EUROPEAN WILDLIFE

                  Last weekend I was in Switzerland doing a seminar and enjoyed talking with folks from several European countries.  They were all quick to remind me that the U.S. is normally about a decade behind whatever is happening in Europe. 

                  For sure, Europe has secularized much faster than America; it is a godless, churchless, for the most part amoral culture.  Part of that is a rabid addiction to wildlife.  Many people don't realize that roughly 60 percent of all farm income in Europe is a government subsidy, and a significant chunk of that is for "environmental benefits." 

                  Although Switzerland is not a member of the EU, it is roughly the same, with up to 67 percent of farm income in the form of a subsidy.  Originally, the subsidies were only given for production support, but they are gradually moving over to these environmental elements.  

                  A typical farmer can pull out a file of papers and start ticking off the various environmental elements that pay him:  a woodpecker nest, $1,000; a goose nest by the creek, $1,000; a two-acre hillside abandoned to wildflowers, $5,000; a tree with squirrel nests in it, $2,000.  Seemingly without end, these special payments add up to roughly 60 percent of all farm income in Europe.

                  In fact, EU farmers receive $1,000 per acre per year just for owning farmland.  This drives up the price of farmland and makes it far more difficult for a young person to acquire agriculture property.  When I present our farm's techniques, the most common feedback is "that's illegal."  In our county, I can build 5 kinds of structures without a government permit (farm building, treehouse, houseboat, mobile unit, hunt camp).  In Europe, they can't build anything without a government permit.  That artificially raises the price of every project, whether it's a backyard chick brooder or a farmstand to sell vegetables. 

                  The big one that struck me this trip was prohibiting livestock in forests.  On our farm, this time of year we run pigs through the woods to pick up acorns and help churn leaves into humus.  The Swiss said the forests are completely off limits to any livestock.

                  In a strange twist, though, they can harvest wildlife and sell it into the public market.  You can find wild hog, for example, in the grocery store.  So while farmers are precluded from growing domestic pigs in the woods, they have the freedom to shoot wild ones and sell them.  In the U.S., the government owns all the wildlife.  If a farmer creates attractive wildlife habitat and increases the wildlife population, he can't harvest anything and sell it.  The only way wildlife in the U.S. can be sold is if it's a captive supply, meaning you have to fence the property with wildlife-proof fence (deer and elk, 8 ft. high).

                  This is why in Europe, where wild hogs have enjoyed life for centuries, they have never become as destructive an issue as they have in the U.S.  Farmers can monetize their excess wildlife and regular people can enjoy the fruits of good wildlife habitat.

                  Many years ago I had a vexing fox in our pastured chickens that I couldn't catch or shoot.  Goodness knows, I tried.  I finally called the state trapper (Virginia employs a professional trapper to deal with pugnacious predators).  Knowing that the state owns all the wildlife--that's the official and legal position--I said :  "One of your foxes is getting in my chickens and I need you to come get him." 

                  The wildlife bureaucrat responded:  "Well, it's not our fox; it's a 50-50 arrangement where he's part yours and part ours."  Then I said: "okay, then, when I get hungry for venison, I'll just go out and shoot my deer; don't worry, I'll leave yours alone." 

                  He began laughing, knowing he'd been had, because it's illegal to shoot any deer out of season and without proper permits.  In Europe, it really is a 50-50 because while the government pays for wildlife benefits, a farmer can harvest these animals and sell them. That's reasonable and sensible.

                  In Virginia, deer-car collisions are a major insurance and safety problem.  A game biologist told me that they could eliminate the deer season and let people harvest as many as they wanted anytime and it would not reduce the overabundance of deer.  The problem is hunting is no longer politically correct.  Father-son bonding in this primal way no longer exists; fathers watch football and sons are in the basement playing video games. In our area, deer, beer, and foxes are all at unprecedented numbers and becoming a severe nuisance.  In other areas, it's wild hogs.

                  Should we allow hunted meat to be monetized?