instead of Uggs, mukluk boots

[roo4]

Oakleaf,

Here in PA, Black Bears and Coyotes are significant predators of fawns. They might not pull down an adult deer on a regular basis, but they do target fawns. And we have a lot of bears, last year's harvest was over 3500 statewide.

[lph]

But isn't what the Arctic can support based on traditional hunting lifestyles with a tremendous emphasis on meat? Hard to replicate these days.

If I were to base my intake of food on local produce it would be severely limited. Potatoes, onions, cabbage, beets. I'm not saying I couldn't, and I do try to keep my intake of off-season and greenhouse vegetables to a reasonable level.

[OakLeaf]

Here in PA, Black Bears and Coyotes are significant predators of fawns. They might not pull down an adult deer on a regular basis, but they do target fawns. And we have a lot of bears, last year's harvest was over 3500 statewide.

3500 bears vs 390,000 deer taken by human hunters in Pennsylvania last year? Sorry, I'm not seeing how that bear population is enough to balance the deer population without human predation.

And @lph - I know - I'm far, far from the ideal myself, but living where I do, it's just a different equation. Sustainable food is fairly easy, but sustainable transportation is hard. We all do our best as individuals, but I'm talking as a matter of policy, to what extent unsustainable lifestyles should be supported and encouraged.

The first chapter or so of Animal, Vegetable, Miracle - the chapter(s) where Kingsolver talks about her motivations, first for moving out of the desert and second for her family's yearlong effort - are what I'm talking about.

I'm not expecting everyone to make that kind of effort; she herself did it only for a year. But for what our policymakers ought to be encouraging, I don't see it as any different from building more and more narrow, busy, sidewalk-free roads, instead of investing in public transit and bike/ped facilities.

[roo4]

Oakleaf,

I was responding to this post:

"Something like 120,000 white-tailed deer are harvested each year in each STATE. I'd be surprised if black bears hunt deer - are you sure of that? They're not much bigger than deer ..."


In fact, black bears do prey on deer and a significant amount of fawns are killed each year by bears.

As for this comment:

"3500 bears vs 390,000 deer taken by human hunters in Pennsylvania last year? Sorry, I'm not seeing how that bear population is enough to balance the deer population without human predation."

I never said that the bear population was enough to balance the deer population and in fact I agree that hunting is necessary to keep the deer numbers down to a sustainable level.