On the points of culling, and varmint removal:
Culling:
Every year, the US sells licenses to hunt various animals whose populations need to be controlled due to the past elimination of predators from the regions those animals populate. This is a vitally neccessary act, as without the human hunters taking the place of animal predation that no longer exists, those prey animals would overpopulate, denude the local flora, and cause mass starvations of not only their own species, but other animals that live in those areas as well. The number of licenses sold is carefully calculated based on population size and expected food supply, and poaching is a punishable offense. The hunted populations are in no danger of extinction as a result of licensed hunting.
It is all well and good to say that we should not have gotten rid of the natural predators, but that is not the reality of the situation. The reality is, those predators are gone, and something needs to take their place. Efforts are underway to introduce predators to areas where they have been hunted out, but these efforts will never restore the ecological balance of those areas, while man lives in them. Our herds and children must be safe, and no one is going to choose wolves et al over cows and children.
Varmints:
Gophers, rats, opossums, raccoons and the like are a constant pest, and many pose threats to health and agriculture as well. While many varmints are not predators per se, they 'predate' upon valuable crops, making them just as dangerous as wolves, albeit to a much different demographic group (carrots instead of kids, asparagus instead of cattle). With their natural predators gone, at the hands of humans, it is up to us to become their new predators. The simple fact is, we are the fittest, and we survived.
Observations:
In the US, there are two groups lobbying Congress on behalf of the environment: groups which, in addition to desiring strong pollution controls, are opposed to all hunting, trapping, and fishing, and hunting groups which also desire pollution controls, who are also lobbying to protect the environments that the animals they hunt live in. The two best examples are GreenPeace for the first group, and Ducks Unlimited for the second.
GreenPeace raises money, buys ships, and rams them into tuna boats and pesters naval vessels, and generally makes a nuisance of themselves.
Ducks Unlimited raises money, buys wetlands, and then sits on the deeds and does not a damn thing with the land except let hunters, fishers, and trappers exercise their licenses. We already know that licensed hunting is good for the environment, so it is obvious that DU is doing a very positive thing for the environment.
Both groups also raise holy hell over things like drilling for oil or mining in wildlife preserves.
Conclusions:
The sun has set upon the wolf and the lion. The day of man has dawned. Let all the beasts of the earth tremble at his approach. On the bright side, given that man has shouldered this new burden responsibly, human hunters will probably not trigger a global apocalypse. That will come from boy bands.
