By NRA-ILA
Assembly Bill 711 is scheduled to be heard by the Assembly Appropriations Committee on Wednesday, May 8. It is crucial that you call AND e-mail members of the Assembly Appropriations Committee and your Assemblyman respectfully urging them to OPPOSE this egregious anti-hunting bill. Contact information for members of the Assembly Appropriations Committee can be found here. Contact information for your Assemblyman can be foundhere.
To assist policymakers and to educate the public, hunters and recreational shooters, Hunt for Truth’s website has all of the facts and science on the lead ammunition debate available for your review. Policymakers and hunters are urged to visit the Hunt for Truth website and to subscribe to the Hunt for Truth e-mail list to receive e-bulletins with the latest breaking news and information on the proposed lead ammunition ban in California (AB 711), and all lead ammunition issues.
Self-proclaimed environmental organizations are trying to prohibit the use of traditional ammunition consisting of lead core components in hunting and recreational shooting. They claim that some scavenging animals, like the California condor, ingest and are poisoned by small pieces of lead contained in the carcasses of game and gut piles left in the field by hunters.
But there is substantial evidence that the groups attacking the use of lead ammunition have employed faulty science, which uses questionable scientific methodologies and selectively cherry picked, and/or excluded data to support preconceived conclusions in their campaign to ban all traditional ammunition. In fact, some researchers from public institutions who have published studies funded with taxpayer dollars that support the lead ammunition bans are actually thwarting attempts by peers to independently review their work. They refuse to provide the original data on which their studies were based available for scientific scrutiny.
The real truth is that lead ammunition is an unlikely cause of the alleged poisoning, because the metallic lead used in bullets and shot is relatively insoluble in the digestive tract of birds of prey and scavengers. Scientific studies have confirmed that it is very difficult to poison some birds with lead, even by repeatedly feeding them lead shot mixed with food over time.
On the other hand, lead compounds found in legacy paint, gasoline, insecticides and micro-trash are quite soluble in the digestive tract and are responsible for many of the highly publicized lead poisonings attributed to lead ammunition. These lead compounds are common in the environment, and should be investigated first in cases of lead poisoning of wildlife. The anti-lead ammunition researchers, however, typically ignore “alternative sources” of lead in the environmental, because the existence of such sources undermines their “get the lead out” campaign and the anti-hunting agenda.
Lead ammunition ban proponents also routinely ignore the fact that metals proposed for use in alternative ammunition can cause serious environmental consequences. Alternative ammunition containing bismuth, tungsten or copper coated steel all presents various environmental concerns. Bismuth leaches into the soil and groundwater and interferes with soil bacteria. Tungsten, which is transformed to a soluble form by oxygen, accumulates in the spleen of wildlife and can cause immune system disorders. Even copper is toxic under certain circumstances, and can do far more environmental damage than lead. Steel shot does not perform as well as lead on game, leading to higher numbers of crippled game that escape and die in the field, and injuries to humans from ricochets. Traditional ammunition containing lead is still the best, and safest, alternative.
Everyone needs to learn the real truth behind the all out assault on lead ammunition, not only in the battleground front of California, but everywhere in the United States. Anti-lead ammunition groups will not rest until all lead ammunition, and perhaps hunting, is banned within the United States. One of the sponsor’s of AB 711 was recently quoted as saying: “We are going to use the ballot box and the democratic process to stop all hunting in the United States. We will take it species by species until all hunting is stopped in California. Then we will take it state by state.” (Humane Society of the United States President and CEO Wayne Pacelle)
Please don’t wait. Visit the Hunt For Truth website and Facebook page and “like us, “share us with your friends, and anyone else you think may be interested in helping to fight this serious assault on hunting. You can also follow Hunt for Truth on YouTube.
