I'm not going to waste another second arguing about how well people shoot. I've hunted in a couple dozen states, and the same percentage of people who can't shoot well enough for the ranges they try to hunt at exist in every single one of them. It's a lot larger percentage than anyone wants to admit. Anyone who says it isn't is only fooling themselves. There is just as high a percentage of hunters over extending their skills in Wyoming, Colorado, or Idaho as there are here in Tennessee. The Bravo Sierra of "hunters here can shoot, the hunters around you suck" is just more ego stroking B.S., don't waste your time trying to sell that to me, I know better. I've been hunting and shooting for close to 40 years, reloading for nearly as long, and I was a wildlife tech for several years.
tbh I think the hunting environment over here contributes to a difference in hunters. Firearms licenses are required, to get it you have to sit a safety test, have 2 good references, and proper storage. So it takes a significant effort to get into hunting as opposed to just picking up a rifle. Hunting here is pretty much all stalking, no sitting in a blind waiting for a deer to wander past. Ranges are mixed, bush stalking is pretty much <50m, but then you get people hunting chamois and tahr at extreme long ranges in the mountains. Hunting is pretty much open slather in our national parks, we have red deer, fallow deer, whitetail deer, sambar deer, rusa deer, sika deer, tahr, chamois, wapiti (elk), feral pigs, and feral goats: and all of them are listed as pest species.
Then we have the small game, rabbits, hares (aka jack rabbits), possums, stoats, and feral cats - once again all open slather and listed as pests.
A lot of people here get there eye in working on bunnies on farms before moving up to be stuff. Once you can drop a bunny at 100y with a 22... well.. your eye is in
Oh and everything I shot (bar stink goats and possums) ends up in the pot
. Our freezer is chocka full of fallow deer, goat, and hare right now.
