Comments on: P.J. Reilly, Baiting Deer, and Tattling on One’s Neighbor

By: Waldo

Waldo — Sat, 06 Jan 2024 12:19:19 +0000

Deer eat food i.e. acorns, from the ground. Should it be illegal for the trees to drop acorns on the ground as this may spread CWD from the soil? The land owner apparently would be guilty of this acorn drop and thusly should be fined and/of have their property confiscated?

In fact NO-ONE owns property! If you don’t pay your taxes it is confiscated. We are renters. The “you wont own anything and will love it” mantra of the WEF already exists. Same goes with your car here in KY, don’t pay your yearly tax plus your tag cost and you lose your car.

Totalitarianism has been present in the USA since day one.

Car tags and drivers license should be a one time issue. There should be no property tax on primary residences or privately owned non-corporate farms if the owner resides on that farm.

But then the government would have no control over us useless eaters.

By: Chris Hume

Chris Hume — Tue, 30 May 2023 12:17:23 +0000

In reply to Erik Ek.

I appreciate the comments, Mr. Ek.
1) While I cannot recall ever using the term ‘Karen’ in my own writings to refer to someone, I did quote Stoltzfus, and I am not going to be a Negative Nancy or a Debbie Downer in regards to Stoltzfus using the term.
2) One of my main points is that there are non-statist solutions to these issues. Sure, disease is a reality – it will continue to be so, and we can work on solutions that do not involve heavy-handed government regulation. Also, the issue of justice and wisdom is hardly ever addressed here (as in the case of Amos Miller being fined and Reuben King being harassed for selling rifles). You said you would have “done the same thing.” The Chester County regulation says shelled corn and protein pellet supplement can be “dispensed up to three times a day during legal hunting hours through automatic, mechanical feeders. The bait dispensed cannot exceed five gallons per site.” So, to press you for consistency, if you were hunting and your automatic feeder kicked out 5.1 gallons per site and you took a trophy buck, and then realized your grave and heinous violation, would you turn yourself in, give up all the meat, and voluntarily pay the $5,000 fine? You broke the “law.” Or if you saw someone commit such an atrocious act, would you report them for their 1/10 of a gallon unpardonable sin? Or would that circumstance be different because your violation wasn’t “that bad” and wouldn’t contribute to “serious” CWD problems? If not, at what point would you? What is your standard now? How many gallons over was Stoltzfus? These regulations are not about justice and they are not about actually educating anyone.

By: Erik Ek

Erik Ek — Fri, 26 May 2023 20:07:30 +0000

Two comments. First, the term “Karen” is a racially offensive pejorative of the type apparently acceptable only when directed towards women who are white. P.J. Reilly may be white, but he is not a woman.
Second,, I direct readers to the Pa. Game Commission website’s dashboard on CWD, Chronic Wasting Disease, fatally infecting deer and elk, which has expanded significantly since first detected in 2012
CWD spreads through animal to animal contact, urine, saliva, feces, and can remain infectious in the soil for decades, into plants, ticks, possibly mutating into strains capable of infecting other types of animals. While apparently harmless to humans, it renders venison inedible. This is a problem to the extent that the PGC has created Disease Management areas, DMA’s, where infections have been found, along with regulations to try to limit the disease’s spread. Allowing limited baiting for deer hunting in high population areas like Chester County is a trade-off between the disease risks caused by deer feeding in close proximity to each other, and other problems such as deer-car collisions, property damage, etc.. There is a difference between releasing controlled amounts of bait, at limited, specific times, and simply spreading unknown quantities of food on the ground. One seeks to limit the ability of an infected deer to spread CWD to other animals, the other less so, or not at all.
If we are to obey Biblical law regarding stewardship of our natural resources, then here it is not a matter of killing just one deer over baited ground, but rather the possibility that more deer may die as a result, infected, suffering, wasted meat. To dismiss CWD as no big deal, once you know about it, is irresponsible. I completely disagree that P,J, Reilly “tattled” on his neighbor. While I don’t know the extent to which, hopefully not at all, I would have patted myself on the back, (after all, the gentleman lost himself a nice buck) If I had seen it I would have done the same thing. It is up to we hunters to keep our blessed pastime both safe and ethical. While I don’t think this individual meant to deprive another hunter of taking a beautiful animal, that can easily happen because of the spread of this disease.