Teen Poaching Issue Rears Ugly Head Again

Strange and disturbing cases of teenage poaching incidents have been ignored by most media outlets over the last five years.

Deer massacres, dolphin shootings and numerous cases of eagle killings involving teens should concern the outdoors community and that’s why it’s the top of this week’s edition of Higher Calling Wildlife. Host Chester Moore and guest Jeff Stewart dig deep into the issue and hit on some uncomfortable but very relevant points.

Click to listen to this shocking episode.

More On Teen Poaching

The last Texas case we heard about was reported by Texas Parks & Wildlife Department officials last fall.

Orange County Game Wardens received a call from the Orange County Sheriff’s Office Dispatch reporting several deputies were attending to an alligator near Bridge City.

A ame warden responded to the popular fishing spot and discovered three teenagers had caught a 7-foot alligator. The youths had also enlisted the help of another person to kill it.  The three teenagers were cited for taking the alligator in closed season. The alligator was turned over to a nuisance control hunter. Cases are pending according to Texas Parks & Wildlife Department officials.

For the last four years  I have been writing about a concerning trend of teens poaching and in many cases killing endangered or otherwise completely protected species.

And no one seems to be addressing it head on.

And when our young people are involved in so much  concerning behavior, everyone from the hunting industry to wildlife organizations should be asking why.

This has to change and we must take off our blinders for not only the sake of wildlife but the teens themselves.

Poaching is not hunting. It is the antithesis of legal, regulated hunting and it damages wildlife populations in terrible ways.

We need to confront it here in America before it becomes an epidemic.

Unfortunately this kind of contempt for wildlife can be contagious.

Chester Moore