They're not going to starve! They're all lazy and just need a kick in the pants, even those who are old and infirm, or maybe have serious illness. We just need to break them from their couch-sitting, Oprah-watching, bon-bon-noshing bad habits.

Everybody knows they all drive Escalades and have iPhones. Jeez

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You're a daisy if you do.
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84 Euro 240D 4spd. 220.5k sold
04 Honda Element AWD
1985 F150 XLT 4x4, 351W with 270k miles, hay hauler
1997 Suzuki Sidekick 4x4
1993 Toyota 4wd Pickup 226K and counting

100 Million Dollars of food stamps redeemed by military families.

Those gold-bricking freeloaders....

Some folks are so caught up in their preconceived notions of who poor people are, that they end up 5hitting on the very people that they claim to honor.
Sad.

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On some nights I still believe that a car with the fuel gauge on empty can run about fifty more miles if you have the right music very loud on the radio. - HST

1983 300SD - 305000
1984 Toyota Landcruiser - 190000
1994 GMC Jimmy - 203000

https://media.giphy.com/media/X3nnss8PAj5aU/giphy.gif

I get what you'er saying and I'm not generally a welfare basher but it is true that many farmers in our land would be in serious pain without illegal immigrants harvesting their crop. Meanwhile, able bodied people/citizens get their dole every month.

The Latino migrant knows he has no safety net and thus works his behind off to stay afloat.

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Te futueo et caballum tuum

1986 300SDL, 362K
1984 300D, 138K

Agreed.

Moving on…

While I agree that parent critters teach their children, are these raccoons in a national park or in your neighborhood? Can you provide proof that raccoons only eat from handouts and never anything else? While on the topic, can you provide any proof that raccoons in suburbia don’t have hunting skills?

Any proof that "foraging skills decrease"? Also, as a reminder, the topic is about animals at national parks. I pointed out that an animal raised at a home or lab would probably never establish hunting skills. That said, can you provide proof that a wild animal that is fed occasionally would lose the hunting skills?

An interesting story, but again, this does not sound like a national park, it sounds like a housing development, a.k.a suburbia.

Also, what is interesting to me here is that different animals will adapt in different ways. In any event, and I hope this doesn’t come across as my being obstinate, as that’s not my intent, but your example does not make a case for an animal losing its hunting skills, but rather using them to take advantage of the circumstances.

Really, they act as enforcer, judge and jury in your state? When I asked the local game warden about neighbors feeding wildlife, he said “So?” The local game wardens don’t have a problem in this area, unless it occurs in a National Park. I understand laws differ in different areas. I also acknowledge the point that when people feed wildlife regularly (“regularly” being the key criteria), animals will take advantage. However, again, this doesn’t prove anything about animals losing hunting skills as a result of being fed by visitors, which appears your central point.

I read that the overwhelming majority of humming birds do not live 1 year. According to the articles, if they do live more than a year they may live up to 6 years.

I’d like to see an example where feeding some humming birds significantly alters the population of humming birds, or can alter their typical migration patterns. It may be the case. I don’t know.

I can’t answer our question about someone congratulating themself. I suggest you ask someone who does this. But the bigger point: Is man not part of the natural pattern of existence on this planet? If your answer is yes, then anything man does is also part of the natural pattern. If no, then can you explain how man is not part of nature?

If we can return to the topic of feeding animals in a national park, the interesting thing here, and I have to admit I hadn’t thought of it as around here, the national parks are closed to the public due to snow about 5-6 months out of the year. Any opportunistic habits the critters may acquire during the warm season, is quickly lost.

If your postulate about animals losing their hunting skills were true, then the populations of animals in the national parks nearby would diminish. I haven’t come across any evidence to support this. Can you find any evidence? I looked but did not find anything suggestive either way.

Anyway, in parks where the conditions don’t close the parks for part of the year, I could see where consistent feeding would bring more animals in closer contact with more people. I already wrote that leads to people getting injured and the injuries are why the NPS doesn’t want to get sued again and again. I have seen no evidence that feeding wildlife occasionally causes them to lose hunting skills. That appears the key question in this debate.

I've been feeling guilty about our 4 barn cats, all of whom live outside. The cats are thriving, but I understand that they might not be helping the local bird population. I just can't bring myself to not let them stay outside. The good news is that our barn has 4 or 5 barn swallow nests that turn out several batches of chicks each year. The adult swallows get aggressive when any of the cats walk below a nest.