I read on a separate post here that some people pay up to $60,000.00 in order to hunt bighorn sheep. they say that was in Mexico, but I am also told that sheep licenses and hunts are getting very expensive in the states as well.

Some argue that it should be highest bidder wins just like buying a car. But I don't think its like buying a car becasue those sheep belong to all of the people and therefore all of the people who want to hunt should have an equal chance to hunt regardless of their bankroll.

What do you think?

Blue

Blue,

Hunts such as you describe are not awarded to the highest bidder (Special permit auctions not withstanding). The licenses, if drawn are the same price for anybody but the cost of the hunt is going to be set by supply and demand. A guided hunt is a commodity, the same as a car. If I'm a car company and can sell as many vehicles as I can build at $30,000 why on earth would I charge $10,000? I have no obligation to build a car that everyone can afford. There is no such price anyway. What is percieved affordable to one person may not be to another with the same income. There are hunting opportunities in this country for everyone. Maybe that means whitetails on the back 40 or bighorn's in the wilderness. It doesn't mean everybody can do everything. That's the incentive of America. The opportunity is there. You talk fairness but life is not fair and I'm glad it's not. I have the opportunity to try and make my own life better and my kids do as well.

Jeff

i see what you're saying, blue, and i agree 100%. too bad the rest of the country is letting it go commercial.

Your problem isn't so much a right to hunt or a fair chance of drawing say a sheep ticket; but rather, a place to hunt. Contary to what some hunters seem to think, hunting on someone else's private property is not a birthright. With your dot com millionaires buying up large tracts of land, especial care has to be taken that the "use" regulations on our National lands continue to include recreational hunting. And the access issues, like in Wyoming, have to be reconciled. Political activism is needed to keep an eye on what the "huggers" and the bureaucrats are doing. We outdoorsmen tend to wait until the pot boils over before we do anything (ala Clinton). We may not have that luxury any longer.

I agree that at times the costs of hunting seem to favor the rich, but using a sheep hunt is a little misleading. The hunts in Mexico are for Desert Bighorn Sheep and are arranged for those that do not want to wait to be drawn for a tag. They have the money and there is a market for their desire.

I'm from Colorado and every year the Division of Wildlife gives up a sheep tag, a goat tag, a deer tag and a moose tag for auction. They also give up the same tags for raffle. The auction tags go to the highest bidder, and it can get very pricey. The raffle tags go to the lucky winner. This year, the price of raffle tags were $25 which is hardly extravigant. The winners of these licenses can hunt anywhere in the state they want in any open season. Pretty good deal if you get the sheep tag for $25. All the dollars paid for these tags go to habitat purposes. I buy raffle tickets every year, but haven't been lucky so far.

For the people that don't want to go that route, they can apply for sheep, goat, moose, desert sheep etc... in the regular drawing. I also do this and have been lucky here. In 1986 I drew a sheep tag for area S-31 and in 2001 I drew a goat tag for area G-13. The amount of money you have doesn't influence the draw, only persistance pays off here.
So, not being rich doesn't mean you can't hunt "glamour" game.

What I hate to see, is the escalation of costs for every day hunting. I hate to see the large ranches in my home state leased to big time outfitters and corporations. This will eventually destroy the sport because it will be harder for newcomers without any connections to find a place to hunt. Without new blood, the sport dies.

Look at the state of Texas for instance, every foot of land is owned by somebody. If you want to start to hunt deer, you will probably have to buy into a lease of some sort. That outlay of cash can be somewhat substantial based on what friends have told me. If you don't have the money to hunt at home, you will go out of state.

I believe we get so many out of state hunters in Colorado from Texas for just this reason. That means that you will pay non-resident fees, which are getting pretty high these days. If more non-residents keep coming out, the Division of Wildlife will be forced to begin to limit non-resident tags (already happened by the way) and increase the fees every couple years. This just continues to keep the costs going up. And who gets forced out? It's the young father that can no longer afford to take his children hunting.

I'd like to see it become more affordable, but how? You can't take the opportunity to earn some extra money from a rancher or farmer, and you can not decrease the desire people have for some of the more desirable animals. Anything in a limited supply, will have a continuingly increasing cost assigned to it.

Just my 2 cents worth.

Mac

Skibum



Please do not misunderstand me. I certainly am for anyone having the opportunity to better theirselves and to get ahead, and I hope that your children have the opportunities you wish for them.



Nevertheless, big game animals belong to all of the people unless they have been bred on a farm. And that means that everyone should somehow have an equal opportunity to hunt them.



Take for example the case of the private rancher having some land bordering on a national forest. on one side of a very very thin line a magnificent trophy deer could be standing there and only his high dollar clients can shoot the deer. But if the deer takes four steps to the west he is now on the public land and available for everyone.



And what about the animal that crosses a state line. Why should a state be able to limit out of state hunters by the amount of the license fee when we are all citizens of the same country?



I am a landowner (given to me by my father), and I hunt deer on that land. I pay the taxes and expect to be able to use the land as I wish. But I don't lease it or charge money for others to hunt there. The only thing I do is limit the number of other hunters for safety reasons. I don't charge because I don't believe the game is mine to charge for. And I also feel, as a landowner, that if I restrict people from hunting on my land, then I should have no right to go and ask others to allow me to hunt on their land.





As for this restriction put on by the states and some provinces that you have to have a guide to hunt certain species or in certain areas. I was out in Wyoming two years ago with my camera and was able to get within 30 yards of 15 magnificent bignorn sheep, with no restriction as to a guide. But if I was carrying a rifle I would have needed a guide.



Again, do not misunderstand. I am not saying that there shouldn't be guides. Guides provide a great service to those than want to hire a guide. But to make hiring a guide a requirement is to me a violation of equal protection under the laws.



Blue

Blue: SOrry but that "belongs to all of the people" stuff sounds like commie....sorry democrat BS. I believe in the free market system whether it's the price of gas or a sheep. You can afford a sheep tag, you just have to be lucky and draw the permit. Or if you're a man of means you can buy one if you have the high bid from one of the prmit owners. I'll never be able to afford one and I'm comfortable with that, but then again , I'm not into goats. jorge

Blue,

I agree that game belongs to all people. I also am not a fan of requiring out of state hunters to hire a guide when hunting public land. But you are getting that all tangled up with access to private property. If a landowner chooses to charge for access to his property it is his right. In your case you have every right to limit who you allow to hunt your property. The fact you don't charge the people you do allow to hunt is irrelevant. The fact is you tell some people no. By the definition in your own post you are not giving everyone equal opportunity to hunt the animals that are on your property. In some cases it may be economic, in your case is personal. In either case the result is the same.

Jeff

High dollar hunting will cause the sport of hunting to disapear as we know it.it is known that not of all hunters make $200,000 a year.Its play money for the rich to be able to hunt when and where and what they want.I grew up hunting deer on my farm and had thousands of acres to hunt for free.Now hunting leases are $20-30 an acre.Its making hunting in the United States like European hunting all high dollar with alot of high fence hunting.I take as many kids hunting as I can.Its a shame to see it turned into a high dollar bragging sport.I have hunted for up to two months for one deer on my farm.These money humnts have turned into how big can I shoot and animal and how fast can I shoot it .I worked hard for about every big buck I ever shot.

dgr416: What you say does have a ring of truth to it, but there are still many, many millions of acres available to us regular folks to hunt in. But we cannot get into the class warfare issue with the well-to-do hunters, unless it becomes an illegal hunt. Thenwe have an issue. THe realit is there are not enough of those "200k plus" hunters out there to sustain the hunting industry. I am part owner of an outfitting business in Maine and my other partner has a place in SC. Virtually ALL of our clientele are "regular" folks,most of them repeat customers. You have to realize that sheep hunting, by the extremely low numbers of animals HAS to be an expensive proposition by the laws odf supply and demand. And that will ensure the survivabilty of the specie. jorge

Skibum, Jorge and others:

I respectfully submit that:

Access to private land is one thing. What is done on that land is quite another. For example, the government may claim public domain upon the mineral rights under my land, or the air space above my land, or the water rights on the land, thereby disallowig me from granting someone on my land the right to interfere with that public domain.

Animals must belong to the state, and therfore everyone. If they did not, then the state would have no right to legislate seasons, fees, etc.

Blue

So you are suggesting that since wildlife belongs to the state (a point upon which I agree) that there should be public domain for anyone to go on your land during hunting season to pursue the public resource?

Jeff

The states like to claim that wildlife belongs to all of the people and in the next breath they raffel off tags for five or six figures. Effectively taking away a chance at a tag for everyone and making it accesible to only a select few with the cash. This method has passed from sheep to elk and moose tags also,these tags don't generate as much money as sheep tags,but the prices have pushed the five figure price.

The thought behind this method of tag issue,is that 60,000 dollars worth of tag sales,could go a long way towards the departments budget. However,it doesn't and the dept. always finds a way to spend more, requiring it to raise all fees.

What you're seeing,is state departments being run just like free enterprise,rather then in the intrest of the public and they are supposed to work for the public,which they don't.

If you give a department 12 million dollars to operate on annually,they will spend 14 million and have to ask for more from the state and in addition raise fees. Its the nature and game of these assholes.

Skibum

NOt at all. Once again, I suggest that tresspass law and big game laws can either coexist, or not coexist, but are not one and the same thing. Moreover, this discussion is sort of getting away from my original premise, which is that I do not believe that there should be any monetary sanctions to hunting big game as proposed by the state.

Certainly, I don't disagree that a person may allow another to hunt on their land. But I do not agree that those property rights take precedence over the states duty to make sure that everyone gets a fair shake at hunting big game.

That does not mean that I think that each and every year everyone should have the right to hunt big game. Far from it. Even if I own land on which animals live, I should not have the right to go on that land and kill big game at will or make money by letting others shoot big game on my land.

I believe in conservation so long as it is fair to everyone, rather than conservation by only allowing the few that have lots of money to hunt.

Blue

blue,
It would be nice if everything was fair. (drawing tags) I don't like Washington's bonus points. Montana's preference pt. is a better program. Both are better than a lotto. Auction would be horrible if it ever came to that. Many of us would not be hunting BG anymore. To many can afford the price and don't give a hoot about those who can't. There are some that have been priced out of hunting already.
I don't have a problem with a few tags put aside for auction. Puts some big money in the kitty. Hopfully the money will go back into our wildlife.
I suppose it becomes more of a issue with the sheep tags because there are so few.
Can't add to much to what has already been said here.
I will say this on the landowners behalf. I know a family in Montana. They have a large cattle ranch. It is not as lucrative as it use to be. The enviromentalist are starting to put the pressure on. (Its not just on the coast) Anywhere there is running water there are some that think there should'nt be cattle. They have a point, but where do you draw the line? Anyway, on this properly there are huge wt deer and muly's and elk. They want to pass this land onto their kids as it was to them and its gettin tougher to make ends meat. They can bring in about 50k on the hunting and they NEED it. I don't blame them a bit. They had neighbors that were pissed cause they had been letting them hunt there for free. Too bad.
They dont charge me to shoot their gophers or p-dogs. But I would'nt blame them if they had to start.
I would just find another spot.
I am afraid someday hunting will come down to who has the most money. Hopefully not for a LONG time.
Enough of the glume and doom...

sidewinder

Skibum



I really wish you knew me better. I let complete strangers hunt on my land without personal gain, just as I represented 3 complete strangers this week without personal gain. My only criteria is that once there are what I deem to be a sufficient number of hunters on the land, I cut it off so that nobody gets shot.



I don't dispute that there is a right to charge people to go on your land if you so desire. What I despise though is that somehow that right has turned into "conservation by money".



Don't misunderstand. I have nothing against money. Some of my best friends have some.



Sidewinder



I agree with you. Put the money back into wildlife. But I don't agree with the big money auctions. If you need more money for wildlife, then raise the cost of a regular license by a half a buck or so, which to me is more fair that letting somebody buy a tag based only upon her income.



Blue

It is absolutely about Supply and Demand, if there are a limited number of animals and a large number of hunters wanting to hunt that animal naturally the price will go up and this is what determines market value. I hate charging that much money for a hunt but I guarantee that I do not make that much money off of it. The majority goes to actually purchasing the permit from the landowner. Why should anybody charge less money for whatever it is they want to sell if they can get more?
Its important to note that the price of these hunts are on private land hunts where landowner permits are issued on a very limited basis. The landowners should be able to charge whatever they want to charge for access to their properties, they make the land payments and pay the taxes, it is theirs to do with as they please. Its not being discriminatory, its just maximizing your resources to be able to make a living.
On public ground all you would have to pay for is the tag and the outfitters guide fees if you choose not to hunt by yourself.

Drummond

I agree. The landowner should be able to charge whatever they want for people to trespass on their property, but I disagree that they should be able to charge what they want for people to trespass on their property when the purpose of the trespass is to take an animal that belongs to all of the people.

Why should somebody charge less if they can make more? Well, I don't know about most other things, but in my business I get great satisfaction in sometimes making it such that "justice" was not decided by money!!!

Blue

I see both sides of this discussion. If I had a large piece of land w/ deer. elk, whatever, I see no problem charging a fee for someone to hunt on my land. I do have a problem w/ guys like Ted Turner.
I hunted some land in Montana last fall, that borders one of TT ranches. Nice whitetail in the foothills & washes on his property & the land that borders his property. He charges$3000 for a whitetail hunt on his ranch. You can hunt the BLM land that borders it for free. The catch is his employes drive the fence line of the ranch before dusk to "discourage" the deer from moving out of the bottom land into the foothills. These are not Turner's deer but his staff act like they are. Pisses me off.

Well, I gues if it helps you sleep at night we could pretend that the $60,000 is for an expensive tour of the ranch but as an added bonus the hunters will have the opportunity to shoot a great ram. In this scenario the animal is actually free. LOL

I dont know if that will help but I thought I would throw that out there for you.

Drummond

Ann: you made a good point. I guess I'm just showing my ignorance about this sheep business. I just didn't like the tone of the state over the private individual tone. I'll reaf up on it and come back with another irreverent retort! jorge