Saturday, February 13, 2016

Northern Shrike

Sent off a scathing (well, not really) e-mail to the DNR this morning.  I read an article in the February Department of Natural Resources magazine about their program for stocking ring-necked pheasants in the state.  The article said at the very beginning that this kind of pheasant comes from Asia.  Then goes through the history of the DNR's raising and stocking of native birds until the late 50's when they switched entirely to pheasants.  They just opened a new hatchery which cost well over a million dollars of taxpayer money.    I asked why a state agency would stock a non-native species?  Did they learn nothing from all of the damage done by the introduction of other non-native's - buckthorn trees, zebra mussels, kudzu, starlings, Asian silver carp, crazy worms, etc. ?  Why not use hunting fees to raise and stock native ruffed grouse?  I doubt I will get an answer but I think I already know it and it's not pretty.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Good on ya! Makes me mad when our tax money is misused also.
Rebecca