I'm Totally in Favor of Bowhunting to Control Deer

Recently, the Town of East Hampton has been considering to use bowhunting as a method of controlling the deer population and just yesterday, they got a letter from PETA asking them not to do that. The letter said, “Bowhunting is among the cruelest forms of,” the email, signed by Jodi Minion, a wildlife biologist with PETA. “Bowhunters often spend hours following bloody tracks before finding wounded deer. Many are not found, and their deaths are slow and painful as it can take weeks for them to succumb to their injuries. Families are then torn apart, and young and weak animals starve or die of dehydration.”

PETA suggested to the Town that they use other methods such as scare tactics to control deer populations, which included using loud radios and water sprinklers.

I’m almost always in favor of PETA and their recommendations for animals. But the deer population is out of control and bow hunting helps control them. Water sprinklers? Is this a joke?

I don’t mean to sound harsh, but people bow hunt. It’s a nice activity and when deer are shot and tracked, I’d say 90 percent of the time the hunter is able to track it down. To me, deer hunting and fishing are in the same category.

So no, I can’t agree with using sprinklers and radios to control the deer population. This is a real problem and the solutions are as simple as doing a great American activity. Furthermore, it’s not like these deer go to waste, every hunter that hunts deer either keeps the meat for himself or gives it away. Life and death is a part of nature. Bow hunting isn’t cruel, packing animals into factory farms is cruel, but bow hunting isn’t.