Deer Hunting Laws in North Carolina

Introduction

During the initial stages of European settlement of North America, the activity of hunting was tremendously influenced by the practices and perceptions of the Old World. During the Middle Ages, hunting in Europe had been transformed from a means of subsistence to almost exclusively a leisure activity for idle and wealthy men that primarily reinforced a hierarchical social structure. With the relative scarcity of abundant food sources and lack of security in and around many colonial enclaves in North America, European immigrants quickly amended traditional views toward hunting. Out of necessity, early American colonists became adept in the use of firearms and hunted often and without most of the social restrictions evident across the Atlantic. By the eighteenth century, hunting was commonplace among men of virtually all social classes within the American colonies, especially in the frontier regions.

Discussion and Analysis

Hunting is the practice of pursuing or trapping and killing animals for food, sport, or trade (usually fur). Some people consider trapping to be separate from hunting, but the activities are both governed by the same laws. Illegal hunting (such as of species protected by law or not in season, or on grounds where you do not have the legal right to hunt) is called poaching, whether it involves pursuit or trapping (Hall, pp. 532-542). Mammals or birds that are the object of the hunt are called game. Fishing is generally considered a separate activity, though it is also bound by laws and regulated by the Fish & Wildlife or Fish & Game agencies of the local jurisdiction.

Hunting is a controversial activity, whether or not it is done for food. Hunting advocates claim that hunting keeps wildlife populations in check healthily, the way grazing benefits plant life. Opponents claim otherwise or protest regulations that permit what they consider overhunting or the disruption of the natural ecosystem. Vegetarian animal rights groups like People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals oppose hunting—as they oppose all harm done to animals—to an extreme extent; however, hunting opponents include many unrepentant meat-eaters as well, who argue that hunting is cruel and unusual (because of the fear felt by the animal, or because the weaponry used may be overkill and can cause the animal more suffering than death in a slaughterhouse would), that it is poorly regulated with little oversight, and that it is too often wasteful.

There are few requirements as to what hunters must do with their kills, for instance; although there are regulations about what they may sell, and which animals are too young to be killed, hunters are not required to do anything at all with their kills, and a pursuit that originated to defend the village and provide meat for families may legally result in nothing more than a heap of dead animals. It sometimes seems there is little middle ground in the hunting debates, with the extreme positions co-opted by animal rights organizations on the one side and gun rights organizations on the other, neither of which pursue ...