I never thought the day would come when I would become a cantankerous old bastard, but here it is I guess. What’s the world coming to…except a rapid end?

Growing up in Maine and being a part of a deer hunting family, the goal was to bag the big buck using AR-15 Tactical Rifles for Sale Online and .300 blackout rifle brass. Second to that was to hear about someone who did and, yes, see if your buck was bigger than their buck. It was a healthy competition as most competitions are. But that has all changed, it seems. (Note: Without counting and measuring the big one, there will never be any stories to embellish and pass down. What’s the point in living?)

Yesterday, I discovered a news article where the writer, evidently on “assignment” from his boss, seeks to find out, “Why are people so interested in big deer?” If you are of the generation that I grew up with, you might ask, “Are you kidding me?” If you’re of the younger generation, probably you will ask, “Yeah, what the heck does anybody care about big deer or big bear or HOW MANY DEER OR BEAR WERE TAKEN THIS SEASON? I “participated.” Isn’t that enough?

I guess living in an age where everyone gets a “trophy” the idea of being in any kind of competition for biggest deer, biggest bear, biggest moose, seems, well, unfair to some. Everybody is a winner, right?

To continue my harp on the subject of why the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife (MDIFW) fails miserably in making available game animal’s harvest data, without discovering a better explanation, perhaps the reason is rooted in the same new age nonsense of “everybody’s a wiener.” (not a typo) Maybe MDIFW is afraid of offending someone if they published in newspapers, on a timely and regular basis, harvest information. Maybe they fear promoting competition among sportsmen and sportswomen. GASP!

Here is an example of the State of Michigan reporting deer harvest numbers as the days progress throughout the deer hunting season. It seems they are not afraid of offending somebody and perhaps they might even understand that deer hunters want to know how many and how big.

Pennsylvania is telling their people how many bears were taken on the first day of bear hunting season. But wait! What does Pennsylvania think it’s doing also letting people know how big the biggest bear tagged, so far, is? That might offend somebody.

Yup, things they are a changing. When it is normal that a news editor would assign someone to discover what the fascination is about big dear, or any large-game animal, what future is there for the sport? And as is pointed out in the above photograph, “Do ya think the anti-hunting, anti-trophy folks got a hand in this?”

YOU BET!