NOV, 2012 "In The Crosshairs"
Wednesday November 21,
2012
Educational Seminars Offered
At 41st Annual SCI Convention: “Tucson, Ariz. – A
variety of educational seminars will be available for interested
attendees of the 41st Annual
Safari Club International Hunters’ Convention in Reno, NV Jan.
23-26. ‘We are proud to offer a long list of educational seminars
held each and every day of convention,’ said SCI President John
Whipple. ‘Our annual convention offers much more than a place to
catch up with old hunting friends and book a hunt,’ he concluded.
Seminars are complementary for convention attendees and are repeated
throughout the four-day convention. This year’s featured seminars
include 'Whitetail Food Plotting for Small Acreages'
presented by Paul Cwiklinski, ‘Field Dress Like the
Experts’ with Ron Dube, ‘Fierce Fishes of the
Amazon’ by Paul Reiss, ‘Creating the Perfect Trophy
Room’ by Tom Julian, and ‘Making Sure Your Trophy
Gets Home’ which will be given by SCI attorney Anna Seidman
and focus on the challenges of trophy documentation and
importation.” (Source: Howard Communications) To read more, please
visit http://bit.ly/10uYp4t.
Trijicon Sponsors 2013 SCI
Veterans’ Breakfast: Trijicon, long known for its
“brilliant aiming solutions,” is sponsoring the 2013 Safari Club
International Veterans’ Breakfast to be held Friday, January 25,
2013 at the Naples Ballroom in the Peppermill Resort in Reno,
Nevada. The event runs from 8:00 am until 10:00 am with doors
opening at 7:30 am. The program includes presentations by CWO Brad
Garfield, USMC, Retired–a wounded warrior, decorated veteran and
hunter; Michael Petersen–country western singer and stalwart
military supporter who has made numerous trips to the Middle East
entertaining coalition troops; and Jim Shockey–TV personality,
outfitter and hunter. To read more, please visit SCI’s HuntForever
blog here. http://bit.ly/ZZmyRi
SCI In Court Challenging ESA Settlement:
Yesterday, SCI argued before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the
District of Columbia against two massive ESA settlements that
“fundamentally reorder” the entire ESA listing program. The
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service privately negotiated these
settlements with only two litigious private groups. SCI oppose
the settlements because they illegally force the Service to propose
listing rules for hundreds of species, including three game species:
the greater sage grouse, lesser prairie-chicken, and New England
cottontail. SCI appealed both (1) the District Court’s refusal
to even let Safari Club participate in the case to comment on the
illegality of the settlements and (2) that Court’s approval of the
settlements. A decision from the Court of Appeals is expected
in the next couple of months.
SCI Joins Minnesota DNR in Defense of Wolf Hunt:
The Minnesota Court of Appeals has granted SCI leave to participate
in a lawsuit brought by animal rights groups that seeks to stop the
state's wolf season. SCI has joined the case to help the
Minnesota Department of Natural Resources defend the legality of the
wolf hunt. This is Minnesota's first wolf hunt since the U.S. Fish
and Wildlife Service removed Minnesota's wolves from the federal
threatened species list. SCI is also participating in another
lawsuit in Wisconsin to help the Wisconsin DNR defend a challenge
regarding Wisconsin's wolf harvest.
SCI Helps Secure Victory in
Calif., Nev. Wild Horse Gather Case: Washington –
Safari Club International (SCI) defeated the animal rights group In
Defense of Animals in a major court battle over management of feral
populations of horses in accordance with federal law. On
November 15, 2012, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District
of California rejected the horse groups’ claims that the Bureau of
Land Management’s (BLM) gather of the excess wild horses and burros
violated federal law. The case focused on the Twin Peaks Horse
Management Area (HMA), located on the northern border of California
and Nevada. The BLM conducted the gather during August and
September 2010, after SCI joined the BLM in defeating the horse
groups’ emergency request to halt the gather. To read more, please
visit SCI’s FirstForHunters advocacy blog here:
http://bit.ly/RUnOAS.
ICCF Holds Congressional Hearing On
Global Poaching Crisis: On Thursday, Nov. 15 the
International Conservation Caucus Foundation (ICCF) held a hearing
on the Global Poaching Crisis for members of the U.S. Congress and
their staff. The hearing’s purpose was to discuss the recent,
unprecedented spike in illegal trade in wildlife and links to
organized terrorism. The U.S. State Department, launched by
Secretary of State Hilary Clinton at her November 8 meeting
“Wildlife Trafficking and Conservation: A Call to Action”, has
taken an interest in wildlife poaching because of a suspected link
between the illegal trade of wildlife and terrorist groups like al-Shabaab
and al Qaeda. To read more about the ICCF hearing, please visit SCI
Foundation’s blog here: http://bit.ly/TYy4YN.
How To Hunt Fall Turkeys (For
Your Thanksgiving Feast): “Fall was the original turkey
season. We eat turkey at Thanksgiving, not Easter, yet the
generation of hunters that came of age during the bird’s ‘great
comeback’ sees turkey hunting as a spring-only pursuit. Although
many turkey hunters have never tried it, they’ll tell you the fall
hunt is boring (‘Turkey hunting is all about the gobble’) or wrong
(‘I’d never kill a hen’). They’re missing out. Half a dozen lost
turkeys converging on you from six different directions gets your
heart going every bit as fast as a spring gobbler at 30 steps does.”
(Source: Field&Stream.com) To read
more about fall turkey hunting tactics, please visit
http://bit.ly/XW4J6s
Farm Bill Could Be Part Of
Solution: “ST. PAUL — A farm bill awaiting
congressional action is being viewed more and more as a partial
solution to the federal government’s debt and budget crisis. The
farm bill and impending ‘fiscal cliff’ are being linked because new
federal farm policy could produce billions of dollars in savings.
‘There is a growing recognition that this could be part of the
puzzle,’ said Sen. Kent Conrad, the North Dakota Democrat who leads
the Senate Budget Committee and is a key player in fiscal cliff
negotiations.” (Source:
Republican-Eagle.com) To read more, please visit
http://bit.ly/Xt4Szj
Gun Owners Enter The Fight Of
Our Lives: “The NRA has been saying all along that
Barack Obama would unleash an assault on our Second Amendment
freedoms if he won a second term. It sure didn’t take long for him
to prove us right. Just hours after Obama won re-election last
Tuesday, his administration endorsed a new effort by the global gun
grabbers at the United Nations to draft a gun ban treaty early next
year. The official starting point for the new talks is last year’s
failed draft, which contains provisions that threaten our sovereign
right to keep and bear arms through an international gun
registration scheme.” (Source:
DailyCaller.com) To read more, please visit
http://bit.ly/WpVkDB
Moose, Two Calves Illegally Shot &
Left Behind In Grand County: “A Colorado Parks and
Wildlife official called the shooting of a moose and her two calves
‘outrageous’ and authorities are asking for the public's help to
find the person responsible. A reward of up to $7,500 reward is
being offered by the state and Safari Club International,
a sportsman and wildlife conservation organization.” (Source:
DenverPost.com) To read more,
please visit http://bit.ly/TbVHyy
South Africa: North West
Considers Calling in Army As More Rhinos Are Killed:
“Pretoria — The North West provincial government is considering
asking the South African National Defence Force to assist in
overcoming the scourge of rhino poaching, Premier Thandi Modise
says. Modise's statement follows the killing of seven rhinos at a
game farm near Sun City at the weekend. This brings to 21 the number
of rhinos killed in the province in recent weeks.” (Source:
AllAfrica.com) To read more,
please visit http://bit.ly/TMEzvp
Tanzania Minister Calls for
Tougher Poaching Laws: “In the face of an operation
that has unearthed millions worth of product of illicit hunting, the
Minister for Natural Resources and Tourism Hamis Kagasheki has urged
the government to consider increasing jail time to up to 60 years
for poaching.” (Source: AllAfrica.com)
To read more, please visit http://bit.ly/XW9ZXy