Attitude toward animals Neanderthal

It’s been said that you can judge a society by the way it treats its animals. If that’s the case, future generations surely will believe that Illinois legislators and Kane County officials were quite the Neanderthals for approving river otter trapping and, respectively, bow hunting in forest preserves.

Particular acknowledgment must be given to State Sen. Michael Noland for believing that Illinois needs to harvest the cute and adorable. Noland co-sponsored the bill to kill river otters. There is no justification for hunting and trapping a playful and appealing animal that is beneficial to a river environment. Noland lost my vote with his cruel political callousness.

As for Kane County, are they really not aware that turning our public preserves into private bow hunting reserves is an accident waiting to happen? There are two reasons why other counties do not allow hunting — safety and liability.

Picture a deer wounded from an arrow running madly into traffic. Imagine a deer with an arrow protruding from its body running into a backyard where children are present with the county permitted hunter in pursuit. These are very possible consequences that should dissuade anyone with common sense from approving bow hunting in our forest preserves.

Kane County was disingenuous in its presentations, using old (2008) traffic statistics to justify culling deer to reduce traffic accidents. The latest statistics (2011) from the Illinois Department of Transportation state that vehicle crashes involving deer continue to decline.

Also, the county seems unaware of the compensatory rebound effect. Hunting and culling results in the remaining does giving birth to twins and triplets, resulting in no population loss, or an increase. Proof of this is found in other counties that have been culling deer for decades, a killing spree with no relief in sight — even a Neanderthal would have known better.

Billita Jacobsen

Carpentersville