That post is either intentionally misinformed, unintentionally uninformed, or pointedly personal axe grinding.
Thanks, I hadn't read that study before. I saw it while finding the studies I linked and saved it for later reading. In order to comment on it I skimmed through just now. I'll have to do a full reading later.
Note that i qualified my guess with "or they don't care" because they are not personally affected. I stand behind that guess.
This is true, and to be clear, the Western Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies Wild Sheep Working Group posted the CCH-17 (we call it) on the front end of their web site, and immediately took it down once they realized it had serious development and content credibility. As did many agencies, chose not to use it in their final land management plans in the USA. It was the prodigy and making from the Wild Sheep Foundation, and of course they put it up their web site. It was a card played by a few individuals within the WSF, and it failed, as it should have. Even the managing author has publicly said (outside of the CCH-17 document) it should not be used for risk assessment decision making in land management plans.
Not really a response, but for folks reading, I had to bust out a tax chart myself thought it might be helpful to others.
Yes, Bovidae is a very big family which resides in the Ruminatia sub order. Equids (horses) and Camelids (llamas) are not in the Bovidae family nor Ruminatia suborder. Pathogens tend to be species specific. And it the rare cases of cross over, the species tend to die very fast, and are not hosts or reservoirs for those pathogens.
Per bigfin... I am a member of BHA, RMBS, and I hunt with llamas.
Nope rent them, been trying to talk my in-laws into letting me leave some at their ranch playing the long game on that one.
Although some of the concerns may be well intended, it seems to me that the goal among many of these "sheep protection advocates" (with respect to the pack llama issue) is to skirt around the fundamental issues and distract everyone
It's a matter of survival. Freedom isn't free. You have to fight for it. And you also have to believe that truth will eventually prevail. I would have been dead in the water a long time ago if I had rolled over and played dead on this issue. I know it's worth it because I'm still enjoying the llamas and still hunting with them. You can see an impressive list of "wins" on this issue for the pack llama user group because of their involvement in the public process. Yes, we're stacking up a lot of wins with various public land management agencies.
The other thing that drives me is the incredible support that our user group has been getting from the scientific community (including experts in wildlife disease epidemiology and camelid experts). AASRP for example and their recent policy statement. It is not the hunters or hunting groups that the pack llama user group needs to convince. It's the regulators that we need to convince. We are having incredible success with that. So the only reason I am spending a very small amount of my time on this forum (relative to the amount of time I spend with the scientists and regulators) is to encourage fellow hunters to use some critical thinking skills. Also to reveal issues with the WSF BHA pack llama prohibition/restriction proposals that they may not be aware of. Sheep hunting is turning into a sport for the elite and the wealthy. That is not a good thing. Just look at history of what happened in Europe, for example. Why do you suppose that is continuing to happen here right now in the US? Where I live there is some remaining opportunity to hunt sheep with an over-the-counter tag. But I have seen a huge erosion of that opportunity over the years even though (according to ADF&G) there are fewer sheep hunters than there used to be. If you are a man of simple means are you somehow unwittingly contributing toward the trend of turning sheep hunting into a sport for the wealthy? Always remember that the sheep are a public asset. Who is it that is continually trying to gain a greater share of those assets and why? Does it have anything to do with money? If so, who is getting that money? Again, fellow hunters, BHA leadership, and WSF leadership are not who I need to convince on the pack llama disease issue. Of course I don't want disease introduced to wild sheep and I don't know of any sheep hunters that use horses that would want to either.
There is a huge difference between an interstate transportation health certificate, which by the way, most states require for camelids, and a series of lab tests created by a protocol designed by the WSF, simply to access public land ( and I've seen these, have you?). Its cost prohibited, and that's the goal. And even if you did, it needs to be applied equally and fairly to horses, llamas, cattle, dogs, and humans. That's probably an over reach by a special interest group for one specie on public land.
