A nurse who posts pictures of wild animals she’s hunted on social media has revealed she receives threats to rape and murder her baby daughter.
Kate Small has killed hogs, deer, wolves and bears in her hometown of Boise, Idaho, as well as in other places like South Africa. She then posts pictures posing next to their carcasses on Instagram, where she has amassed 27,000 followers.
The 29-year-old can spend days or weeks out in the countryside hunting down the animals she kills, the biggest of which a 6ft black bear weighing more than 350lbs.
She says the most difficult animal she’s ever hunted was a wolf, because of the creature’s heightened senses and sheer speed, which means they can travel miles and miles in the space of a day.
Small isn’t new to the world of hunting – she’s spent 10 years killing animals and hopes to introduce her baby daughter Finley into the ‘sport’.
The mum-of-one claims to hunt in an ‘ethical way’, only killing animals for food or ‘conservation’ and she wants more women to get involved.
Posting a video on social media, Small shared a video in which she brags about ‘dropping’ a bear.
Small explained her rationale for hunting:
I like being able to know exactly where my food came from and not only that but working extremely hard to get it. I like being able to provide organic, nutritious meals for my family.
This lifestyle also lets me create everlasting memories with my friends and family.
Even if I am unable to harvest an animal, memories made on a mountain, battling the elements and being pushed to your limit are invaluable. It’s a true test of your inner strength and character.
I salvage as much of the animal as I possibly can. I always keep the head and hide for mounting. The meat is what we live off of, we butcher it ourselves and then we will eat it the rest of the year.
Aside from wolves, as they carry parasites that are dangerous to eat and the meat is bad, I don’t hunt anything I won’t eat. I never take an animal for fun, it’s for food or for conservation.
However, not everyone is convinced by Small’s argument as she reveals she’s received thousands of death threats online, with people even targeting her dog and her one-year-old daughter.
She explained:
I have actually received thousands of death threats. People saying things I’d never wish on my worst enemy. I’ve had hundreds of people also threaten to rape and murder my one-year old daughter. I recall one person saying, ”I’m going to put your baby in a blender and listen to her scream”.
I’ve also had people say they are going to murder my dogs, which just doesn’t make any sense to me, you’re mad that I killed an animal, so you’re going to kill an animal.
For the most part I try to use education and explain why I do what I do but I must admit sometimes my sarcasm gets the better of me and I respond with humor. I usually laugh the death threats off, if you are threatening someone who hunts apex predators for a living, you mustn’t be very bright.
Despite her critics, Small claims hinting certain animals is kinder than allowing them to die from natural causes.
She argued:
Those that I know who hunt, including myself, have an immense respect for animals and care deeply about them, that’s another reason why we do what we do.
Every year fish and game [authorities] comes out with new quotas specifying what and how many of each species in each particular area can and should be hunted. These quotas are based on scientific research to help keep the populations at their healthiest.
Small continued:
Hunting helps these animals combat spread of disease and competition for food. I know people think hunting is cruel, but it isn’t, you know what’s cruel? Mother Nature. Have you ever seen an elk get half eaten by wolves and suffer for hours while it slowly and painfully dies?
Have you ever seen a mule deer gradually waste away and eventually die of starvation? I don’t know about you, but to me a single shot to the vitals sounds like a much better way to go.
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Emma Rosemurgey is an NCTJ trained Journalist who started her career by producing The Royal Rosemurgey newspaper in 2004, which kept her family up to date with the goings on of her sleepy north east village. She graduated from the University of Central Lancashire in Preston and started her career in regional newspapers before joining Tyla (formerly Pretty 52) in 2017, and progressing onto UNILAD in 2019.