Lead Ban Boycot.

[tomzuki]

OK Guys.  You may not be aware, but California is weighing a ban on High Power Rifle ammo with lead projectiles.  They seem to think that the rare California Condor picks up lethal amounts of lead from gutpiles within its range.  Several sportsmens associations have offered to recommend to voluntarily bury gutpiles, but special interests groups have chosen to go the litigation route.  This not only costs the Dept. of Fish & Game a great deal of money, money that is raised from the sales of hunting and fishing licenses, but there is also no phyisical science to back up the claim.

If this rule is made permanent, I will give up hunting in-state and will only hunt outside California.  I'm sick & tired of getting squeezed by the "Tree-Huggers" every time I go out in the field.  The DFG has hardly enough budget to manage the herds that remain.  Put this on top of Hunting on Public land and the hordes that slob hunt, shoot does, poach trophies and burn the forest down with their carelessness, the experience has become less rewarding.  It's too crowded here and I'll look elsewhere for my recreation.

[beemanbeme]

That's exactly what the greenies want to happen.  And then they'll move their efforts to another state and another gate will close.  And the sportsmen in Oregon will say "hey California, give us a hand here fighting off the greenies" and the Californians will say, "where were you when we needed you?" 
What happens when the laws in California laws become so draconian that other states won't let you hunt in their state?  Californians aren't well received in a couple of states that I can name now.   

[tomzuki]

  September 26, 2007

THE WEIGHT OF THE NRA

Is the NRA representing the interests of hunters?

By JIM MATTHEWS
Outdoor News Service
The National Rifle Association again proved why it has become a heavyweight in the political arena when it weighed in earlier this month on a regulatory proposal to ban lead hunting ammunition in condor range. The NRA had been providing documentation to the Fish and Game Commission on how the ban was both expensive for hunters and how much of the science was flawed or downright misinformation. Then the powerful organization took the next step.
Judd Hanna, a California Fish and Game Commissioner, resigned earlier this month. This apparently happened after the NRA brought the pressure of nearly the entire Republican caucus in Sacramento to bear on Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger who then asked Hanna to resign.
Hanna’s crime? An avid hunter, shooter, and pro-Second Amendment Vietnam veteran, Hanna was one of an increasing number of sportsmen who was becoming convinced that lead bullet residue left in big game gut piles could be a serious problem for critically endangered condors. A lot of us fall into that camp, but Hanna seemed to be leaning toward banning the ammunition.
Hanna put together a dossier of all the of the available science on the subject, and he told people the evidence was pretty compelling. Notes in the margin said he was leaning toward voting for a lead ban. The NRA thought Hanna had sold out, playing into the hands of people who were using this “science” as just another way to get at hunting and gun ownership.
Yet, Hanna was part of the very same Commission that had -- just days before his requested resignation -- sent a letter to the Governor asking him to veto a bill (AB 821) passed by the legislature that would have banned the use of lead big game hunting ammunition in condor range. Why, because the Commission was doing a thorough analysis of the issue, and found that under a strict interpretation of the bill, even copper bullets -- the highly touted alternative -- would be banned by this legislation because they had trace elements of lead in their construction. The NRA likely provided this information to Commission -- and the Commission responded to the “new” data.
While there is no question that some anti-hunting, anti-gun people are wringing their hands with glee over the proposed lead bans, the whole condor-lead issue is certainly not being driven by that crowd. The science is compelling that lead ammunition is a factor in some condor deaths. This issue is not settled -- in spite of the grandstanding earlier this year by some in the conservation community that presented a letter to the Commission basically saying everyone in the scientific community agreed. In fact, there are increasing questions about whether or not hunters’ lead is cause for most of the background lead showing up in condors’ systems. There is absolutely no question that big chunks of hunter lead in carcasses or gut piles has led to the death of condors, but new science is suggesting that lead hunting ammunition may not the heart of the lead problem.
This evidence suggests the NRA is probably right in saying that a lead ban is not warranted at this time because some of the science is downright incomplete and speculative, at best. And the NRA took the next step in lobbying the state legislature to go after votes on the Fish and Game Commission. The NRA knew we didn’t need another wrong vote on lead, and Hanna was the target.
Yes, there is a growing element in the hunter-conservation community who believes that at least some of the lead-condor science is rock solid, and those of us who fall into that camp feel hunters don’t need to be killing any condors via lead poisoning. But within this camp there are two hugely divergent trains of thought (and, unfortunately, the NRA has bashed both of them):
The first group believe that hunters can completely eliminate the lead link to condors, simply and voluntarily. That could be done by shooting non-lead ammunition or simply taking care to make sure the carcasses and gut piles of lead-shot animals were unavailable to condors. The education program is working in Arizona, where compliance is high without mandated bans. A lead ban is unnecessary and if enacted, it would force a lot of hunters to change firearms, start reloading, or hunt outside of condor range. Non-lead ammunition is widely available and only modestly more expensive, but it’s certainly not available in all cartridges -- including perhaps the most popular deer cartridge in America, the .30-30 Winchester. I’ve read estimates that from 15 to 30 percent of hunters would not be able to get non-lead ammunition for their firearms. So why inconvenience so many hunters when other voluntary measures are available?
There are others who believe a lead ban is the only sure way to make sure those few condors that might be poisoned by lead bullets are saved. Hanna likely fell into this camp, and the NRA felt it couldn’t chance his vote on such an important issue. While the “ban” perspective might be a valid opinion, the massive decline in hunter numbers of the past two decades suggest that increasing regulatory burdens and costs are two of the major factors in the loss of hunters. We are regulating and pricing hunters into extinction.
There’s a corollary story: Lead waterfowl hunting ammunition was banned to protect ducks from eating spent lead shot. The ban was nationwide for all waterfowl hunting -- and we’ve since found it was unnecessary in most waterfowl hunting conditions. Zeal got the better part of common sense and good science. The ban didn’t end waterfowl hunting and it wasn’t about taking away our firearms, like the NRA was saying at the time. But that didn’t make it right, and in the end it chipped away at hunter numbers, many who simply gave up the sport. Now some are trying to rewrite history and say -- with more bad science -- that the lead shot ban didn’t affect waterfowl hunting’s popularity and the number of hunters involved. And that is just wrong.
The lead ban was wrong then and another lead ban is wrong now.
That doesn’t mean lead isn’t a factor in condor deaths. It doesn’t mean hunters shouldn’t take precautions so condors and other wildlife doesn’t eat lead. It just means we shouldn’t ban it. Let hunters do what we’ve done best for over 100 years: solve the conservation problem with our actions and let good science dictate those actions.

[dakotashooter2]

At this point the source of the lead truely is unproven. How much lead does it take to affect these birds (who were probably headed toward natural extinction anyway). Yes some traces of lead may be left behind from harvested game. while gutpiles may have trace amounts in most cases the lead is more likely to be deposited in the muscle of the game or even completely pass through. Studies have been done which have indeed found those trace amounts in gutpiles however no direct correlation to condor consumption and lead poisoning has been proven. Are other predatory birds dying from the same source of lead? One would assume that hawks and eagles being more predominant would suffer a similar fate as they would probably encounter such gutpiles first.

I would be more inclined to believe that small calibers such as the 22 and small game would be a more likely source than high powered rifle bullets yet the 22 will be exempt.

Will burying gutpiles work? I would suggest no as other predators would likely dig them up still leaving them accessible.

If hunters are forced to quit hunting the condors may even starve to death on their own.