For the past several years, outdoors writers — me included — have written stories about an apparent increase in the number of women involved in hunting and fishing.
Now it looks like the increase was more “apparent” than actual.
My friend and fellow outdoors writer Tammy Sapp of the Women’s Outdoor Wire did a little digging, and she found that the number of outdorswomen hasn’t increased appreciably since 1991. Here are Tammy’s numbers:
1991
Women anglers —9.9 million (28 percent of all anglers)
Women hunters —1.1 million (8 percent of all hunters)
1996
Women anglers —9.5 million (27 percent of all anglers)
Women hunters — 1.2 million (9 percent of all hunters)
2001
Women anglers — 8.9 million (26 percent of all anglers)
Women hunters —1.2 million (9 percent of all hunters)
2006
Women anglers —7.6 million (25 percent of all anglers)
Women hunters —1.2 million (9 percent of all hunters)
The number of women involved in fishing appears to be declining ever so slightly, while the number of women involved in hunting seems to have flat-lined. Neither trend is good.
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Yeah, lotsa people (including me) got schnookered by that bizarro unsupported 72 percent increase claim that just won’t die, but all is not lost, my friend.
Unlike in a hospital, flatlining in our case doesn’t mean dead; it just means our numbers are holding steady, rather than declining, which is the case with men.
Here’s the stat that should make you feel really good: The number of girls 15 and under who hunt has DOUBLED in the past 15 years, based on the USFWS 2006 National Survey – click here for more information: http://norcalcazadora.blogspot.com/2008/04/sweet-girls-hunting-numbers-are-way-up.html
The way I read that is that some moms and LOTS of dads are taking their little girls hunting, and their population bump will be entering the adult stats really soon here. These girls are our future!
The table that Holly refers to in the National Survey has, throughout the years, not had enough respondents to be statistically significant. I’ve talked to the experts in our industry about this, and they indicated that low numbers of respondents means you can’t develop any trends from one survey to the next with any confidence.
What all this really says is, there may be growing numbers of women…we just don’t know for sure right now. When the next national survey comes out, we hope it sheds more light on this matter.