doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Public commentary to MN DNR.

Hmmm ... maybe not a moron -- maybe just not used to thinking in the language of crude.

Larry,
Right on schedule, the local leftist rag in Minneapolis had an op/ed piece on Monday, the day after public comment ended, on the need to ban lead shot. I sat down and fired off my response last night, using the statements in it you posted as part of my argument.
Thank you. I expect a rubber stamp from the DNR, implementing the change, but, we will see.

Best,
Ted

Thanks for your efforts, Ted. During my almost 5 years as a resident of Wisconsin, the Natural Resources Board made a similar attempt. They floated a proposal about banning lead shotshells on all DNR-managed lands. Fortunately, Wisconsin has an interesting program under which annual meetings are held by the DNR in every county in the state. At those meetings, attendees get to vote on changes proposed by the DNR and the Natural Resources Board. The statewide vote on that lead ban proposal was 1,979 yes, 2,726 no. And of all the items on that evening's agenda at the meeting I attended, that lead ban provoked more commentary from attendees than anything else. Politicians do tend to listen when there's a public response of that nature.

Will be interested in hearing what the MN DNR does.

Ted, if you come across a link to that Minneapolis newspaper op/ed, I wouldn't mind seeing what they have to say.

I am surprised to see how close the voting on this matter by sportsmen was in Wisconsin. I suppose those DNR meetings Larry tells us about were also attended by non-hunters too though. It's hard to believe that many hunters would voluntarily support banning lead and vote for using ballistically inferior shot which costs a lot more.

Keith,
Try this:

http://www.startribune.com/opinion/

Best,
Ted

I found it Ted. Thanks very much. I had to click on "Browse More Opinions" to find the Dec 11th anti-lead op/ed piece. I note there was also a Dec 11th op/ed calling for a semi-auto firearm ban. Gee, where did you ever get the idea that this is a Liberal rag?

One anti-lead person made an interesting point in the comments. She stated that this ban would be too little too late since there is already a 150 year accumulation of lead shot and sinkers on the bottoms of these lakes. That is a point I brought up a few years ago when GrouseGuy Ben Deeble was posting all of his junk science supporting lead shot bans. The lead is still there. Nobody has dredged the bottoms of our lakes, swamps, rivers, and ponds. It has not dissolved. It still gets churned up by wave action, and bottom feeding waterfowl would still be able to consume it. So now that the anti-lead people got their 1991 Federal Lead Shot Ban for waterfowl hunting, why aren't we still seeing those heart wrenching pictures of dead and dying ducks and geese supposedly poisoned by evil lead shot? The anti-lead/anti-hunting liars are still trying to tell us that only one or two pellets consumed by a bird will lead to a slow agonizing death. The anti's got what they wanted and are moving on to lead bans in upland and rifle hunting. Pure agenda driven B.S. intended to reduce sport hunting!

Keith, you're absolutely right. You don't have to show a hunting license to get into those meetings. They're open to anyone interested in the environment, from the greenest bird watcher to your standard issue redneck deer hunter.

Speaking of deer hunters--of which WI has several hundred thousand: The interesting thing about the proposed lead ban is that the "poster bird" has switched from waterfowl to bald eagles. As most folks know, bald eagles have made a miraculous recovery since DDT was banned and since we stopped shooting lead at waterfowl. But some of them are still getting sick and dying from ingesting lead. But examinations done on the birds almost always show that the lead in question comes from bullet fragments (eagles scavenge unrecovered deer), not lead shot. But the NRB knows better than to try and take on WI deer hunters. Lots more of them than upland hunters! So they propose something that will do at best very little to reduce eagle deaths from lead poisoning.

If the bald eagle has become the poster bird, and it's settled science that ingested lead from hunters are at fault, I wonder if hunters can get thirty year eagle and protected bird 'take permits' like the wind turbine industry can.

The bald eagle angle is an absolute sham. The bald eagle population is at all time highs, and has been consistently rising since the banning of DDT. The use, or elimination of lead shot, has had statistically zero impact on the bald eagle population.

This is easily seen by looking at the US Fish and Wildlife services tracking of the eagle population: http://www.fws.gov/midwest/eagle/population/chtofprs.html

If there is a higher rate of eagles coming into contact with carcasses with lead fragments, it is because the eagle population is so high. One can use the same logic with an endless number of examples, like deer/car collisions. A high deer population naturally leads to more cars hitting deer.

However the anti-lead/gun proponents realize the bald eagle has a sympathetic story, and will use that fact when dealing with the public.

I agree completely Flintfan. The evidence is there for people who are interested in maintaining their hunting traditions and rights. It is far better to get involved in the fight now than to come here several years from now asking where you can find $50.00 or more a box non-tox inferior shotgun shells.

As I noted in Ted's other thread about Huntfortruth.org, the lead ammunition ban in Kalifornia has had zero impact on the declining populations of California Condors. So the knee-jerk reaction is for Kalifornia to expand a ban which is doing nothing except making hunting much more expensive. The few that were getting lead poisoning were getting it from other environmental sources of lead. You must remember that the people who are supposedly doing the autopsies and testing of these bird carcasses are the same anti-hunting agenda driven people who would like to totally eliminate sport hunting. It has become obvious from simple observation of populations of supposedly threatened species that they have been cooking the data. I can show you photos of birds that are dead or dying from a hundred different maladies including old age and claim my tests show lead poisoning. I wouldn't put it past some of these anti-hunters to actually poison some birds with lead compounds just to make their case.