This chapter explores the killing and taking of wildlife in the name of sport via an examination of shooting, fisheries, game and poaching. As earlier chapters of this book illustrate, wildlife is often viewed as an exploitable resource and its status as ‘property’ determines the extent to which wildlife is protected (Wise, 2000). Most jurisdictions allow hunting of wildlife subject to regulation, which usually specifies which non-human animals can be killed or taken and which also places restrictions on when non-human animals can be killed or taken. Regulations on hunting, shooting and fishing firmly relate to our wildlife criminology themes of commodification and exploitation and violence. The classification of wildlife as ‘game’ or as ‘legitimate quarry’ arguably commodifies non-human animals as undeserving of full protection from harm. In this context, wildlife arguably loses its intrinsic value and status as sentient beings subject to legal protection, and instead become something ‘other’. In shooting and game operations, non-human animal life is in the hands of human hunters and game managers who are literally given the power of life and death over wildlife made available for sport activities. Our wildlife criminology theme of violence is also clearly in evidence in respect of activities whose aim is to end the life of non-human animals or which can involve deliberately inflicting pain on non-human animals. Such actions are, of course, frequently carried out with the sanction of the state, which will often derive revenues from hunting, shooting and fishing activities.

In discussing hunting, shooting and fishing within our wildlife criminology project our aim is not to directly challenge the legitimacy of these activities, although our green criminological lens would doubtless argue that the harms caused to wildlife through such activities are problematic. Hunting and shooting may not be problematic per se, given the necessity of shooting or non-human animal control in some wildlife or conservation management contexts. This is the case where non-lethal methods of control or translocation of a species might not be feasible and the presence of some non-human animals might even be harmful to other non-human animal species who require protection. However, evidence suggests that legal sporting activities are inextricably linked to illegal activities and thus the scale of non-human exploitation and death is arguably much higher than what is recognised by official data collected by environmental, conservation or sporting agencies.