HUNTING
From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 1993:
To fight deer overpopulation,
the Ohio Division of Wildlife intends to
seek legalized bowhunting in suburbs;
legalized Sunday gun hunting; a longer
deer season; increased deer quotas; hunt-
ing access to state parks; and the repeal of
suburban hunting bans. Until last year,
Division policy was to boost deer numbers
to create more targets.
The odds a hunter will kill a
person by accident are 279.5 times
greater than the odds a deer/car collision
will. A record 118 people were killed in
deer/car collisions last year, while 130
people were killed in hunting accidents––a
record low. But the 165 million drivers in
the U.S. drive an average of at least once
a day, while the 14 million hunters hunt
an average of 17 days apiece, according to
the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Pete Benavides, a city com-
missioner in Brownsville, Texas, blew
up his car and suffered minor burns
during a hunting trip November 16, when
he reached for his rifle and accidentally
shot a can of hair spray.
An Ohio bowhunter shot an
arrow between the legs of one of a group
of five men and three women, purportedly
anti-hunting protesters, during an argu-
ment in West Branch Park, Portage
County. Wardens hope to identify the pro-
testers, to charge them with harassment.
Fishing crews from four boats
joined to rescue a stranded deer from a
rocky island off the Maine coast on
Halloween. Ninety minutes after they left
her on posted land, a jacklighter shot her.
Jackers also killed and butchered an eight-
year-old Sitka doe at a petting zoo in
Plattsburgh, New York, among the best
publicized of thousands of other victims.
The Chicago Bears will pay
fullback Bob Christian a bonus of $10,000
this year if he refrains from bowhunting.
Because Bears’ policy is not to discuss
details of player contracts, ANIMAL
PEOPLE was unable to find out if team-
mates have similar clauses.
Police in Eden Prairie, Mich-
igan on November 19 found the remains
of grocery clerk Grant Hussey, 15, and
Stephen Eastburn, 30, in a car parked in
a wooded wildlife preserve. Hussey had
vanished from his job four days earlier.
Eastburn was free on bail pending trial
for allegedly molesting Hussey during an
early-November hunting trip. He appar-
ently shot Hussey first, then himself.
