Hunting Accidents - Human Factors

[baguio]

They have their place, but I do think contractors are a very very poor substitute for full or part time staff whether its in Forestry, Health Service, Business, Agriculture, Science or Academia.

Abd I struggle to see how full time deer culling contractors can actually make a living. I suspect most are pretty much just about breaking even once they take in the true costs involved of vehicles, fuel, kit and clothing, accomodation etc. i suspect they are well below min wage levek with no benefits.

Meanwhile the houses that used to accomodate staff are now Air BnBs.

I think that you underestimate just how many deer some of the contractors are culling. Some of their numbers are eye watering! They go in, shoot 20 deer and move on. It would take quite a while for the average hobby stalker to shoot 20 deer and they would stress out the herd a lot more in the process. No I appreciate that the hobby stalker could be (although probably isn't) more selective but when the population is through the roof the contractor most definitely does have a place.

 

[Kalahari]

Wish you'd kept him once he was trained.

The training was p poor.

David.

 

[Heym SR20]

I think that you underestimate just how many deer some of the contractors are culling. Some of their numbers are eye watering! They go in, shoot 20 deer and move on. It would take quite a while for the average hobby stalker to shoot 20 deer and they would stress out the herd a lot more in the process. No I appreciate that the hobby stalker could be (although probably isn't) more selective but when the population is through the roof the contractor most definitely does have a place.

I absolutely do understand the types of culling they do. I have done it in the past when I used to help out on an estate up North. 20 hinds in the snow, all skinned and butchered then 20 the following day.

Contractors have their place, but as said above no substitute for full time people on the ground.

What’s happening is that well funder developer are buying up large swathes of land. Get rid of all the staff and tenants, especially tenant farmers. Sell off or rent out houses. Where you can plant yet more housing around the villages etc. do minimal levels of infrastructure so you maximise profit. And don’t about all the extra **** going down the sewers, traffic, schools etc that somebody else’s problem.

Stick in a windfarm or solar farm. Fence off the rest using fencing contractors, shoot all the deer and plant trees. Sell it all for a large sum to large corporate or institutional investor.

They no can extract full value by:
1) increasing their own share price by ticking the ESG box
2) adding fluffy pictures on their marketing
3) selling in carbon credits so that electric car manufacturers can claim zero net emissions etc etc.

Most of these new owners / investors will never even visit the land. Its just a pin on a map or a line on the balance sheet.

And if their is any farm land you get a big contractor to farm thousands of acres.

In the meantime the heart and soul is stripped out of rural communities. Nobody makes a living from the land, they all end up driving desks.

And there is an intinerant contracting workforce who live in temp accommodation, struggle to make ends meet but thats fine because they are all part of the new gig economy.

And yes I do know what I am talking about - I worked with those who are putting these sorts of plans together and funding them, or now reinvesting the proceeds. Mostly the money is now from offshore “family offices”.

 

[long_range_rob]

I’m still a believer that accidents are down to mechanical failure or acts of god. Everything else are incidents and can be root caused to human factors.

 

[baguio]

What’s happening is that well funder developer are buying up large swathes of land. Get rid of all the staff and tenants, especially tenant farmers. Sell off or rent out houses. Where you can plant yet more housing around the villages etc. do minimal levels of infrastructure so you maximise profit. And don’t about all the extra **** going down the sewers, traffic, schools etc that somebody else’s problem.

I don't doubt that you have most of that nailed but the councils have a responsibility to be tougher on developers when it comes to infrastructure. The children living in these new houses do need schools etc and the Council need to ensure that they ring a good bit out of the developer to pay for and build at least some of it!

 

[Heym SR20]

I don't doubt that you have most of that nailed but the councils have a responsibility to be tougher on developers when it comes to infrastructure. The children living in these new houses do need schools etc and the Council need to ensure that they ring a good bit out of the developer to pay for and build at least some of it!

Councils are simple. They all drive fancy cars and have nice houses. And they have honourary membership at the golf club.

As for schools etc, most developers get around this with multiple little companies each doing a small development so they are below the threshold for having to meet all those requirements. Or they go bust conveniently when it’s scheduled they have to make their contribution to the public pot. And they go bust because of the very high fees these companies have to pay to the contractors doing the building work, and who are supervising the work. But of course these in way related to the prime developer.

And its made even more fun by using offshore companies as prime contractors. Councils have no chance nor any inclination. And who cares if electorate whine and whinge. Most councillors, MPs etc will have sufficient to live comfortably ever after.

Clarkson’s farm battle with local councillors is going on all over the UK. Any body actually wanting to do something ends up dealing with these sorts of idiots.

But its OK as the all the red tape is now blue tape.

 

[User00053]

Would like to think on the accident front in terms of accidental shootings in uk or lack of them its down to the basics been instilled into many as children and from a very young age and just part of you in terms of what safe and generally acceptable and over rides anything else for the most part.
Still accidents do happen from time to time, flankers getting peppered, odd deaf person shooting after horn blown, and even with sticks up in butts odd gun shooting another even with loader/ nanny present.
Prime example been a true sportsman of much experience who shot his neighbour on grouse drive and such was his shame did not shoot for a few years after and the last person you would have thought to have swung through the line and fired. Now morning safety talks advise that you will use the safety sticks provided or else!
Always the odd tragedy happens but that’s life, but think those using rifles in uk extremely safe and aware people judging by the lack of accidents reported, so must be a reason and think a lot is part of been british

 

[User00053]

meant to say in previous rant that accidents and irresponsible actions clearly two different things, only accident that stays with me was blowing a hole in the ground in front of my foot when hammer slipped in wet.

 

[Freeforester]

There’s generally minimal alcohol consumed when handling rifles here in the U.K., tinnies round the campfire aren’t really our style, generally speaking; nor are there much by way of ‘battues’, nor hounds giving tongue to game afoot and getting the post-lunch, well-lubricated chasseurs un peut dérangé. It may also be noted, paradoxically enough, on this side of the water we seem to possess a soupçon more of ‘sang-froid’ - maybe it’s generally colder too, but that doesn’t stop the Swedish and Norwegian incidents almost annually - skål!

The use of handheld thermal image units to check and identify clearly what one sees can be no bad thing, though I understand that they are nowadays beginning to be used a bit more in NZ than hitherto.

As ever - Safety First!

 

[Cootmeurer]

NZ has a rifle-deer hunting culture that is accessible to all due to DOC (Department of Conservation) land.

If the UK were to open up the equivalent (FE and FLS) land to all and sundry rec stalkers as some here want, instead of contractors, then larders would have less coming in whilst the morgue would see more...

Not necessarily. In the USA we have around 15 million paid hunting license holders and usually less than 100 fatalities per year, and decreasing yearly. Of those fatalities a significant percentage are falling from tree stands/high seats. One major factor that reduces our public ground shooting fatalities is the mandatory wear of either blaze Orange or blaze pink. While it can happen, it’s damned hard to mistake a blaze Orange suit for a deer.

 

[User00040]

Not necessarily. In the USA we have around 15 million paid hunting license holders and usually less than 100 fatalities per year, and decreasing yearly. Of those fatalities a significant percentage are falling from tree stands/high seats. One major factor that reduces our public ground shooting fatalities is the mandatory wear of either blaze Orange or blaze pink. While it can happen, it’s damned hard to mistake a blaze Orange suit for a deer.

Most states have hunter saftey courses too, yes?

 

[Ranger6555]

2 Feet minimum of solid backstop behind target. Dont pull the trigger until you have positively identified your quarry. Its not rocket science.

 

[Taff]

The use of handheld thermal image units to check and identify clearly what one sees can be no bad thing, though I understand that they are nowadays beginning to be used a bit more in NZ than hitherto.

As ever - Safety First!

Thermals have been used in nz for at least 15 yrs on private land, they are not allowed on DOC land. Not sure if you have hunted bush, but a thermal is not that useful, it would probably cause more shootings.

 

[Mungo]

It’s also possible that the fact that the bulk of carcasses go to game dealers might affect things. People seem to take that little bit longer thinking about the shot if they know the money they get for it is affected by carcass quality. I know this isn’t always the case, but I know plenty of people who will turn down a shot if they think they’ll get an opportunity for a cleaner shot later.

 

[Freeforester]

Thermals have been used in nz for at least 15 yrs on private land, they are not allowed on DOC land. Not sure if you have hunted bush, but a thermal is not that useful, it would probably cause more shootings.

Be interesting to see a breakdown in the numbers where the fatalities occur, whether on private or DOC land.

 

[User00053]

Couple of academics from Huddersfield uni produced a piece of work entitled mistaken -for-game hunting accidents in 2015, 25 pages worth, best of British

 

[Cootmeurer]

Most states have hunter saftey courses too, yes?

Indeed. One upon a time there was a grandfathered exclusion age of those that didn’t need to course certificate, but that exclusion is aging out. It is usually around a birthdate of 1970 +/- a few years.

I would also point out that on quite a bit of public ground, ALL users must wear blaze Orange (walkers, mushroom foragers, etc..) . That doesn’t stop idiots from being idiots, but at least it makes them partially culpable. That is one thing I do like about the systems you have - an idiot can freely choose to walk across a pasture that has cattle, but that idiot is culpable if they managed to get stomped. Under our system, unless signs are posted and significant efforts are made to prevent access, that cow stomped idiot then can sue the farmer

 

[tarponhead]

There has been a recent thread on whether or not Forestry is safe Backdrop. This has led to several comments thta we have a very low hunter accident rate in the UK and thus chances of an accident are very low. Also comment that New Zealand has a very accident rate, which prompted me to do a little quick research using Google. Having been involved in potentially dangerous sports for most of my life - paragliding, offpiste skiing etc, risk mitigation is a very constant thread, and a large part of the learning is looking at causes and how to avoid becoming a statistic. And more experience in many many cases is a contributing factor to many many accidents.

New Zealand is a country with a land mass about that of the UK, but with a population about that of Scotland. But New Zealand has a very high fatal shooting accident rate amongst hunters.

Just found this interesting paper on Hunting Accidents in New Zealand published in 2015. Most seem to happen with experienced hunters and their brain fills in the bits that are missing, and the brain becomes convinced that it is a deer. We all know how that white patch is the bum of a deer, and that brown bit to the left is the body etc. And Heuristic factors come into play as well. The guide has put me in this highseat and said any shot is safe etc etc.

Third Paragraph of the introduction

On average, a hunter is accidentally killed every nine months in New Zealand. To date in 2015, there have been two accidents where target misidentification was a factor, one of which was fatal. The majority of fatalities involving misidentified targets occur in big game as opposed to small game hunting. In New Zealand the accidents primarily involve deer hunting. A 2003 report1 by Inspector Joe Green of the New Zealand Police analysed 33 fatal deer hunting accidents occurring between 1979 and 2002. Incorrect target identification was by far the largest contributor (64%) in the cases examined, and figures from overseas appear to be similar, if not higher.

https://eprints.hud.ac.uk/id/eprint/28868/1/Mistaken for Game Hunting accidents – a human factors review - Final - V9.0.pdf



Doing some further quick reading - this article on Fishing Outdoors NZ does add some interesting thoughts. A lot of NZ hunting accidents probably being driven by the view that the only good deer is a dead deer, and any deer seen should be shot. Hence lots of pressure to shoot deer. Translate this to the UK, and the current view from the powers that be that deer are pests, and contractors are being paid per deer shot etc. This is just adding huge pressures on deer being shot. Even more reason why we should be very very mindful of correct identification of targets etc.

Analysis of hunting accidents offers a sobering reflection | Fishing and Outdoors

The Human Factors reveiw paper is well worth a quick read as it does rather highlight a lot of things that we all should be thinking about. Especially the fact that the majority of fatal accidents came about through incorrect target identification - "I was sure it was a deer".

Discuss

Interesting thread. I was stalking with very experienced guide and we spent 10 minutes tor more, scrutinising a hot lump with thermals before we decided to try and flush what we thought was a fallow deer sat under a tree,. We could definitely see an ear and a rump as it moved a bit. Longer story short, what we “flushed” was an old guy, sat on a bucket with a .22 rim fire waiting for squirrels, who should not have been there. Quarry ID is the most important safety mindset, after assuming a gun is always loaded and being strict about muzzle awareness and safe drills. Not the first time, either.

 

[User00053]

Every picture tell a story, don’t it?