Hunting license

A hunting license is a regulatory or legal mechanism to control recreational and sports hunting.

Hunting may be regulated informally by unwritten law, self-restraint, a moral code, or by governmental laws.

The purposes for requiring hunting licenses include the protection of natural treasures, and raising tax revenue (often, but not always, to dedicated funds).

History

Hunting licenses are millennia old.

Amongst the first hunting laws in the Common law tradition was from the time of William the Conqueror (reign in England starting 1066). In the Peterborough Chronicle entry of 1087, The Rime of King William reported in verse that:
Whoever killed a hart or a hind
Should be blinded.
This was because "William the Conqueror's moral life lives in the landscape. His control of the forest mirrors his control of the people, and his establishment of hunting laws reveals the dissonance between his love for animals and his contempt for the populace: ...
He loved the wild animals
As if he were their father.

Hunting

Hunting is the practice of killing or trapping any animal, or pursuing it with the intent of doing so. Hunting wildlife or feral animals is most commonly done by humans for food, recreation, or trade. In present-day use, lawful hunting is distinguished from poaching, which is the illegal killing, trapping or capture of the hunted species. The species that are hunted are referred to as game and are usually mammals and birds.

Hunting can also be a means of pest control. Hunting advocates state that hunting can be a necessary component of modern wildlife management, for example, to help maintain a population of healthy animals within an environment's ecological carrying capacity when natural checks such as predators are absent. However, hunting has also heavily contributed to the endangerment, extirpation and extinction of many animals.

The pursuit, capture and release, or capture for food of fish is called fishing, which is not commonly categorised as a form of hunting. It is also not considered hunting to pursue animals without intent to kill them, as in wildlife photography or birdwatching. The practice of foraging or gathering materials from plants and mushrooms is also considered separate.

License

The verb license or grant license means to give permission. The noun licence (British,Indian,Canadian,Australian,New Zealand,Irish, or South African English) or license (American English) refers to that permission as well as to the document recording that permission.

A license may be granted by a party ("licensor") to another party ("licensee") as an element of an agreement between those parties. A shorthand definition of a license is "an authorization (by the licensor) to use the licensed material (by the licensee)."

In particular, a license may be issued by authorities, to allow an activity that would otherwise be forbidden. It may require paying a fee and/or proving a capability. The requirement may also serve to keep the authorities informed on a type of activity, and to give them the opportunity to set conditions and limitations.

A licensor may grant a license under intellectual property laws to authorize a use (such as copying software or using a (patented) invention) to a licensee, sparing the licensee from a claim of infringement brought by the licensor. A license under intellectual property commonly has several components beyond the grant itself, including a term, territory, renewal provisions, and other limitations deemed vital to the licensor.

Deer hunting

Deer hunting is survival hunting or sport hunting for deer, which dates back tens of thousands of years. There are many types of deer around the world that are hunted.

International practices

New Zealand

New Zealand has had 10 species of deer (Cervidae) introduced. From the 1850s Red deer were liberated, followed by Fallow, Sambar, Wapiti, Sika, Rusa, and White-tail. The introduced herds of Axis and Moose failed to grow, and have become extinct. In the absence of predators to control populations, deer were thought to be a pest due to their effect on native vegetation. From the 1950s the government employed professional hunters to cull the deer population. Deer hunting is now a recreational activity, organised and advocated for at the national level by the New Zealand Deerstalkers' Association.

North America