RICHMOND — Amid growing complaints and concerns, Virginia’s game department on Tuesday began a study to look at potential regulations on the use of dogs in hunting.
Lee Toliver wrote a great article for the Hampton Roads Pilot talking about Virginia’s policy on allowing hunting for deer with hounds.
Hunting with hounds has been a long standing tradition in Virginia brought over by the English and has flourished ever since. I have spent the last several years in Virginia around dog hunters and in areas where dogs are not allowed. The issue has been a tremendous issue and as Virginia moves to study both hunting with hounds and allowing hunting on Sundays. Both of these issues will be tied together because as soon as a group of hounds runs a deer by the church grounds some folks are going to get really upset.
In Virginia anything that we can do to continue to work on the tremendous overpopulation of deer and keep people hunting I am willing to support it. At first I was very against hunting deer with hounds but I am not the kind of person who is going to tell people who have lived their entire lives hunting deer this way to stop. I have seen areas though that I believe the only way it could of been hunted was with hounds. I have talked with many men who I believe to be great hunters and very ethical men who love hearing the hounds on the chase behind a nice deer. I personally do not hunt this way but I have shot a fat doe that was driven to me while in a stand by some ones dog. I heard the barking and looked up and there was the doe.
I hope the state of Virginia at least hears both sides of the argument and really listens to the public and offers a fair alternative. As a tradition that so many love, I think there will probably be some kind of compromise on this situation and maybe they will have some kind of two week season for hunters with hounds.
