Unfair Chase: Ethical Objections from Both Ends of the Spectrum

Trophy hunting is a sport whose object is to kill sentient beings for pleasure, and that can never be ethical. It is a sport in which only the aggressor participates willingly; the victim has no choice in the matter. And it is a sport in which the stakes are dreadfully uneven; if the animal loses, he dies; if the hunter loses, he goes home empty-handed and life goes on as before.

That being said, we all recognize that, among ethically objectionable acts, some are more heinous than others. Due to their blatant violation of the hunting community's "fair chase" standard, canned hunts inspire a higher level of outrage than more traditional forms of hunting, even to the extent that many staunch defenders of sport hunting are vocal opponents of canned hunts.

Hunting advocates defend the ethics of their sport by invoking the concept of "fair chase." Even the pro-trophy hunting Safari Club International has a code of ethics in which the hunter pledges "to comply with all game laws in the spirit of fair chase, and to influence my companions accordingly." "Fair chase" is left undefined. In an affidavit for hunters who wish to have a trophy buck recorded in its record books, the Boone and Crockett Club defines fair chase as "the ethical, sportsmanlike, and lawful pursuit and taking of any free-ranging, wild, native North American big game animal in a manner that does not give the hunter an improper advantage over such game animals." This statement leaves several key terms, including "ethical," "sportsmanlike," and "improper advantage" undefined, although B&C does give examples of practices that violate fair chase, such as shooting an animal who is helpless when mired in deep snow or swimming in the water.

Jim Posewitz spent 32 years as a biologist with the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Parks. As founder and president of Orion: The Hunter's Institute, he is one of sport hunting's most passionate defenders, much in demand as a speaker by hunting organizations and wildlife agencies across the country. In his book, Beyond Fair Chase, which is widely viewed within the hunting community as the "bible" of hunting, Posewitz discusses fair chase in these terms:

Fundamental to ethical hunting is the idea of fair chase. This concept addresses the balance between the hunter and the hunted. It is a balance that allows hunters to occasionally succeed while animals generally avoid being taken.

Posewitz's organization, Orion, defines hunting as "the fair chase pursuit of free-roaming wildlife in a noncompetitive situation in which the animal is used for food."

Orion's definition of ethical hunting includes four elements: 1) fair chase; 2) free-roaming wildlife; 3) noncompetitive; and 4) used for food. The first two elements are shared with the definition used by B&C. But because B&C exists to promote trophy hunting, their definition of fair chase does not include "a noncompetitive situation" or consuming the animal.

Is It Even Hunting?

Fair chase is the fundamental standard put forward by defenders of hunting. All other defenses of hunting for sport depend on and derive from the notion of fair chase. But, hunting on game ranches and preserves is killing for fun and bragging rights under circumstances in which the traditional defenses of hunting become meaningless. So is hunting on game ranches and hunting preserves really hunting at all, or is it something else entirely-something quite different that is masquerading as hunting?

Outdoor writer Ted Kerasote, whose popular book, Blood Ties: Nature, Culture and the Hunt, is an impassioned defense of hunting, including trophy hunting, has no doubt about the answer to this question: "Wildlife is not livestock. The problem comes when people are supposedly hunting these animals. That's the problem right there." According to Kerasote, canned hunts are turning hunting "into this caged, paid affair and it bears no resemblance to what hunting is, was, and could be. Like so many things in our world, people want to buy the product (the trophy) rather than experience the process (meeting the animal on its own terrain)."

Orion's definition of "ethical" hunting and Kerasote's comments provide an excellent standard for identifying canned hunts and making judgments about them by comparison to traditional hunting. These judgments aren't made according to the standards of the animal protection community, but according to the standards of the hunting community. In fact, according to both Orion and B&C's definitions, any managed situation that is manipulated to significantly reduce the animal's chance to survive is a canned hunt which fails to meet the hunting community's own standard for hunting.

No Kill, No Pay

A hunting preserve or game ranch at which the hunter occasionally succeeds while the animal usually escapes is at a strong competitive disadvantage in today's market. And canned hunt operators are closely attuned to the economics of their business. They also know that a busy professional or business person or first-time hunter who plunks down several thousand dollars for a day of hunting does not expect to go home empty-handed.

Their advertisements go out of their way to reassure prospective clients. "We specialize in 100% Success Rate on all Whitetail rifle hunts," brags the Oak Creek Whitetail Ranch in Missouri. By Jim Posewitz's standard, a rifle hunt at Whitetail does not even have a nodding acquaintance with fair chase, regardless of what other conditions it may be conducted under. In one fashion or another the operators have manipulated the odds so that the hunter always succeeds and an animal always dies. Pennsylvania's Tioga Boar Hunting Preserve tells prospective customers that hunts never require "more than two days; all hunts are guaranteed." Nor do hunters have to be accomplished shooters since "kills are usually made from 25 to 100 yards," which is point blank range for a modern hunting rifle.

And in case the prospective client is "gun shy" of vaguely worded guarantees, the European Wild Boar Hunt, a hunting preserve in Idaho, spells it out: "You are guaranteed a pig, or your money will be refunded."