How would you feel if the day befor Black Powder season for Elk the game dept. takes a plane and scatters all the herds to the next county? Some of these hunters have been scouting these Elk for months, then have all that work shot down the tubes. This happens often in this state
Fuzz

Altho I have never personally seen it happen,I am told that it is a regular occurance in my home state.

Bravo five one

That's, unfortunately, what happens when bunny-hugging marxists are allowed to infiltrate state agencies.

I've seen them do it with helecopters in Oregon. The helecopters were probably purchased with the money we spend on hunting.

FUZZ,seen it happen many times. Talking to the wardens.... they say it was done to break up the herds for hunter safety. Cross fires? Don't know about your side, but in some(most) places kevlar helmet and body armour are not out of place. Since you are a Washington guy answer me this ...
mule deer over here are 3pt. min on one side
elk are spikes only.
Now is the Dept. of Game trying to kill off all the mature mule deer bucks or kill off all young bull elk?
Or they just havn't figured how to manage game yet? STILL!!!!!!

Fuzz

The WA. State Game Department has been breaking up the Colockum herd since at least he mid 60's with aircraft.

This is nothing new. The Wyoming Game & Fish was known to do it back in the 70's, and for all I know are still doing it. The story was they were trying to scatter them around to prevent the opening day herd shooting hordes from blasting away as the herd ran about from one area to the other.

[ 10-13-2002, 01:45: Message edited by: Matt Norman ]

Dan in WA
I don't know, over on the west side all deer from spikes on up is fair game. For Elk now it's 3point or better,5-6yrs ago it was spikes only. Fuzz

Note the common thread in all stories of this type . . .

NO NONE has ever seen it happen,just heard about it 3-10th hand!
Just goes a lot faster over the net!

LouisB

Just an opinion of course!

Dan,
Funny you ask that. I was hunting up north of us in Douglas County above Wells Dam on Saturday and was asked the same question. It seems a bit contradictory.

The Wa. Dept. of Fish and Wildlife doesn't want the 3 point minimum for mule deer...they tried to go to "any buck" and hunters complained enough that they didn't do it. Same with the spike only for elk on the west side several years ago...hunters complained about it so they were forced to go to a 3 point minimum instead. You just have to realize that the regulations in this state aren't based on biology, they are based on what the public wants and not what is best for the deer and elk herds.

[ 10-17-2002, 13:17: Message edited by: Washington Hunter ]