The Boone and Crockett Club is now receiving four times more trophy entries than 30 years ago, and Theodore Roosevelt's great, great grandson says hunters who reach this apex are notable beneficiaries of historic conservation successes, according to a recent release by Boone & Crockett.
Further, the TR descendant says trophy record holders are “perfectly positioned” to help keep hunters at the forefront of America's resurging conservation movement.
Simon Roosevelt, whose great, great grandfather was the 26th President of the United States, legendary sportsman, consummate conservationist and founder of the Boone and Crockett Club, delivered the remarks as part of his keynote address at the Club's recent 27th Big Game Awards in Reno, Nev.
Roosevelt said all hunters share a legacy with early Club members who developed the hunter-funded, science-based system that helped to recover that era's devastated wildlife and habitat. B&C said the system remains the “lifeblood of conservation still today.” But those who achieve special status within the hunting community have a chance to join TR and his contemporaries in accomplishing “something even more important-more crucial for the long-term success of conservation-that is, fundamentally changing the way Americans think,” he said.
Although 80% of U.S. citizens now live in cities, they understand the importance of natural resources and sustainable use, said Roosevelt, but, “What they don't understand is how we as hunters fit, or maybe better said, that we fit, and why we're important. If we fail to get this message across, we will continue to lose hunters and hunting access, and 'hunting' may well come to mean nothing more than high-fence farms and park culling.”
Boone and Crockett record holders openly communicating who they are, what they do and their love of doing it-even when they don't take an animal-will lead to greater public support of hunting, said Roosevelt. And that, in turn, will spur more resources for today's conservation challenges: climate change, habitat loss and fragmentation, and diseases.
Roosevelt's speech was given at the triennial Boone and Crockett Club event held June 24-26 at Reno's Grand Sierra Resort.
