Psychology of Recreational Hunting in Canton Zug

Canton Zug operates under patent hunting.

The Office for Forest and Wildlife is responsible for hunting planning. The shooting quotas for roe deer are determined based on spring population counts, calculated summer populations, and accident and roadkill figures. This systematic approach appears scientific but obscures the fundamental question: Why hunt at all when Canton Zug has neither significant wildlife damage nor overpopulation problems that couldn't be solved by professional game wardens?

'Loud hunting': Tradition of pursuing roe deer with hounds

Zug's roe deer hunting is traditionally practiced as 'loud hunting'. This means: tracking dogs drive roe deer from their cover in the thickets. The animals flee along so-called trails, small paths, where hobby hunters are positioned nearby and the roe deer are killed in motion with shotgun blasts.

Psychologically, this form of hunting is problematic on several levels. First, the roe deer is not perceived as an individual, but as a moving target. The chase hunt creates maximum stress for the animal and minimal reflection time for the shooter. The Swiss Animal Protection (STS) has been demanding a ban on shotgun shots on roe deer for years, because the risk of non-fatal hits and difficult tracking is high.A study from Denmark showed that around 25 percent of the examined foxes had individual pellets lodged in their bodies. Every fourth fox had therefore been grazed by shotgun pellets at least once in its lifetime. Similar values are likely to apply to roe deer.

Second, 'loud hunting' is framed as tradition. The word 'cultivated', which is used in official representations, reveals much: hunting is not described as a necessity, but as cultural heritage. Psychologically, this is central, because it shifts legitimation from function to identity. One does not hunt because one must, but because one has always done it this way.

Hare moratorium: When renunciation is celebrated as achievement

Since 1993, the canton of Zug has refrained from hunting hares. It is remarkable that this renunciation occurred at the request of the Zug hunters themselves, 'to promote populations'. The recreational hunters thus voluntarily refrain from shooting a threatened species and present this as a contribution to species protection.

Psychologically, this moratorium is a textbook case in self-legitimation. The renunciation of killing a species that should not actually be killed is framed as proof of responsibility. That the brown hare is listed on the Red List as vulnerable (VU) and its hunting is simply no longer justifiable is not named as the reason for the renunciation, but rather 'the promotion of populations'. The message reads: We could shoot, but we choose not to. This framing transforms a matter of course into a gesture of generosity and stabilizes the image of recreational hunters as responsible actors.

That the same moratorium does not also apply to other threatened species, such as waterfowl or marmots, shows the limits of this logic. The renunciation is selective and only affects species for which hunting has little demand anyway. This is not species protection, but image cultivation.

Waterfowl on the kill list: Cormorant, coot, ducks

In the canton of Zug, mallards, tufted ducks, pochard, coots, cormorants, Egyptian geese and shelducks may be hunted from October to the end of January. Hunting waterfowl in a densely populated, urban canton with intensively used water areas raises psychological questions.

First, waterfowl hunting is in no proportion to any defined need for regulation. The mentioned species are neither overpopulations nor do they cause relevant damage. Hunting coots and tufted ducks is pure pleasure, packaged as 'utilization'. Second, this hunting takes place in an environment where the same waters are used for recreation, nature observation and tourism. The population's acceptance of shooting ducks and coots near shorelines is likely to be low, but is never surveyed. Third, the inclusion of Egyptian goose and shelduck on the kill list shows how invasive species serve as legitimation for expanding hunting. BirdLife Switzerland has criticized waterfowl hunting for years.

Hunting education: Indoctrination as quality feature

Hunting training in the Canton of Zug lasts one and a half years and is jointly supported by the Zug Cantonal Licensed Hunter Association, the examination commission, and the hunting administration. It ranges 'from hunting law, weapons knowledge to tree species knowledge, wildlife biology, wildlife ecology, up to a module where professional handling of hunting dogs is learned'. The administration emphasizes that 'through good training, it is ensured that Zug hunting is conducted according to applicable rules in an animal welfare-compliant and safe manner'.

Psychologically, the emphasis on training quality is a legitimization mechanism. It suggests: Those who are trained act correctly. But training does not only convey knowledge, but also a worldview. Those who learn for one and a half years how to kill animals 'professionally' internalize a normality that does not exist outside this system. Critical perspectives, fundamental ethical questions, or alternatives to hunting do not appear in the training. IG Wild beim Wild analyzed the Zug hunting training and concluded that it reproduces a closed interpretive system that structurally excludes criticism.

Urban canton, rural psychology

Zug is one of the most urban, wealthiest, and most densely populated cantons in Switzerland. Nevertheless, hunting psychology functions here according to the same patterns as in the Alpine cantons: tradition as legitimization, training as immunization against criticism, abstention as generosity, and extension of hunting to waterfowl as normalization.

The difference from the Central Swiss neighboring cantons lies not in the system, but in the packaging. In Zug, recreational hunting is not framed as Alpine heritage, but as 'contemporary', 'well-trained' practice. The language is more modern, the structures are the same. And the fundamental question remains unasked: Why does a canton with 240 hobby hunters not need a professional wildlife warden solution according to the Geneva model?

The answer is psychological, not factual: Because recreational hunting in the Canton of Zug functions as part of a social network. Those who hunt belong. Those who belong do not question. And those who do not question need no alternatives.

More on this in the dossier: Psychology of hunting

Cantonal psychology analyses:

• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Glarus
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Zug
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Basel-Stadt
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Schaffhausen
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Appenzell Ausserrhoden
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Appenzell Innerrhoden
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Neuchâtel
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Thurgau
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Nidwalden
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Uri
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Obwalden
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Schwyz
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Jura
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Basel-Landschaft
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Zurich
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Geneva
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Bern
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Solothurn
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Aargau
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Ticino
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Valais
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Graubünden
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of St. Gallen
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Fribourg
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Vaud
• Psychology of recreational hunting in the Canton of Lucerne