Drone-Assisted Hunting To Be Illegal In Alaska 397
garymortimer (1882326) writes in with news about rules for hunting with drones in Alaska. "At its March 14-18 meeting in Anchorage, the seven-member Alaska Board of Game approved a measure to prohibit hunters from spotting game with such aircraft, often called drones. While the practice does not appear to be widespread, Alaska Wildlife Troopers said the technology is becoming cheaper, easier to use and incorporates better video relay to the user on the ground. A drone system allowing a hunter or helper to locate game now costs only about $1,000, said Capt. Bernard Chastain, operations commander for the Wildlife Troopers. Because of advances in the technology and cheaper prices, it is inevitable hunters seeking an advantage would, for example, try to use a drone to fly above trees or other obstacles and look for a moose or bear to shoot, he said."
Re:Redefine hunting. (Score:1, Interesting)
A lot of hunters are asshats (Score:4, Interesting)
In Maine it's legal to bait an area until bears come to it, then chase them up a tree with a pack of dogs, then walk up and shoot them out of the tree.
This pervasive mentality (shooting wolves from a helicopter) and now this new drone thing is what gives hunters a bad name.
Re:Whats the poing of hunting as a sport? (Score:2, Interesting)
How is shooting something from hundreds of feet away with a high powered rifle any kind of sport?
Yea know, most hunters like myself hunt for food. I don't see a difference between using a rifle to put dinner on my family's plate or a cow that has been raised in a pen for its life only to be ground up, mixed with horse meat, processed in a plant with similar cleanliness to an auto garage, then sold to the customer via a dollar menu.
Re:Redefine hunting. (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Video games are not real life (Score:4, Interesting)
Do you understand the appeal of first person shooters?
There is a HUGE difference between doing something imaginary in a video game and killing a real, live creature or a real live person.
Yea, namely that one is a method of food acquisition that requires training, certification, and licensing, and the other is a way for little kids (or people with little kid mentalities) to play up fantasies about murdering other humans.
Here's a hint, in a video game no one actually dies and all the participants know that.
No one actually dies when hunting either. At least, you hope no one actually dies, but accidents do happen.
Trouble is, if a kid's only interaction with firearms is playing a fantasy game where "no one dies," if/when they encounter a real firearm they aren't going to understand just how dangerous of a tool it is. Kids who hunt know the difference.
It's one thing to fantasize about something and quite another to actually do it in the real world.
True. Now apply that to your own thought process: your fantasy about what hunting is, and how hunters are motivated, is one thing, and reality is another.
We're talking about people getting amusement from the real world suffering of another creature.
Proof that you don't know jack about hunting, other than what [insert preferred 'envronmentalist' group] told you to think. FWIW, most hunters try to avoid causing the animals to suffer.
That's why we invented target practice.
I hope you can actually understand why that is very very very different.
I do. I hope you can understand how unreasonably uninformed you are presenting yourself as.
Re: Redefine hunting. (Score:5, Interesting)
No matter how good of a bow hunter you are or how good your aim is, simple fact is that an arrow travels at a third the speed of sound, meaning game can both see and hear your shot long before the arrow arrives. Every bow hunting season, forums are slammed by bow hunters that take a heart shot, the buck digs off at first sound, and the arrow ends up in its gut because it had time to travel the foot and a half or so to turn a good shot into an ethical hunter's worst nightmare.
Rifles do not have that problem. Bullet arrives too soon after first flash for game to react ( usually traveling 10x faster than an arrow ).
Anyways, as for drones, I don't mind so much that it allows hunters to find game, as infrared does a similar job. The problem I have is that it allows a hunter to know about game that is far away or hidden, encouraging long-distance shots (as soon as distanced game becomes visible), and thereby decreasing the chance of a clean kill.
Re:Redefine hunting. (Score:4, Interesting)
Besides, I've never been to a supermarket that serves venison.
They don't have venison in the US? Every supermarket has venison in the UK, even the cheapest ones like Lidl and Aldi. They don't have a big selection, though.