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Russ Mason

Commentary: Diversity may kill us as hunters, anglers and trappers if we fight about our differences

1 Comment / Discussions, Featured, Fishing, Hunting, Michigan, National Fishing, National Hunting, Opinion /

Hunting, trapping, and angling have a diversity problem. Not the kind you’re probably thinking but the sort on the bumper stickers I used to see as a kid: “You Bet Your Dupa I’m Polish.”
Ask any hunter, angler, or trapper how they see themselves, and the response is rarely generic. Chances are they’ll self-identify as deer hunters, fly-fishers, waterfowlers, beaver trappers, grouse hunters, or predator callers. I suspect you get the drift.

Commentary: Diversity may kill us as hunters, anglers and trappers if we fight about our differences Read More »

Commentary: What does science say about population effects of lead in wildlife?

Featured, Home Page News, Hunting, Hunting, Hunting, Hunting, Hunting, Hunting, Hunting, Hunting, Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, National Hunting, Nature Page & Night Sky, New York, Ohio, Opinion, Opinion, Opinion, Opinion, Opinion, Opinion, Opinion, Opinion, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin /

Concerns over the effects of spent lead ammunition prompted federal resource agencies in the United States and Canada to phase in a ban on lead shot shell ammo for waterfowl hunting starting in 1987. Now, the focus is shifting towards the effects of spent lead centerfire ammunition. Wildlife veterinarians, bird advocacy organizations, animal rights activists, and even some wildlife biologists assert that it’s “common knowledge” that lead is bad from a population perspective.
One might ask: What’s the evidence?

Commentary: What does science say about population effects of lead in wildlife? Read More »

Russ Mason: Privatization of CWD testing could help minimize human exposure, save money

Featured, Home Page News, Hunting, Michigan, National Hunting, Opinion /

From a wildlife perspective, management of chronic wasting disease (CWD) boils down to prevention, surveillance, and suppression. Eradication is unrealistic, just as it is for other wildlife diseases.
Most likely, CWD eventually will spread to most (if not all) cervid populations and drive changes to the size and age composition of herds. Said another way, the disease is going to do whatever it “wants” to do regardless of natural resource agency interventions. Luckily, minimizing human exposures to CWD is more manageable.

Russ Mason: Privatization of CWD testing could help minimize human exposure, save money Read More »

Lone star tick expanding its range; here’s what hunters should know

Featured, Featured, Featured, Featured, Featured, Home Page News, Hunting, Hunting, Hunting, Hunting, Hunting, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, National Hunting, Nature Page & Night Sky, Ohio, Wisconsin /

Health experts advise archers and other hunters to be extra vigilant for ticks this year, with the lone star tick (a female lone star is pictured at right) expanding into Michigan and other northern states. Photos by Adobe and Graham Hickling/University of Tennessee, Knoxville.

Lone star tick expanding its range; here’s what hunters should know Read More »

Commentary: What can ranching tell us about wolves and whitetails?

Featured, Featured, Featured, Home Page News, Hunting, Hunting, Hunting, Michigan, Minnesota, National Hunting, Opinion, Opinion, Opinion, Wisconsin /

Although wolves are a hot topic from the Pacific Northwest to the Great Lakes, reintroduced wolves in Colorado (and to a lesser extent Mexican wolves in Arizona) have been getting the most attention. Mostly, the focus has been on agricultural issues.
In July, agricultural economists at the University of Arizona examined the impacts of wolf predation on cattle ranching.

Commentary: What can ranching tell us about wolves and whitetails? Read More »

Commentary: Time to rethink CWD management

Featured, Home Page News, Hunting, Michigan, National Hunting, Opinion /

News reports and agency communications make clear that chronic wasting disease continues to spread to new places and also that prevalence is increasing among herds already affected by the disease.
Despite 50 years of research and attempted management interventions, there are no demonstrably effective methods to contain, much less to eradicate, CWD. At best, in states like Illinois, hunting and sharp-shooting seem to have slowed (but not stopped) increases in the prevalence of the disease.

Commentary: Time to rethink CWD management Read More »

Commentary: Why is the Michigan DNR silent on proposed baiting bill?

Leave a Comment / Discussions, Featured, Home Page News, Hunting, Michigan, National Hunting, Opinion /

The seven principles of the North American Model of Fish and Wildlife Conservation represent the most successful approach to sustainable game and sportfish management ever devised. Chief among those principles is the recognition that “science is the proper tool for the discharge of wildlife policy.”
Unfortunately, for both the resource and the future of hunting, state legislatures across the United States are choosing to ignore this fundamental tenet.

Commentary: Why is the Michigan DNR silent on proposed baiting bill? Read More »

Commentary: Has the Michigan Wildlife Council simply lost its way?

Leave a Comment / Discussions, Featured, Fishing, Home Page News, Hunting, Michigan, National Fishing, National Hunting, Opinion /

At a recent sportsmen’s breakfast in Lansing, I was surprised (and a little encouraged) when the event’s speaker asked hunters to stand together and demand better from the Michigan Department of Natural Resources.
It’s no secret that the always fragile partnership between hunters, anglers, trappers and the DNR seems to have broken. In no small part, this is because the agency increasingly has displayed a careless disregard towards the essential economic and management importance of hunting, fishing, and trapping. Nowhere is this more evident than in its approach to shareholder engagement.

Commentary: Has the Michigan Wildlife Council simply lost its way? Read More »

Commentary: Bureaucratic cooperation needed to solve conservation shortfalls

Featured, Fishing, Home Page News, Hunting, Michigan, National Fishing, National Hunting, Nature Page & Night Sky, Opinion /

Bureaucracies, by design, resist change.
They aren’t open to new ideas. Max Weber described it this way: “The fully developed bureaucratic apparatus compares with other organizations exactly as does the machine with the non-mechanical modes of production.” In other words, like a machine, bureaucracies are rationally designed but once built operate only as intended.

Commentary: Bureaucratic cooperation needed to solve conservation shortfalls Read More »

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