alaska outdoor hunting equipment

Hunting is the practice of pursuing animals to capture or kill them for food, recreation, or trade in their products. In modern use, the term refers to regulated and legal hunting, as distinguished from poaching, which is the killing, trapping or capture of animals contrary to law. Hunted animals are referred to (and often protected by law) as game animals, and are usually large mammals or migratory birds. The killing of other humans is most often called execution (judicial), homicide (illegal), genocide (an entire people or culture) or war (legalized, between political parties).

By definition, hunting strictly speaking excludes the killing -though the same techniques may be used- of individual animals that have become dangerous to humans and the killing of non-game animals, domestic animals, or vermin (or "varmints") as a means of pest control. Hunting may be a component of modern wildlife management, but is only a portion, sometimes used to help maintain a population of healthy animals within an environment's ecological carrying capacity. Written by former a former State Wildlife Division Director for Alaska.