An honourable kill?

From TwinCities:

The famous Field and Stream buck won't set a world record, but the antlers of the deer downed two months ago by Bob Decker, of Eau Claire, Wis., will bear another significant honor.

Wouldn't it have been more honorable to let the buck live and watch it thrive? Where's the honour in killing an innocent non-threatening creature? I'll never understand these people...

Update

Over at AliveNotDead, I have been informed about the deer population problems in certain states in the U.S.A. Without natural predators (bears, wolves, mountain lions), the deer population continues to increase at an inconvenient rate. Hunting is considered the only way to keep the population at a healthy level.

Even so, I would hope that a more humane method of population control could be found, or at least a painless one. Very few hunters are accurate enough to guarantee a painless kill with just one bullet or one arrow. Some people suggest that does (female deer) should be killed in preference to bucks (male deer). If we were talking about dogs or cats where one female usually gives birth to several offspring, then I'd agree, but deer rarely give birth to more than one fawn (baby deer) so killing does in preference to bucks will not make a significant difference to the deer population.

Like heavy snowfall (hello Vancouverites ;-), those of us not encumbered by the deer problem would love to see deer roaming free and cringe at the thought of killing them, while for the people living in deer territory, deer culling is a necessary part of life.