When you walk among the fearless who have never been hunted,
who are not angry with you for being there;

when you stalk an elder ram for five days,
putting him at ease;

when you blow his heart out and drag his carcass off the mountain
to flaunt and display;

there is no beauty left.

Is nothing sacred?

Yukon resident Nelson Turnbull has acted out the scenario described above, in an animal Sanctuary, no less. And perhaps the greatest tragedy is that what he did is entirely legal, and was in fact sanctioned by both the Yukon government and the Kluane First Nation, in whose traditional territory the hunt took place.

Susan Rogan heard Nelson Turnbull interviewed on the radio after the hunt. She wrote a beautiful letter to the editor outlining her concerns about the hunt, about Turnbull's choice to kill a sheep, and about alternative ways of capitalising on our wildlife and natural places without destroying what we find there. Mike Grieco responded to Susan Rogan's letter. Both of their letters are below.