Predatory animals should be treated like criminals

Published 8:00 pm Tuesday, June 30, 2015

To the Editor:

In our society, we have animals who are killers. These killers sit down to a dinner table and eat a meal with a knife and fork. Now, when one of those killers takes a life, our society will leave no stone unturned until that killer is taken out of our society and either meted a death penalty or incarcerated to where he or she can do society no further harm.

In our society, we also have killers who sit down to a dinner table with tooth, claw and fang, and are allowed to keep killing on and on and on. They are not being taken out of the equation in near enough numbers. These killers are destroying the wildlife that has been a part of our society for years and years and are a huge economic factor in many of our communities.

The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife wants and needs to sell hunting licenses and tags. There is not much need to buy these tags if there is nothing to hunt, and our deer herd is to the point where it is almost shameful to kill one of them.

Would it be to much too ask of the ODFW people to use some of the money they spend on helicopters to count the deer we don’t have, and instead spend it on helicopters to remove some of the tooth, claw and fang diners from their dinner tables? There is no doubt that we would find an increase in the number of animals that are necessary to sustain our deer and elk numbers for viewing, as well as making hunting seasons worthwhile.

There is absolutely no reason to allow these killers to run amok as they are currently doing. It is way past time to do something about it.

Dean Elliott

Canyon City