Why Is The Government Shooting Cows From Helicopters?

I’m an animal lover. I can’t say that I am particularly fond of cows, but generally I love animals. The idea that our government is shooting cows from helicopters because they are feral cows is offensive to me.

On Saturday, Townhall reported the following:

This weekend, cows roaming in southwest New Mexico’s Gila National Forest are being hunted from helicopters after the United States Forest Service (USFS) decided to move forward with plans to use “lethal methods” to “remove…approximately 150 head of cattle” in Gila National Forest’s second chopper hunt in as many years.

The article goes on to explain that the cows that are shot will be left to decompose naturally unless they are near water, a hiking trail, or a ‘culturally sensitive area’ whatever that it. So I have a question. If you are going to shoot the cows, why not take them to a meat processing plant, have the meat processed and use it to feed people who are hungry? We are always hearing about the problem of hunger is America, wouldn’t giving the people who need food this beef help with that problem?

The article concludes:

Beyond the cruelty Sullivan [Ranchers-Cattlemen Action Legal Fund United Stockgrowers of America (R-CALF USA) Property Rights Committee Chair Shad Sullivan] accused the U.S. Forest Service of employing, he said a larger issue “may be the unchecked power by unelected bureaucrats within governmental agencies setting a precedent for how federal officials handle authority” and the fact that area cattle ranchers are “contending that the USFS isn’t abiding by its own regulations.”

Apparently, this weekend’s hunt has been “decades in the making” according to local cattle growers:

Over the years, by over-regulation or otherwise, allotment owners have left or have been removed from the area, leaving the land vacant and without proper management. This resulted in remnants of cattle herds being left behind. With no plans by USFS to reactivate vacant allotments and lengthy and unsuccessful contract applications for a more humane cattle removal plan, the decades-long problem has come to a head. 

Sullivan further cited “pressure from environmental groups” as weighing on the Forest Service’s decision to use helicopter hunters to put down the cattle. He and R-CALF USA maintain their call for the USFS to “consider other options, such as seeking applications for private individuals to gather the cattle over time or, at least, putting the meat from the estray cattle to good use such as for feeding people in need.”

So, your tax dollars at work: funding chopper cow hunters that will leave some 65 tons of otherwise good beef to decompose in a national forest because otherwise 150 cows might trample some grass in the three million acre reserve. 

Government overreach at its finest.