Hanspeter Egli, former president of Jagd Schweiz, explains

The lynx, an agile and silent wild cat in Swiss forests, is a protected animal.

However, in a Swiss television broadcast, hobby hunters hypocritically accuse the lynx of endangering other animals.

Before the lynx was wiped out by hobby hunting, it roamed across large parts of Europe. Through international reintroduction programmes, new populations have been established in Switzerland, Austria, and Germany.

Lynx demonstrably reduces wildlife browsing damage

As part of the “Lynx Relocation North-Eastern Switzerland” (LUNO) project, the lynx was reintroduced from 2001 onwards, including in the canton of St. Gallen. By reducing roe deer and chamois populations, a decline in wildlife browsing damage in forest regeneration was sought. The results showed significantly reduced culling and population estimate figures for roe deer and chamois in the years following lynx reintroduction. The browsing intensity on silver fir decreased significantly after lynx reintroduction in the core lynx territory.

Hobby hunters justify their hobby partly by arguing that without their intervention, certain animal populations such as roe deer would multiply out of control and cause economic damage. Yet when a native predator takes over their role and eats roe deer or chamois, they are not happy about it either.

The decline in chamois has nothing to do with the lynx

The fact is that the populations of all wild-living even-toed ungulates in Switzerland are increasing despite the lynx. The exception is the chamois, whose large-scale decline has demonstrably nothing to do with the lynx. Apart from scientific research, this is also illustrated very clearly by a comparison of chamois hunting figures in Switzerland and Austria. While the lynx is well known to be widespread in Switzerland and, according to hunters' lore, has caused the decline of the chamois population over the last 20 years, Austria shows exactly the same trend — without any significant lynx populations.

Roe deer and chamois populations are not fundamentally declining even in lynx territories. A decline in ungulate populations is quite desirable, as these are or were simply too high in many cases. The decline of the chamois is occurring from a very high level, and even experts are debating the theory of whether the decrease is merely a settling back to a more appropriate level, as the Group Wolf Switzerland also explains.

Hobby hunters want to kill

Hobby hunter Hanspeter Egli (73), president of the association «Jagd Schweiz», is time and again a prime example of the selfish depths to which recreational hunting can sink.

Problem animal, predator, pest, source of disease, plague, invasion, and so on — these are not biological criteria, but serve to evaluate and devalue. They are a popular and proven means of creating and maintaining enemy images.

«Hunting has its historical origins in a vital cycle — the process of obtaining food. However, today only 10 percent of hunting actually aims at sourcing nutrition. The remaining 90 percent serves the purpose of sporting ambition. That should give us pause.»

Prof. Dr. Arno Gruen

Spread across the whole of Switzerland, there are these hobby hunter gangs, with a fanatical and militant orientation. Half of the huntable animal species, however, are extinct or threatened with extinction (e.g. elk, wisent, lynx, wolf, wildcat, capercaillie, black grouse, hazel grouse, great bustard, eagles, falcons, vultures) — and this after 136 years of «sportsmanlike stewardship» in Switzerland.

The hobby hunter's primary concern is to maintain wildlife populations that are of interest to hobby hunters at a stable, high level, and to substitute for the still-weakened predators in our country, such as wolves and lynxes. Every year there are also deaths and injuries caused by hobby hunters. In the years 2011–2015, a total of 1’526 injuries from hunting accidents were recorded by accident insurers in Switzerland. More on the animal welfare problem of hobby hunting and on the hunting myths.