Doug Hamm of Williams Lake doesn’t agree with the recent attempt by Yunesit’in (Stone) First Nations to ban the legal limited entry hunt for moose in the Chilcotin.
Hamm, who has been a moose hunter for more than 40 years, said he’s angered by the two sets of hunting rules for First Nations and non-First Nations and blames the government for the situation.
“We should all have to buy a hunting license, buy a tag, and adhere by the same rules,” Hamm said. “Do you know what would happen if you called and said you thought Doug Hamm shot a cow moose? Those guys would be up at my property, tearing my freezer apart ... I’d be hung out to dry.”
Hamm prides himself on being an ethical and legal hunter and in fact believes a 100 per cent ban on moose hunting in the area is needed to recover the population.
“I love moose hunting, my whole family loves moose hunting, but there shouldn’t be any allowed in the Cariboo because we are virtually losing our moose in the Cariboo area.”
This autumn, Hamm and his son obtained a three-week LEH for hunting area 5-14, Hamm’s first in 10 years.
“That’s west of the Fraser to Alexis Creek and north to Quesnel, everything Meldrum Creek, Mackin Creek, Rudy’s bridge, Alexis Lakes, all that area,” Hamm said. “We drove all those miles, we quadded, walked and called. We did not find one, not even one old moose track in the dirt.”
It was really, really disheartening, he said.
“When I read in the Tribune about the blockades going to be on bridges for hunting units 5-3, 5-4, and 5-5, I know why they aren’t going to be blockading Rudy’s bridge, there’s no moose over there,” Hamm said.
Hamm said he has heard stories about hunting that make him angry.
Out at Puntzi one December recently, Hamm said he saw ravens circling. He walked in snow up to his knees off the road a few yards and found a whole cow moose that had been shot.
The tongue and nose had been taken. The cow had not been gutted, and there was no attempt to take a hind quarter.
“Twenty miles later, ravens again, here was a good sized calf moose, same thing. Shot, tongue and nose taken, nothing else,” Hamm said.