The International Encyclopedia of Shooting, edited by Michael Brander.

The International Encyclopedia of Shooting, edited by Michael Brander.  Hardcover book published 1972.

Shooting/Hunting books… some of you may choose not to read this blog entry… which is a good idea if you are sensitive to the idea of hunting… If you are still reading this and are a bit touchy about the idea of killing for sport, maybe you shouldn’t read any further…

Hunting is a very emotive subject.  To be honest I personally don’t feel all that comfortable with the idea of hunting for sport or pleasure… but I wont go into the whole politics of hunting and my personal beliefs and feelings, partially as I would then have to have some “beliefs and feelings” which as soon as I start thinking about them, become very complex and more than I really wish to write about here.   Is this a cop out?  Yes it is.  Possibly even more of a cop out as despite writing about some sort of vague lack of comfort, I’m still willing to sell this book.  But you know what, I don’t feel very comfortable selling books about Alien abduction either.  If I were to not sell books on all the subjects I don’t particularly have an interest or liking (or comfort) for, it would be slim pickings and it wouldn’t be long before the wolves were at my door… I guess I could shoot them… (the wolves)(just checked… no listing for wolves, so maybe I wouldn’t shoot them).

This book is basically an A to Z of hunting.  Many countries are dealt with as are specific animals… Australia hasn’t been left out, Kangaroos and Wallabies are mentioned (… foreign readers of this blog may find it a bit strange that we eat our national emblems, they are very tasty… marinated in a little bit of soy and garlic and cooked rare… beautiful).  All of the entries are quite brief and basically provide an introduction to the subject.  There’s even a conservation aspect to some of the entries.  The following is from the publishers blurb:

“The importance of game management control of breeding, predators and culling, are also dealt with amongst many other aspects, always remembering that today the sportsman is in the forefront of the battle against needless deaths of wildlife. The modern shooting man’s role in active conservation is fully recognized.”

Wow, sensitive hunters and this was 1972… My big question though is why is this picture on the back of the dust jacket?

“When the elephant is down it is advisable to run up and put another bullet into the back of the neck…”

I guess in 1972 it was OK to kill something this big (?).  Here at Huc & Gabet we don’t like the idea of shooting something that is this big (and difficult to eat in one sitting), that it would be hard to miss and overall we don’t approve.  I like elephants… (but I can’t eat a whole one).  My hope is that whoever buys this book doesn’t get the urge to go out and kill an elephant, in the same way that I hope people don’t go out and get abducted by aliens after buying an alien abduction book.  The book does have lots of other animals to kill, so let’s hope the new owner is happy killing some of those instead… or maybe not.