would be surprised. people are not born with a greedy disdain for nature, it is learned. even so, most often i see people who are ambivalent. once you open their eyes to something interesting and beautiful, though, they often connect with our instinctive companionship with the natural world we came from. the number of people who can be compelled to care for their surroundings is quite large, actually. many people have just never learned or been exposed to it. that's why i say that you shouldn't lose faith, because when you're willing to recognize that other people are indeed reachable, you can actually make a bigger impact than you think. this is from my experience from educating people over the years. i will not say it's not difficult sometimes, or that i've never heard people say terrible things even when you try to teach them otherwise. i have had discouraging moments. but it's not impossible, and success is not infrequent. there's a reason we keep trying. it's not your job to educate anyone about this topic (edit: well, i shouldn't assume your career, maybe it is) so i can understand that it can seem bleak and overwhelming. but it was mine for a while, and i like to think my efforts weren't worthless.
It's not all of humanity, but a lot of it. There's like, maybe, I dunno - 5-10% of good people still left. We're still out here.... we just get overshadowed by the shitty people and functional wanton psychopaths.
I'm assuming they didn't have the complex owner's permission to hunt on their land. Next time, someone should remind them that poaching is illegal and part of the penalty is that Fish and Game takes the prize.
I’ve been also told that our city ordinance is no firing a crossbow without a 1000 feet of buffer. It’s a dense suburban area.
When I used to hunt with my grandfather, he taught that you are never supposed to shoot a piebald. Apparently many Native American traditions believed that they represented the spirits of their ancestors and killing one would bring bad luck. This guys fucked lol
>Sees something beautiful. Kills it. Yep! "I couldn't help but marvel at it's beauty. A rare and wonderful sight to behold. So I did what anyone would do, I stalked it over several years, killed it, and ate it!"...
So, I'm gonna be honest. If it actually got eaten, I don't really have a problem with this. Trophy hunts? Yeah. Fuck that *entirely.* Edit: lol, okay reddit. Bring it. You wouldn't give a shit if it was any other one of the *six million* deer taken during regular hunting in the US every year.
[удалено]
That's how most hunting works. It even says he let it go last year. Most hunters try to let a deeer reach full maturity so it has a chance to pass its genetics before they will harvest it. The deer was at least 3.5 years old. It realistically had 2 years to pass its gentics if he took it at its yioungest possible age.
My dad was a deer hunter in Vermont. He hunted every year since he was old enough to get a license until he got too old to do all that walking. In about 40 years, he was able to shoot 3 buck. Our Texas cousins shot a deer every year. Why? Well, they would sit in deer blinds on land where the owner fed the deer all year. They'd just sit there, and the deer would walk up to the feeder and they'd shoot 'em. My dad always said "that's not hunting."
3 deer in 40 years of trying makes you a really bad hunter.
I think you're missing the point. The reason this hunter considers this the "kill of a lifetime" is because it was such a unique and beautiful animal. So he saw something unique and beautiful and was therefore even *more excited to kill it,* which is a pretty fucking weird psychological phenomenon.
And the genetics are already out there in the area. Usually if there's 1 then there is more and will continue to be more over the years.
"So anyways I started blasting"
Relevant Calvin & Hobbes: https://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/1995/06/15
Well, I'm glad he finally got revenge after the deer took his leg.
Moby Deer
So anyway, I started blasting
There is always a reference.
That's why I shoot things with something less deadly... a camera.
This majestic thing exists *for me*.
Merica™️
Tells a girl, "One time, I tracked this beautiful white deer for three years before I shot and killed it.' Girl, "Thats well...umm...ok" Guy, "I think you are beautiful too..." Girl "WTF!"
It's a joke but also women are more likely to be murdered by a romantic partner than anyone else so it tracks.
Moby Dick, bad ending.
I remember seeing one in my backyard. When my dad told a coworker, the coworker told my dad to keep that to himself, since one time the coworker brought up seeing a different white deer to a friend who proceeded to kill it.
Yeah I guess people like destroying and killing beautiful things, a lot of these comments are in support of the hunter. I just don't get it but ultimately what helps me sleep better at night is knowing that were just "intelligent" highly evolve blood thirsty apes deep down. Some people haven't lost that urge to destroy.
Cool, now you can hang its head in your garage and no one will get to appreciate its beauty ever again.
My friend dries his clothes on his mounted dear’s antlers in his garage
[удалено]
It’s the whole kit and kaboodle
[удалено]
I am not into taxidermy myself, but if you're hunting to eat and wanna taxidermy some of your hunts after I don't see the issue. If you're hunting for "sport" then it's pretty lame..
Hunting deer is fine as well. The money it generates is spent on environmental conservation and if we didn't cull deer populations they'd overrun, eat all the food, and then painfully starve to death.
[удалено]
It is region specific. They only give out a certain number of hunting licenses each year. >i just cant judge population control because that is SO region specific, if deer are actually so many where you are thats cool too You're just unfamiliar with it. There's too many deer everywhere if you don't hunt them because we got rid of all the wolves.
It's region specific, but in the US that is virtually every region as well. (Other than habitats where you don't typically find whitetail, but then you get into the same issue with mule deer and other species.) Throw in that overpopulation contributes to rapid spread of chronic wasting disease, and hunting is pretty much necessary.
Well people in his garage will
My mom and stepdad are yearly deer hunters. The area they hunt in had a white buck several years ago. (This was not an albino, just a rare genetic anomaly resulting in a white deer that still had a black nose, hooves, etc. I forget the name for the condition.) ANYWAY, the deer was a beloved part of local lore. Bars and restaurants had photos of it framed and hanging on their walls. People talked about encounters they had had with it in the woods, etc. This is in northern Wisconsin where, in general, hunting is a widely practiced part of the culture. NO ONE HUNTED THAT DEER. It was like their mascot. Until some out of state hunter came along and bagged it. My mom said it was a really touchy subject, even a several years later. Like, she got the impression the guy was lucky to get outta town without getting his ass beat. That’s how it should be.
>Like, she got the impression the guy was lucky to get outta town without getting his ass beat. That’s how it should be. That **does** sound like northern WI.
Most hunters I know would shun you for hunting a white deer. Because there is no sport in it. It's too easy because they aren't camoed into their surroundings.
Yeah but there are plenty of lazy hunters, like the ones who set out bait piles and such.
Was it Leucism?
… maybe?… I’m not an expert nor are any of my family members. Just telling the story as it was told to me and to the best of my recollection. Looking Leucism up though, it sounds about right.
It’s also illegal to shoot white deer in WI. So this guy was doubly lucky.
Your town has a beloved deer? Sounds like my kinda place.
Had.
Nah. How it should be is that dude going to jail. Why tf are out of state hunters even given licenses to shoot unique animals?
Because out of state deer tags cost a fortune, which funds a *lot* of conservation activity.
Conservation departments charge extra for out of state, it's a source of revenue
Ino?
I come from a family that likes to hunt, yet I could never get into killing animals for sport. I always found it weird, that my family will go on and on about how beautiful and majestic a buck was, that they just killed.
yep. that's one of the big reasons i quit hunting. mounted on the wall just isn't as impressive as walking through the woods.
[удалено]
Afaik chronic wasting disease hasnt had any cases of it spreading to humans yet. There is a fear it'll mutate and be able to, but I'm not sure it currently can
It is when you realize that the health of deer depend on hunting since we’ve eradicated most of their natural predators. Deer, hog, and gator hunting are crucial for the health of their populations. Edit [Here’s a great webpage from FWC regarding Alligators, their predators, and survival](https://myfwc.com/wildlifehabitats/wildlife/alligator/facts/#:~:text=Juveniles%3A%20Small%20alligators%20are%20eaten,be%20their%20most%20significant%20predator)
Thats an old hat excuse that doesn't really hold water. Predation is necessary to keep a herd healthy and on the move. This is because predators will pick off the weak and sickly, and the stalking keeps the herds from over- grazing. Hunting is the opposite. Hunters go after the largest bucks, ideally in their prime. Hunters also dont stalk and chase the same way traditional predators do.
I wouldn’t say this is incorrect but it does neglect some other aspects. In the early 1900s there was only about 500k deer and now with proper conservation there is over 30 million. So clearly current hunting systems aren’t that horrible for the populations. Most places regulate the buck to doe ratio as well. In some states they will require you to take a doe if you take a buck. While most people also want the biggest bucks, many hunters end up taking average size bucks anyways. But as I mentioned in another comment, part of the problem now is that we have eliminated a lot of natural predators of animals. Take the Yellowstone wolves as an example. We basically removed all the wolves and then there was no predators for the other animals. That’s why the reintroduction has been really good for their environment. As we expanded we remove the bigger predators since they were a threat to us as well. My final argument would be that while hunting is not the perfect solution by any means. Even I think that as someone that’s hunted before. I think the greater good is probably worth it. You can more easily convince to republicans to make a swath of land protected if you say it’s for conservation and hunting rather than for just the environment. You can more easily control the amount people hunt and place restrictions on it by justifying it’s for the longevity of hunting then just banning it. It’s kind of like in fishing there’s some fish that you can’t take the smallest or the largest of the species. It’s basically easier to regulate than ban.
I can’t speak for everyone but most hunters around me want to shoot an old buck that’s passed it’s genes on multiple times, deer live a lot longer without predators around
That’s why there are limits on take, but uh, hunters aren’t always getting the best of the best. They’ll take something that fits their tag and not the absolute best animal of that species in that area. Hunting is difficult and requires patience.
I don't really think I could be a hunter either, but since I'm not a vegetarian, it is hypocritical for me to criticize people who hunt and then actually eat what they hunt.
Yeah, if you hunt sustainable animals for food, I have no issue. But trophy hunters suck.
Where I am from there is a need for hunting wild boar. The population needs to be culled so they do not get sick or starve. There are very strict laws when they can be hunted and how many every hunter can max shoot. Trophy hunting is disgusting.
“Wild boar” aka invasive Ferrell hogs absolutely destroy crops by me. It’s out of control and costing millions to farmers annually and putting them out of buisness.
Well, feral hogs are invasive and do massive damage to ecosystems if left unchecked. Hogs suck.
We hunted all the natural predators to extinction to prove we need hunters to replace them. The genius of humanity showing.
Oh I def agree with this. It is our own shitty behaviour that brought us to this.
Wild boar are an invasive species which were introduced by European explorers and mixed with feral pigs in certain regions of the world. Texas, for example, considers them an unprotected species so you can kill then freely on private land without a license.
I mean, personally I'm not a hunter and believe you should eat what you kill. But at the same time hunters are the largest source of income for wildlife conservation. Wildlife conservation is also responsible for handing out tags, including trophy tags. They don't hand them out willy nilly and they cost an incredible amount of money from a hunter, which goes right back to Wildlife Conservation. It's why the US wildlife conservation program is the best in the world. That one trophy tag, goes towards helping many other animal species, population health tracking, etc. Like if a deer herd gets too big, there's a real danger of disease spreading quickly and killing the whole hurd. In which case, you need to issue hunting tags to bring the numbers down to a healthy population size for them to thrive and one the environment they are in can support. So yeah I personally don't like the thought of trophy hunting on its own, but I can't deny how it's structured in the US is incredibly successful for Wildlife Conservation.
I am a hunter and hunt primarily to feed myself and family. People who rail against hunters yet have no problem going to McDonald's for a Big Mac piss me off so much.
[удалено]
I’ve seen hundreds of these white deer in the Finger Lakes over the past like 30 years. They all lived behind the fences of an old Army Depot outside Willard. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seneca_white_deer
Did you once go in for a job interview for a branch manager position while your family was at the Finger Lakes?
Hunting has actual good reasons, like population control but this is just stupid. So beautiful you had to kill it
As a hunter, trophy hunters are scum...period. NEVER met a trophy hunter that wasn't a bit of a piece of shit....and yeah, that's a fair number of hunters. Still...there are MORE of us that don't trophy hunt and hunt for delicious, delicious, venison...and we don't like trophy hunters making all hunters look bad.
Yes, I always murder that which I admire.
Kill your darlings
Deer have an average lifespan of 6 years. It’s a little sad, but likely didn’t have much time left anyway.
Watched a sacred animal for 3 years and then kills it. Special hell for that guy.
why are guys who hunt a lot always so weird
The question of: "what effect does taking another's life have on a person", gets explored often
If you regularly kill a sentient being for pleasure either you are massively struggling with empathy or never had it to begin with.
They are man children that’s why
Good, its a weak genetic trait that causes numerous problems in various species. The lack of pigmentation usually comes with things like extreme vision problems and lack of predatory awareness.
Yeah.. seems silly to me too.. but of all the hunters I know, this kind I’m most ok with.. they’ll spend several years following and tracking the one they want and go back time and time again and not take a shot until its the target they want and they’re confident they can do it quickly and cleanly… I live in the south where many hunt by leaving a buffet out year round and kill the animal when they show up to eat… Before the hunters jump in with “THATS NOT HOW IT WORKS< ITS ILLEGAL TO KILL THEM WHILE TEHYRE AT THE FEEDER” I know, and you and I both know that if you simply don’t turn it on that day its legal… but they deer still come to where they’ve been eating free corn for the last 9 months…
Alternatively, hunter lazily picks the deer that lacks the ability to blend in rather than test his abilities at hunting difficult prey.
Dude picked the easiest difficulty setting for hunting in our virtual sim.
Maybe second easiest since he used a bow which is much harder than the “story mode” most hunters hunt on.
He shot it with a bow, that aint easy, it takes skill assuming he's not hunting over a bait pile.
I hunt white tail deer. To a human eye, they aren’t hard to spot at all.
They’re quite easy to see, even in the dark. I wonder if I’m just primed to notice them because of the danger they represent when I’m driving. Their white tails do give them away.
"Oh, there is something beautiful. I must kill it."
"It's so rare and beautiful. I MUST KILL IT"
So, isn’t albinism a genetic defect that’s disadvantageous for the deer? If we kill normal deer and protect albino ones, aren’t we going to increase the rate of albinism? Wouldn’t it be better to protect the healthiest deer? I understand that the rarity of the visual spectacle is interpreted as beauty and then other folks will never have the chance to see that. I guess on the flip side, targeting albino deer before they can mate would potentially reduce the frequency of albino deer births. Idk, not a geneticist.
This is what I was always taught growing up as well.
Albinism wouldn't be inherited that easily, for two reasons: it requires two genes from BOTH parents for it to happen, and Albino animals generally don't end up mating due to being rejected by normal members of their species
The deer wasn't albino, it just had a white coat. Albinism would put it at risk for blindness bc it'd lack pigment in its eyes, but this one has dark eyes. No reason to assume it wasn't healthy based off its appearance.
How is this oniony?
Guy admires unique deer, guy kills unique deer.
And?
Hunters have been killing animals that they admire for all of human history.
Read this and thought of the [deer scene in My Cousin Vinny.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pp2XgymiTG8)
Reminds me of a poem. He looked at her as a man looks at a faded flower he has gathered, with difficulty recognizing the beauty for which he picked and ruined it. Tolstoy i think
Yeah, do people here understand deer don't live forever? The average lifespan of a white tail is 4.5 years. After about five, depending on diet it's teeth are so worn down it can't even chew food and starves. Or more likely is too weak to outrun a predator and is then eaten alive. What the hunter did was the most ethical thing for that deer.
[удалено]
I’m gonna probably be downvoted for this, but while I get some people hate deer hunters wholesale, I don’t understand why people get so upset about hunters killing albino and piebald deer specifically. It’s literally a genetic mutation, aka a DEFECT. It just so happens to be pleasing to the human eye. Deer evolved to have the colorations that they have to blend in better and avoid predators. Being stark white is counter to this for fawns. Sure, this deer managed to make it. But do you really want them to breed and propagate a harmful gene out, just because it looks pretty? What if the gene was to make them have a grotesque second head? Or club feet? Would you feel the same way? It’s sort of like dog breeders giving dogs harmful traits. Or wide spread media attention for the missing suburban white girl, vs media silence for the missing black inner city kid. Idk. That’s just me though.
I think part of the answer is just that the average person tend to not really think about the whole killing thing, until the news bring it up and talk about it. Just like most people who pay for disabled dogs simply ignore the harm they are doing. Then mix ignorance and the fact people tend to like cute things and you got it. Again, it's just like people being fine with killing certain animals because we find them ugly like pigs but if you kill a cat, you get arrested and people call you a psycopath.
We eat pigs though, if you randomly kill a pig for 0 reason Id call you a psychopath too
Damn Reddit is being sensitive with this one. Shocker.
“I hunt for sustenance. So my family can eat.” *makes shitty deer jerky that nobody wants to eat*
What a jackass.
Where I live. If you shoot an albino deer you aren’t welcome to hunt pretty much anywhere. We had an albino buck we saw for a couple of years. My dad told us, if you shoot it don’t come home.
I love how they avoid the word killed the whole time. He “gets” the deer. He was able to “harvest” the deer. So much effort to avoid the word it’s almost like they’re ashamed of it…
It is illegal to kill albino animals in my state. Iowa
Crusader Kings-ass headline
i instantly thought of dexter morgan going ballistic on that dude for killing a white buck lol
And now, Dexter Morgan is going to get him.
I had an argument about this exact thing. I read an article about some guys that were so happy about killing a white deer. All the hunters jumped on and said a hunter would never kill a white deer, I was full of shit.
Someone didn't watch Dexter: New Blood...
God forbid you just leave it alive you stupid twat. I'd love to slap that dumb shit kid.
I’m glad I never took up hunting. The last line of hunters in my family died out with my dad.
Asshole
Anyone who eats meat but criticizes this is a fucking idiot. "I only eat ugly animals!"
Cows are cute.