Some sunlight on a quasi-made up word (only 6000 Google hits) and an irritating sport

By Matt Miner

With my Fuqua acceptance, it begins to look likely that the Miners will be in business school somewhere next year; if we are in grad school, we will not be in Arizona.  This anticipated change has me feeling nostalgic about my beloved state, and particularly as I’ve hunted my last hunting season for at least two years, I’ve often thought, “How many times have I [missed a shot at a quail]? And how long will it be till I get to do it again?”  Maudlin, I know.  Sorry.

On Thursday afternoon, I went on my final Arizona dove shooting trip, for at least a little while.  I was solo, and I was in a contemplative mood.  The area looked promising, because there were piles of offal and feathers all over the spot where I left my car.  I got to a place where I had a good view and some concealment from the visually-oriented birds and began scanning the skies as I’ve done so many times before.

Within 30 minutes of my arrival, I found myself having an entirely new experience.  Driving in circles and tearing up the desert all around me were three quad-riders.  I could see the marks they left on the landscape as they rode in and out of a wash (which had some pretty good jumps at the edges).  I’ll admit, it looked fun, but I hate their sport in its current form.

I practice an ancient and heavily regulated sport.  I believe most of Arizona’s hunting regulations are reasonable, and stand a good chance of protecting the environment and maintaining Arizona animal species.  Quadding, on the other hand, is a new sport; it has few regulations, although more people quad than hunt (20% v. 6% of Arizona adults).  In Arizona, quadding is regulated by the Game and Fish department, but has nothing like the resources that are used to regulate hunting and fishing.  And yet, I am confident that quadders do more to harm to our environment than all the hunters combined.

I wrote this rant to say that quadders need to stop this tragedy of the commons before they face massive public backlash against their sport and find themselves with little or no access to public lands.  Over time, hunters have (in general) adopted an ethos of responsibility which is the only thing that saved hunting from being practically banned in many parts of the country.  Quadders should take this approach sooner rather than later, before some environmentally-minded chief executive takes an aerial tour of the National Forest lands and sees what these guys have done.

My hunt had a happy ending.  I left the area where the quadders were riding and came up just one bird shy of a limit at dark, with some fantastic shooting in the meantime.  It was a good way to end my last Arizona dove hunt.