Media Coverage - Delta Township Women Says Anti-Dove Hunting Issue Consumes Her
Published October 19, 2006. By Stacey Range. Lansing State Journal
Julie Baker decided practice of killing doves ‘just wrong’
CORRECTION: Due to an editing error, a quote from Julie Baker was incomplete. The story should have said: “It’s just wrong,” Baker said with disgust. “It’s nothing more than live target practice.” The story has been corrected below.
Julie Baker isn’t a radical environmentalist or animal activist.
She eats meat, albeit sparingly to maintain her figure.
She even has family members who hunt, and she still loves them.
But the thought of killing little mourning doves for sport makes her ill.
“It’s just wrong,” Baker said with disgust. “It’s nothing more than live target practice.”
Her disdain, combined with disbelief in scientific testimony put forth by those pushing to make mourning doves fair game, has fueled a passion that has consumed the single 39-year-old’s life for the last five years.
It started in late 2000 after she called to speak to then-state Rep. Sue Tabor, who days before failed in her attempt to pass legislation for a mourning dove hunting
season.
“I wanted to make sure she heard my voice and knew that I was opposed to shooting mourning doves,” Baker recalled.
“I was rudely and promptly told by a staff member of hers that it didn’t matter what I wanted, Rep. Tabor wanted it.”
Baker, at the time a marketing and sales associate for an East Lansing-based medical technologies firm, created the Songbird Protection Coalition to fight the effort.
The grass-roots group grew over time, attracting not just animal rights activists but also birders who simply like to hear the mournful coo at their backyard feeders. She also secured aid from a couple of heavy hitters, including the Michigan Audubon Society and the U.S. Humane Society.
Managing the coalition, building support and speaking to media, voters and lawmakers have been her full-time job since the medical company folded in early 2002.
She takes home about $1,600 a month, less than half her previous salary.
And she’s lost so much of her free time that she hasn’t ridden her horse, Risky Business, in about two years.
So why has the woman voted shyest in her class at Eaton Rapids High School put herself out there as the poster protester of mourning dove hunting and given up so much of her life for a bunch of little birds?
“I’m doing it for the doves,” Baker said. “It’s all about the doves.”
