Hunt them varmints & vermin

Well, good old Bobcat Bill got his bobcat hunting bill (HB4226) through both houses of the Lincolnland legislature without even considering or allowing biological or ecological testimony. Here's a little background on this purely stupid action. Bobcat hunting was banned in Illinois in 1972 after the species became threatened.  Bobcat populations have recovered in several counties - a recent SIU study found significant recovery in 17 counties in Southern Lincolnland, but there is no data to suggest at what level the population can sustain hunting. What is it that motivates some people to want to shoot (or trap) anything they see?  Bobcats are important apex predators (and certainly not unwanted or undesirable as the definition of varmints and vermin suggests) that live on a diet of rodents and small mammals and contribute to an overall healthy ecosystem, and they are not responsible for the loss of quail or turkey as some proponents of this bill suggested. The bill that passed has significant problematic issues.  First, the bill does not limit the areas or set bobcat population standards for counties to restrict hunting; hunting can be allowed in any county in the state. There may be a bobcat in our area, and if so then probably a young male, and this bill would allow our population of 1 to be hunted, and then there would be none. Second, the proposed hunting season overlaps portions of the bobcat breeding season, putting both bobcats with kittens and pregnant bobcats at risk. This is generally at odds with any good hunting practices. Finally, there is no emergency or automatic procedure to close the season if the species becomes threatened again. There has been significant citizen opposition on this bill and it helped to almost defeat the bill in the Senate (passed by one vote). There are other ways to enjoy wildlife than killing it, and it hunting is allowed where the bobcat is more populous, then the species will certainly not recover in other areas of the state. Ask the Governor to veto this bill by going to this link to sign a petition. Probably best to refrain if you're not a resident of this great nearly sterile state (more on this later). Do pass this blog on to other interested parties.

Don't need no stinkin' science

Us residents of Lincolnland are pretty lucky. Yes, there are legislators here that deny science, but there are also legislators in the state senate like Bill McCann who can do science so fast and easy that he should give lessons to us field researchers. It's been a long time since bobcats (Lynx rufus) were common in this state because like other cats it's a top predator and they are always the most vulnerable. So ultimately the bobcat ended up on the endangered species list, but in some areas, the populations have increased so that bobcats are no longer in danger. Of course, no one knows actually because the state DNR wildlifers and university biologists don't have the personnel or funding to monitor and study such populations, to find out how fast or slow the population is growing or declining.  But Senator McCann, well, he can just take a walk in the woods and you know every time he does he sees a bobcat, or 2 or 3, or 4 or 5. Really? Can we see the data? And how wide spread is this burgeoning population of bobcats in the state? The good senator just knows that bobcats now need to be hunted to manage their numbers. Heck, he don't need no stinkin' science, no troublesome data, we'll just make it legal to hunt those suckers. Now of course bobcat is a non-game species, and they need to be managed, to keep their numbers in check, because, well, because they might get a chicken or two somewhere.  So McCann proposes just the most banal form of hunting, shooting something just to shoot something. It probably wouldn't matter if there really was some scientific study because the good senator would just ignore the findings and recommendations anyways, unless the bobcat study said, "Shoot to kill." This is quite the display of ignorance from one of the boom-boom boys.