Boy hunts bear, then dies

[pacific breeze]

Yeah, it's funny how the "illegal" stuff that these hugely paid guides get away with rarely makes it into print. I bet the hunter baited the bear, too. Most of these fools can't kill anything straight out so the animals often suffer in agony for hours before they die. I've seen too much of this stuff to know that it's almost never romantic or noble. Yeah, shooting a mother bear staggering out of its cave after hibernation -- what fun sport! It's almost as much fun as shooting tame animals in pens for big bucks.

[celeb_2006]

Here's a little of what I could find on a similar case years ago:

ESPN - Ron Schara: The mother of invention

The mother of invention in this story is, in fact, a mother: Tina Pattison of Harborcreek, Pa., is the 46-year-old mother of six boys, and the grandmother of one.

In 1998, one son, 18-year-old Matt, fell extremely ill with Hodgkin's disease. An avid outdoorsman, Matt also knew his life might be short. He asked for a last wish. He wanted to go moose hunting.

“No parent should have to worry about a child's dream being fulfilled. ”— Tina Pattison

His mother called the Make-A-Wish Foundation, an international organization whose mission is to help extremely ill youngsters fulfill a dream.

"No parent should have to worry about a child's dream being fulfilled," Tina Pattison said.

But Make-A-Wish said no. If the dream is hunting, the kid's out of luck.

"Safety reasons," Tina Pattison was told.

But there was one more reason. It's the story of Eric Ness, a Minnesota teen-ager who was stricken with brain cancer.

In 1996, Make-A-Wish arranged for Eric, of White Bear Lake, Minn., to have his dream come true. Eric Ness asked to go to Alaska to hunt the giant Kodiak brown bear.

Overnight, Eric's request made national headlines as animal-rights groups rushed to the media to publicly ridicule his last wish.

His life was threatened. Security guards led him through the St. Paul-Minneapolis airport. Newspaper reporters wanted to know if he could defend his request, as if bear hunting was something sinister.

At the time, Kodiak bear populations were high and stable. Hunting bears was a legal activity with permits limited by Alaska's wildlife agency. In fact, Kodiak bear management is still a success story today.

However, healthy bear populations weren't enough to stop the animal-rights campaign against Eric Ness. They were out to shame a young hunter, and they smelled blood.

Hollywood celebrities invited Eric to do something else, something "non-violent" for his last wish. Important wildlife "news" like that makes People magazine.

When Eric returned home (he didn't get a bear), he sat in his living room and recalled his unexpected notoriety.

He had read the newspaper stories about how awful he was for being a hunter. He had watched the protesters on television chanting and holding signs that chastised him and the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

"Was that painful to go through?" a visitor asked Eric.

The young man, who was weak from chemotherapy treatments, shook his bald head, "Yes." And tears streamed down his face.

Shortly after, Make-A-Wish bowed to the animal extremists, although Eric finally enjoyed a successful bear hunt, paid for by the Safari Club. Months later, Eric lost his life to cancer.

When Tina Pattison realized Make-A-Wish wouldn't help her son, she did what mothers often do. She didn't take no for an answer.

"Why not form my own foundation to fulfill hunting and fishing wishes of sick kids?" she asked herself.

In 1999, Pattison formed a new nonprofit organization called Hunt of a Lifetime.

"I didn't want to see another parent go through that," she said. "I don't want to see another mother go through the channels I had to go through."

Yes, her son Matt finally got his wish to hunt moose. He died in 1999 at the age of 19.

"To date, we've helped 29 children, boys and girls, fulfill their hunting or fishing dream," Pattison said.

"I know what it meant to my son to go on that moose hunt. It's bad enough having to deal with cancer itself. Beating down doors to find a wish shouldn't be necessary."

Pattison said her organization, Hunt of a Lifetime, is run by volunteers with no salaried employees at the moment.

"We pay a lawyer and an accountant when we use them," she said. "We want the donations to go to the children."

The organization operates on donations of money, volunteer time and trip donations from outfitters, hotels and airlines. To reach Hunt of a Lifetime, call (800) 484-4948 or visit its web site at www.huntofalifetime.org.

Pattison, a housewife who drives a school bus part-time, said she spends much of her free time going to sports shows to spread the word about Hunt of a Lifetime.

"It's difficult getting the word out," she said. "We had two boys die before we could help them."

Now that Hunt of a Lifetime is growing, Pattison said, something else is starting to rear its ugly head.

"I'm starting to get e-mails and phone calls from animal-rights people about how terrible I am."

[pacific breeze]

When I was a reporter I once covered a story involving a hunter, a city cop, who had killed a huge cougar. I'll never forgot what he said: "It was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen, so I killed it."

I think that pretty much sums up the way these people think. This cougar was not killed for food or sport or self-defense -- it was killed for the sheer pleasure of killing something beautiful. I wrote the story, and his quote ran under the headline. It still makes me sick to think about that cougar -- he was awesome and doing no one any harm way in the wilds of northern Alberta.

[VenusInFauxFurs]

^^ That sort of thinking I cannot comprehend. Because it was beautiful? Insane.

I asked someone I know who hunts why they do it. The answer "Because I can and I enjoy it".. what the hell kind of answer is that?

[kingcap72]

I never understood the thrill of killing an animal just for the hell of it. To eat it, or in self-defense, no problem. Sometimes, I wish that the animals could just grab the guns from the hunters and turn the hunters into the prey and see how they like it.

[pacific breeze]

^^They wouldn't. And I grew up in hunting country and I am not against hunting for food. But there are very few responsible hunters out there, no matter what they say. I have seen and heard about so much shit, it would turn your stomach.

[kingcap72]

^^I can believe it. My parents and aunts and uncles grew up in the South and they had to hunt for food sometimes, so I've heard stories myself. But the thing that always gets me is these morons that think they need to go hunting with an assault rifle. I mean, who the hell do they think their hunting? I don't think the deers and bears are running with Al-Queda.

[crumpet]

I'd like to take people who kill animals for fun and drop them, unarmed, into a pit with a cougar or bear and tell them, "Okay, show me what you've got big guy". Killing for food or self defense are the only excusable reasons,imo. Trophy hunting is never okay in my book. I truly don't get people who think killing anything is fun.

[MgMMD]

If I get really sick can you all set up a fund so I can hunt pedophiles? Because THAT is my wish.

I always put people first, but this is a little ridiculous.

[twitchy]

I love looking at this site without signing in. That way I get to see all the ads like this one.

[ConstanceSpry]

Well, I searched and searched, and the one lone article which mentioned a cub, and the cub being shot by a game warden, seems to have disappeared. I am inclined to think they want to keep it quiet. I wrote an email to the Prince George Citizen Newspaper, asking outright if the story I read was true. Haven't received a reply yet, if I do, I will post it here.

[crumpet]

Some posters here seem to be hung up on a people vs. animal dilemma. This case was not about having to decide between saving a bear or saving a 10 yr old boy.

[sweetrebel]

The only thing I am hung up on is how people can say they are glad that this kid is dead....the kid didn't even kill the fucking bear-his DAD did.
It may not have been the right thing to do, I have said that over and over, but for someone (GRIMM) to say the world is better off without the little bastard was mean and cold hearted. Plain and simple. It's not ok for someone to kill an animal but it is ok for someone to to say they are glad that the kid is dead. That is what I don't understand.

[Grimmlok]

I didn't say i was glad he was dead, i said the world (especially the natural world) was better off.

[sweetrebel]

Originally Posted by Grimmlok

I didn't say i was glad he was dead, i said the world (especially the natural world) was better off.

Why though? Because he wanted to go on a hunting trip? I really do understand your point about innocent animals, and it does make me sad to know that the bear had a cub that had to be destroyed because it's mother was killed, but it just seems a little over the top to say the world is better off without the kid. Who knows what he may have grown up to be? He may have decided that hunting was not his thing and made it his life's mission to ban hunting...he may have grown up to find the cure for cancer. I just think that it was cold to say that...
None of us are perfect, and I hope that no one judges us the way that some have judged this kid and his family.