I’m not a big fan of hunting or hunters–I find it to be a cruel and unnecessary sport that cheapens the respect for life on our planet. However, I’m even less of a fan of people going hungry.

Iowa, where almost 11% of families couldn’t afford to feed their families at some point in 2005, has found an innovative solution, quickly spreading nationwide, that meets the needs of both hunters and the poor.

The nation’s population of deer has exploded in recent decades with the easy availability of food from farms and annoyed gardeners’ patches (Iowa’s population alone is over 450,000 compared to 10,000 in the 50’s). Hunters have made only a small dent in the population, often because they are limited by licenses in the number of deer they can shoot and because they really only want one or two per season so as to mount their heads as wall trophies. As cute as deer may be, they can also be a pest and account for a good number of accidents on the nation’s roads.

Iowa’s Help Us Stop Hunger (HUSH) program allows hunters to donate any excess deer they hunt, which is then donated as venison to the state’s soup kitchens and food banks. These kitchens and their customers, which rarely see donations of beef, are grateful for a tasty and nutritious meat that can be used from making meatballs to stroganoff. Donations of venison have exploded–last year HUSH was estimated to accept donations of over 250,000 pounds of venison, which equated to about 1 million meals. At the same time Iowa loosened its licensing restrictions for hunters, allowing them to purchase multiple licenses.

Another organization, Farmers and Hunters Feeding the Hungry (FHFH), now operates in 30 states.

While hunting is an unpleasant subject, it has also been essential in feeding mankind throughout its history. While not much purpose is served in hunting as sport, a definite need is met when the sport is combined with feeding needy people. This is one of those rare instances where interests across the entire political spectrum are met in a way that makes everyone happy, so I applaud it.

Tags: deer, farmers-and-hunters-fighting-hunger, fhfh, food-banks, help-us-stop-hunger, hunger, hunting, hush, iowa, soup-kitchens