The Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources (OMNR) 11th hour decision to ban, among other things, the use natural hunting attractants will come as a shock to many local hunters.
I am one of the few hunters, however, not at all surprised by this decision; in fact, I predicted it happening in a column I wrote for the Ottawa SUN back in May 10, 2007, after the Province of Nova Scotia announced an outright ban on the use of hunting scents that contained bodily fluid.
I just knew Ontario would be close behind…
At the time, it meant that all doe-in estrus and dominant buck lures we know and love were illegal for use in that province. The Nova Scotia Natural Resources department justified the ban by saying “they don’t have CWD in their province and they don’t want it either.” While there was no arguing that point there was also, to my knowledge, little evidence to prove that CWD can be contracted through commercial deer scents.
Now 3 years later, the Ontario government, as predicted, has taken a similar stance, however CWD, as far as I know, has been diagnosed almost exclusively on commercial game farms in the west, and there is still no real evidence to indicate that hunting scents or attractants are the source of any disease.
My good friend who I’ve known for nearly 10 years, Terry Rohm of Tink’s Scents – makers of America’s top deer lure – certainly knows a thing or two about scents and lures. He was another person left scratching his head back in 2007 when the Nova Scotia ban was announced; with obvious concerned about sales of his product in Canada. Fortunately Terry and Tinks had already been busy developing a synthetic line of scents and lures, which they have marketed ever since.
He admits, though, that the stinky natural stuff is still preferred by hunters.
Terry was so concerned about the reasoning behind the Nova Scotia ban; he set up a meeting with Dr. Karl V Miller to discuss, among other things, Chronic Wasting Disease. (CWD) Dr. Miller explained to him that through testing, so far CWD has not been able to be transmitted by deer urine.
I am still waiting for someone to produce evidence to the contrary, in the meantime check out the MNR for more details on the hunting attractant ban and a few other goodies:
Outdoorsguy