Thanksgiving, conservation and the US gun culture

It's Thanksgiving - one of the central US holidays, focused particularly on family get-togethers - vast numbers of people travelling, and consequently the institute is emptying fast, apart from rare migrants like myself. It's also thankfully relatively uncommercialized, apart from all the food, which is why there's been much disquiet at the decision of some big stores like Walmart to open tomorrow night - Thanksgiving evening - for the first time. I've been invited to several Thanksgiving dinners - people keep saying that nobody should be alone at Thanksgiving - so tomorrow's a day off from the office.

It's getting colder, but we've been in a 2 week dry spell under a canopy of high pressure, so no snow yet - some forecast for next week. The weekend is forecasting similar, dry sunny weather but with stronger winds. Going for a bike ride with windchill at -15C may be, er, bracing.

Ice developing over a nearby pond - the ubiquitous beaver lodge in the background

All the leaves now gone, waiting for the snow

Guns and Conservation

Election unhappiness continues for the Republicans, and  views like this from right-wing commentators  are not unusual:

‘America, like Western civilization, is a set of ideas, institutions, and ways of doing things. For all intents and purposes, this has become occupied territory; land occupied by hominids who subscribe to a primitive set of foreign superstitions and wantonly attempt to impose those primitive superstitions on the rest of us.’  (Breitbart website)

One consequence of this viewpoint is that it seems to encourage people to buy guns and ammunition. Both Obama's first election win, and even more so the current election process has led to big increases in sales, as the graph below indicates. 

Sales of guns and ammunition rise to unprecedented levels.

How does this fit with conservation? We had a fascinating seminar last week on a piece of 1930s legislation - the Wildlife Restoration Act. This Act, and later amendments means that all sales of guns, ammunition and archery equipment is subject to an 11% federal tax. This is paid to the Federal government which then distributes it to the states, paying 75% of the costs of suitable projects. 

Hunting season at Harvard Forest - I wear my day-glo cycling jacket to go for a walk

Thus for conservation projects, the last few years have been bumper years. 2009 provided funds 150% of the average in the Bush years, and 2012-13 looks even better - this single source of income is expected to pay out $555 million - about £370 million, purely from this guns-n-ammo tax. The staff in the Fish and Wildlife Service (somewhat equivalent to SNH) have been trying to prepare better for this surge by encouraging more projects. Incidentally, the other major source of state funding for conservation comes from the sale of hunting licences - which means that here in Massachusetts, $60 million of the state conservation budget  (roughly equivalent to SNH's total budget in Scotland) comes entirely from hunting and gun taxes. That's an interesting contrast to Scotland, where hunting contributes little or no direct revenue to wider society.