Bear-baiting

Bear-baiting

Bear-Baiting is a useful ecological control


ANDY14

Foisted upon the reading public on the Commentary page of the Star Tribune on Thursday was a bit of fiction offered as fact by Wayne Pacelle, who works in Washington, D.C., as a senior vice president for the Humane Society of the United States, an anti-hunting organization.

Pacelle is a guy who is not unaware of the cash cow that can be milked when the subject is hunting. Or, more specifically, when the subject is the perceived mistreatment of animals by hunters. This time Pacelle's interest is bears and, more specifically, bear baiting. But Pacelle's is a marketing gun gone easily for hire: From ducks to deer, his animal tales mutate like a virus, landing wherever there are emotions to leverage and, too often, facts to fudge.

Pacelle begins with the assertion that hunting bears over bait is unethical. This is an easy argument for two reasons. One, obviously, is that ethics in these matters is subjective. Two is that most people are clueless about hunting and more so about bears and bear baiting. Thus they are an easy target for his misinformation.

Pacelle stated on Thursday:

"Many guides and outfitters set up the bait 'stations' to make it easy for paying clients to shoot themselves a trophy bear. The client, perched in a tree or behind a blind, takes aim with his telescopic rifle or compound bow and shoots the animal, which often has its head in a barrel."

Shooting a bear in Minnesota while its head is in a barrel might have happened sometime in the state's history, but it hasn't happened often. If ever. That image, as presented by Pacelle, is ludicrous and ill-informed; indeed no less goofy than the one offered by our previous governor when he guffawed his way through this sentence:

"Going out there and putting jelly doughnuts down and Yogi comes up and sits there and thinks he's found the mother lode for five days in a row -- and then you back-shoot him from a tree? That ain't sport...