Lead it go

I'm not big on the non-lead push. The details just don't support going lead-free.

It's like the video of some kids catching a mouse/rat and "releasing it into the wild" to have a hawk grab it as it scurries for cover. All the time & effort for nothing. Lead bullets are not like DDT that caused thin egg shells and almost wiped out all birds and raptors.


The condors were a big reason for lead bullet bans. YET they still say current condor deaths are 50% from lead poisoning - funny cause lead bullets were banned. Go figure. Where are they getting the lead?

Eagles, birds, and even whales die in large numbers from windmills (onshore and off) yet the GOVT persist in building the damned things. But the few eagles (they don't put numbers to it, just "widespread") that die from lead poisoning are somehow all hunters' problem and GOVT is gonna save them.

Google regarding wind mills
"Impact and Scope: A 2026 estimate suggests that golden eagle mortality from wind turbines in the western U.S. has risen to roughly 270 per year." (Note: This is golden eagles alone, not including bald eagles or other birds. - that's like 5 per week)

"A subsidiary of one of the largest U.S. providers of renewable energy was ordered to pay over $8 million in fines and restitution, after at least 150 eagles (bald & golden) were killed at its wind farms in eight states"

"Wind turbines have long garnered scrutiny for killing birds that fly into their spinning blades or tall towers. Much of the data about bird deaths at wind facilities in the United States comes from studies published in 2013 and 2014. Those studies gave a wide range for the number of birds that die in wind turbine collisions each year: from 140,000 up to 679,000. The numbers are likely to be higher today, because many more wind farms have been built in the past decade."

A side note - I googled the whale deaths from offshore wind farms and it says none. Then googled all the dead whales that washed up on the NJ shore and got some information but only said like 12. Was following the dead whales a couple years ago and they had like 127 dead whales & dolphins while doing offshore windfarm stuff. That information was available last time I looked but is gone today. Hmm? They did say "The spike in deaths has caused debate over whether offshore wind energy development and associated sonar surveying are contributing to the fatalities."


Googled other things that kill eagles - avian flu, some kind of neuro disease, vehicles, and electrocution from power lines. They specifically blame hunter ammunition and don't mention windmills at all. Slanted BS.

So - until they stop targeting hunting and shooting, be very suspicious.
 
For anyone who is interested, you can read all about the efficacy of lead bans.


TLDR is that, among golden eagles and vultures, the incidence of lead poisoning dropped way off, to essentially negligible levels, after the statewide ban on lead bullets in California. For anyone who says "vultures are not condors", they used turkey vultures and golden eagles because there are a lot more turkey vultures. There are approximately 400 total wild condors.

On a personal note, I have seen the blocks of gel with lead fragments scattered all over. I had not given the issue much thought before that. I have no desire to put that into my body or my family's body. Lead exposure, like most environmental exposures, is cumulative. If I only eat an elk steak once a year, the risk is low. If I kill an elk, then I am going to obviously eat a lot more elk and my risk goes up. I would prefer not to expose myself to neurotoxins on a regular basis.
 
On a personal note, I have seen the blocks of gel with lead fragments scattered all over. I had not given the issue much thought before that. I have no desire to put that into my body or my family's body. Lead exposure, like most environmental exposures, is cumulative. If I only eat an elk steak once a year, the risk is low. If I kill an elk, then I am going to obviously eat a lot more elk and my risk goes up. I would prefer not to expose myself to neurotoxins on a regular basis.
Your personal choices are your own. They should not be forced upon others. I've been consuming small game and upland birds shot exclusively with lead pellets my entire life. I do not have lead poisoning. I've consumed deer killed with lead ammunition for 30 years and do not have lead poisoning. In fact, I don't know of anybody in my family, friends, or acquaintences that have ever had lead poisoning.

Wind turbines kill dramatically more raptors and other bird species annually than lead. However, this "green energy" mortality has been acknowledged by environmental groups, and wind turbine expansion is increasing in the US with no plans to ban construction that I've seen. As a result, a nationwide ban on lead ammunition is not a serious or legitimate response. Rather, it is part of a larger agenda to incrementally restrict and make hunting more difficult, adding pressure to already decreasing participation nationwide.

Make no mistake, the end game of environmental and animal rights groups is a wholesale ban on trapping and hunting. Banning fishing would be icing on the cake. This is not fantasy or tin hat rheotric. All one has to do is look at the efforts to ban hunting, fishing, and trapping in OR and the incremental restrictions and bans in CO.
 
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