Thread: Long-range hunting: is it sporting?

The latest issue of the NZDA magazine “NZ Hunting & Wildlife” has an article by Tony Orman on the ethics of long-range hunting with the above title. This opinion piece roundly condemns long-range hunting for a number of reasons. Included in the reasons are the ethics around the risk of not making a clean kill as ranges increase. However I'd like to set aside this aspect (for maybe another thread) as I was interested in another of the reasons given, supported with the following statement:

“Physically and philosophically shooting game animals this way is not hunting. It’s specialised, highly skilled shooting, more like execution than a sporting hunt.”

Also cited is the view from the Boon & Crocket Club that:

“long-range shooting takes unfair advantage of the game animal, effectively eliminates the natural capacity of an animal to use its senses and instincts to detect danger, and demeans the hunter-prey relationship in a way that diminishes the importance and relevance of the animal in the hunt.”

My interest is at what range do forum members feel the above applies, if at all?

Are we still “hunting” when we make use of any degree of advantage that a rifle gives us in distance over the bow or spear?