The Galveston Daily News from Galveston, Texas • Page 5

The morning cup Waterfowl steel shot hassle lingers on ByJOELKIRKPATRICK News Staff Writer A trial in Austin on a sportsmen's club's attempt to overturn a Texas Parks and Wildlife Department requirement that steel shot be used fo.r hunting waterfowl in a large area of Southeastern Texas' coastal plain has been postponed. The date for the new hearing on converting a restraining order against the state agency into a temporary injunction is Oct. 19. The date of the hearing is just two weeks before the duck season opens on Nov 7. The hearing had been scheduled for Sept.

23, but was postponed by agreement 'between Assistant Attorney Genera! Kenneth Crass and lawyers for the Clute-based Muldoon Hunting and Fishing Club. Lawyers for the group are former State Sen. A.R. "Babe" Schwartz of Galveston and State Sen, Carl Parker of Port Arthur. A district judge in Austin, Jerry Dellana, issued a temporary restraining order stopping enforcement of the steel shot requirement a few days before the end of the special teai-hunting season this year.

Texas Parks and Wildlife Department officials have contended large percentages (they say up to three percent) of waterfowl die off each year after picking up spent lead shot from the ground and using it as grit in their gizzards. Others, like Mike Maier of the Waterfowl Habitat Owners Alliance, an organization lobbying against the ban here and elsewhere, contend the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has greatly exaggerated the problem and has greatly exaggerated the number of birds lost. Maier asked to be shown carcasses on which the percentages are based. He said based on those carcasses recovered, the mortality rate is a fraction of one percent, not the two or three percent the wildlife agency claims.

Reactions from hunters, from ammunition manufacturers who do not have a vested interest in steel shot and from organizations such as the National Rifle Association, have been consistently loud, swift, and angry. They have generally disputed the severity of the die-off. They have attacked the few studies that have linked lead to waterfowl die-offs. They have also claimed that because steel shot lacks range and hitting power of lead shot, more birds would be lost as cripples. The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department's officials have danced to the tune of U.S.

Fish and Wildlife Service advocates of use of steel shot, and urgings of the federal agency that steel shot zones be expanded every year. The state officials have established such a zone, and have indicated their plans to expand it still further next year. Officials of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, like Ted Clark, director of wildlife for the department, have appeared in places like Galveston to contend steel shot is as good as lead shot for hunting. It patterns better, they say, because the steel pellets are harder and rounder. It is soft enough that the steel pellets won't hurt your shotgun, they say.

There will be fewer cripples and more sure kills, they say. Many hunters listening (o the presentation refused to be convinced. Some said they sniffed a propaganda outing in the efforts of the Parks and Wildlife Department to "educate" them after already imposing the rule. One hunter said "I tell you, you can repeal laws in Austin, but you ain't going to repeal the laws of physics." He went on to say that it is more accurate to say that lead is baliistically better than steel for shot. A cubic foot of steel weighs 487 pounds.

A cubic foot of lead weighs 70S pounds. In the field, the lighter mass of steel results in shorter effective range, and less penetrating power when it does get to the target. "The laws of physics do not change," says Edward Kozicky of Winchester Western, a major manufacturer of shotgun ammunition and sporting arms. "Energy equals one half mass times the velocity squared. You're not going to get away from it.

You need (lead's greater) energy to consistently kill ducks beyond 35 yards. Ho.wever, Fish and Wildlife Service-sponsored tests could not find any significant difference in the crippling rates for steel and lead at ranges up to 45 yards. Hunters have complained about steel shot's greater cost, about its lack of availability in all gauges and loads except magnum and 12 and 20 gauges, about the Jack of reloadability of the empty cases, and about the kick of their shotguns using the steel magnum loads. Well, hunters ask, does the state of Texas have to require steel shot? The answer is no. Nearby Louisiana does not.

And in 1978, the U.S. Congress made it possible for states to tell the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to go butt a brick wall. Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska, no stranger to the arrogance of the entrenched bureaucrats in the U.S.

Fish and Wildlife Service, successfully sponsored an amendment preventing the service from spending any money to enforce the ban without approval of the individual states. The amount of lead deposited annually in the environment as spent shotgun pellets is 3,000 tons. That includes hunting for doves, pheasant, grouse, partridge, and waterfowl. Industrial sources and automobiles deposit 284,000 tons of lead a year in the environment, according to the government's own figures. Robert I.

Smith, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist, admits lead poisioning does not endanger the waterfowl population. GALVESTON PARKS AND RECREATION CALENDAR MONDAY Pirates' Golf Course Open8 a.m.-dark. Menard Center Outdoor Activities, 8 a.m.-lO p.m. Adult Badminton, 1-3 p.m.

TOPS Club, 6:30 p.m. Kempner Park Outdoor Activities, 8 a.m.-10 p.m. Adult Badminton, a.m. Wright Cuney Center Outdoor Activities, 8 a.m.-10 p.m. Galveston County Senior Citizens Nutrition Program, 10 a.m.-2p.m.

Gym Hours, 1-6 p.m. Adult Basketball, 1-9 p.m. Golden Circle 3 p.m. Galveston Barber Association, 5 p.m. Senior Citizens Center Recreational Activities, 8 a.m.-5 p.m.

City Senior Citizens Club Games Party, 1 p.m. Soccer Fields Youth and Adult Soccer, 6-8 p.m., Fort Crockett Schreiber Park Fields. Softball Fields St. Mary's Hospital Softball, 6 p.m., Hooper Field. Tennis Courts Open8a.m.-9p.m.

O'Connell Tennis, 3-5 p.m., Menard Courts. neighborhood of $25 million is raised by organizations such as Ducks Unlimited to preserve habitat for waterfowl. The danger in all of this steel shot vs. lead shot controversy is not so much to the waterfowl resource, but that the unfair and dis- criminatory method of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department in simply imposing a shot ban where tfte ''most shots are fired, historically, in Texas, may do its bit to drive the great Texas Duck Hunter that one; more towards extinction. Each year, $15 million is raised by the sale of federal duck stamps.

Each duck hunter will spend $7.50 for a federal duck stamp this year--if he hunts. He'll also pay $5 for a state duck stamp. He'll buy a state hunting license or a combination hunting and fishing license. And each year, that much money or more in the The Andersson family wants to extend a heart-felt thanks to all who gave their prayers and time to comfort and aid them. All donations of blood, food and flowers were greatly appreciated.

MRS. EVA ANDERSSON MAJ. MRS. JOE EMERSON MR. MRS.

DAVE HELMICK HALL'S DOOR CO 337-5647 945-9472 Hours: 8-5 Sat. 8-12 Distributor Authorized Service Center for Genie Systemt JmasWf GS880-D Deluxe Screw Drive with Exclusive Sequensor" "Computer- Controlted Brain." 1 Tronwnltttr Pluitax Included Installation Extra THRU OCT. 14th, J-'fl Genie GS420 Screw Drive One Transmitter Included Expert Installation by our own, trained installers. Quick, professional service. Automatic Garage Door Opener System By Alliance ALLIANCE Manufacturing Co Ohio 4460T SALES, SERVICE INSTALLATION Radio dispatched.

Residential Commercial, Also Available KfMODflING A Rf PAIRS; PRODUCTS: Monday Morning, September 28,1981 5-A briefs Tehran street clash worst since June ANKARA, Turkey (UPI) Machine-gun wielding opponents of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini Sunday battled his revolutionary guards in Tehran in the worst street fighting since June and government firing squads executed 24 more dissidents. Tehran radio said about 40 people were injured but reported no fatalities in the day-long fighting. However, a spokesman at Mostafa Khomeini hospital, con- tacted by telephone, said his hospital alone received the bodies of ten dead and 43 other people were being treated for injuries. In a terse commentary, the state-run radio said, "The people of Tehran today submitted their chests to the bullets of American hypocrites" meaning leftist Mo- iahideen Khalq guerrillas whose leader, Massoud Rajavi, is leading an anti-regime armed revolt from self-exile in France. IRA takes credit in pub assassination BELFAST, Northern Ireland (UPI) The Irish Republican Army said Sunday it killed an off-duty policeman in a pub only a few hours after another IRA convict gave up his hunger strike.

Alexander Stewart, 34, was gunned down while drinking with friends in a Killough, County Down, tavern late Saturday. He was the 27th member of Ulster's security forces to be killed since the first of 10 hunger strikers died May 5, in a campaign for political prisoner status. Stewart's killers got away but the IRA claimed responsibility for his death in a statement released Sunday by the Republican press center. The weekend decision by Maze prisoner Liam McCloskey to end his fast brought the number of hunger strike dropouts to seven. Six inmates, all members of the IRA, continued to refuse food.

McCloskey, 25, of Dungiven, ended his hunger strike voluntarily in its 55th day. His mother told him she would authorize medical treatment once he became unconscious. Bishop criticizes Duarte's U.S. visit SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador (UPI) A leading Catholic bishop lashed out Sunday at junta President Jose Napoleon Duarte's 10-day swing through the United States. "Duarte's visit has filled newspapers and television screens but violence is what continues to affect the lives of Salvadorans," Bishop Jesus Delgado said in a sermon at San Salvador's metropolitan cathedral.

The Salvadoran president, in his visit to the United States, has said elections planned for 1982 are the best way to stop violence in El Salvador. But Bishop Delgado said an end to the political violence is more important than the balloting. Right-winger wins British election BRIGHTON, England (UPI) Right-winger Denis Healey, 64, Sunday narrowly won election as deputy leader and probable future leader of Britain's feuding opposition Labor Party, smashing an all-out bid by left-wingers to capture control. In a runoff second ballot against extreme left-winger Anthony Wedgewood "Tony" Benn, 56, Healey won 50.426 percent of elec- toral college votes against 49.574 percent for Benn. On the first ballot, Healey had won 45.369 percent, Benn 36.627 percent and outsider John Silkin, another left winger, 18.004 percent.

Silkin was eliminated, leaving the race open for a straight right-left contest between Healey and Benn. The final result was in doubt until ballots actually were cast. Three counts were necessary in the runoff. twi Open tot, 10 Sat. Port Holiday Mall 400 Strand, Calvvtton rrarfcwlnrft Shopping Cantvr JMJ Palmar City Quality fashions you can afford energy saver blanket sale "warm glow" acrylic blankets acrylic in powder blue, suede, chestnut brown.

Nylon binding. A AA mm 77x90 Reg. '12 102x90 Reg.M7 "cozy" year round thermal blanket Thermal weave acrylic with nylon binding. White, suede, powder blue. 10.99 15.99 eyelet" ic blanket acryl Solid colors with embroidered eyelet lace binding.

Champagne, blue, white. 102x90 Reg. '21. 12.99 17.99 moss rose rose parade blankets Luxurious floral prints with nylon binding. 11.99 15.99 A'15 save 15.01 to 35.00 "royal" automatic electric blanket 34.99 72x84 full size electric blanket with 2 year warranty.

Full size with single control, queen king with duel control. Champagne, ice blue, golden. 49.99 74.99 84x90 Queen Vol. 100x90 King save 25.01 on throw blankets Rich, luxurious fur-like texture in acrylic. Beautiful for family room, wall hangings, blankets.

60 vol. 34.99.