Ideas on Point Collecting/Point Creep

Agreed, but I’m agreement with wllm that these three things would really help:

1. Must apply for draw to earn a point.

2. No refunds for drawn tags.

3. All tags reset points to zero (certain antlerless/doe tags exempt).
I'm on board with losing points for any antlered or either sex tag but I don't agree at all for forcing people to apply for a tag. I personally like the people just applying for points for a couple reasons:

1. They don't compete with me in the draw.
2. They provide revenue without extracting from the resource. Revenue that would be lost if they had to apply. If managing the resource is a priority, it needs to be funded an revenue has to be a priority.

I also don't agree with no refunds for drawn tags due to some specific reasons. Pretty tough to successfully push for and get legislation passed to reserve tags for medical reasons in Wyoming then advocate against that very policy.

I like the Wyoming legislation and it works well, Randy's Uncle Larry was able to utilize it and some others I've heard from.

I damn near had to use it myself for my moose permit this year...sucks to draw a tag and have a medical reason keeping you from hunting it.
 
@BuzzH would forcing people to apply for a license in say WY help with point creep in the fact that they have a random draw? This would would potentially help "eliminate" lower point holders from the pool? Or are the # of tags in the random draw so little it would have little to no affect?

Also I agree the biggest thing should be
1) No point averaging.
2) If you get license you lose your points no matter the license.
3) if it's a license issued bc of nuisance animals they don't require any points and it's a 100% random draw.
 
I'm on board with losing points for any antlered or either sex tag but I don't agree at all for forcing people to apply for a tag. I personally like the people just applying for points for a couple reasons:

1. They don't compete with me in the draw.
2. They provide revenue without extracting from the resource. Revenue that would be lost if they had to apply. If managing the resource is a priority, it needs to be funded an revenue has to be a priority.

I also don't agree with no refunds for drawn tags due to some specific reasons. Pretty tough to successfully push for and get legislation passed to reserve tags for medical reasons in Wyoming then advocate against that very policy.

I like the Wyoming legislation and it works well, Randy's Uncle Larry was able to utilize it and some others I've heard from.

I damn near had to use it myself for my moose permit this year...sucks to draw a tag and have a medical reason keeping you from hunting it.
I see what you're saying, there's definitely a give and take. You're proposal above may not help draw odds as well as others proposals, but it does maintain a large funding stream that, like you say, doesn't impact the resource.

At a certain point though, I feel like we could provide the same funding with fewer applicants. The issue with that, would be making hunting more of a wealthy activity.

All kinds of give and take.

transferrable is a hard no. Selling is a hard no (even back to the state, where you lose revenue and there's no risk to the applicant).

We just need fewer people and more critters and more places to hunt easy peasy, we invade CAN.
 
@BuzzH would forcing people to apply for a license in say WY help with point creep in the fact that they have a random draw? This would would potentially help "eliminate" lower point holders from the pool? Or are the # of tags in the random draw so little it would have little to no affect?

Also I agree the biggest thing should be
1) No point averaging.
2) If you get license you lose your points no matter the license.
3) if it's a license issued bc of nuisance animals they don't require any points and it's a 100% random draw.
The way the Wyoming draw works, everybody that applies is considered in both the preference and random draws.

So, IMO, by forcing all applicants to apply for a permit, those that really don't want to draw will put in for say, a unit 100 bull elk tag.

The random odds for those tags, although really bad now, will be really, really, really bad if you have to apply to gain a point. Also, lets say someone that has applied for that area simply because the odds are really bad (may or may not know anything about that area) draws the tag. They probably won't put much effort into when someone that actually wanted the tag, would have. IMO, stealing an opportunity from someone that really wants that tag.

Plus, there could also be ways around that too...apply for a tag that takes max points and issues no random tags.

I think there could be some slight decrease in point creep in the mid-tier units by forcing people to actually apply, but the lower and upper tiers wouldn't see much, if any, decrease in creep.
 
The way the Wyoming draw works, everybody that applies is considered in both the preference and random draws.

So, IMO, by forcing all applicants to apply for a permit, those that really don't want to draw will put in for say, a unit 100 bull elk tag.

The random odds for those tags, although really bad now, will be really, really, really bad if you have to apply to gain a point. Also, lets say someone that has applied for that area simply because the odds are really bad (may or may not know anything about that area) draws the tag. They probably won't put much effort into when someone that actually wanted the tag, would have. IMO, stealing an opportunity from someone that really wants that tag.

Plus, there could also be ways around that too...apply for a tag that takes max points and issues no random tags.

I think there could be some slight decrease in point creep in the mid-tier units by forcing people to actually apply, but the lower and upper tiers wouldn't see much, if any, decrease in creep.
Thanks that all makes sense! Making people apply for a license or point probably makes more sense in CO where someone can apply for a point and still pick up an OTC tag.
 
The way the Wyoming draw works, everybody that applies is considered in both the preference and random draws.

So, IMO, by forcing all applicants to apply for a permit, those that really don't want to draw will put in for say, a unit 100 bull elk tag.

The random odds for those tags, although really bad now, will be really, really, really bad if you have to apply to gain a point. Also, lets say someone that has applied for that area simply because the odds are really bad (may or may not know anything about that area) draws the tag. They probably won't put much effort into when someone that actually wanted the tag, would have. IMO, stealing an opportunity from someone that really wants that tag.

Plus, there could also be ways around that too...apply for a tag that takes max points and issues no random tags.

I think there could be some slight decrease in point creep in the mid-tier units by forcing people to actually apply, but the lower and upper tiers wouldn't see much, if any, decrease in creep.
I can agree with you on this. Forcing people to apply for a hunt code is not going to solve anything. Likely lower the state revenue from the process, increase draw odds with only very tiny very marginal decrease in point creep
 
Thanks that all makes sense! Making people apply for a license or point probably makes more sense in CO where someone can apply for a point and still pick up an OTC tag.
Apply for a point, get a cow tag as a second choice and then pick up a 16 point bull tag on the reissue list...oh and get their kid a sheep tag.
 
Apply for a point, get a cow tag as a second choice and then pick up a 16 point bull tag on the reissue list...oh and get their kid a sheep tag.
there are so many things wrong with how CO does things we should probably ignore them for this discussion. ironically however is the fact that their messed up system results in some of the best 1-5 preference point hunts in the west and those hunts aren't impacted much by point creep. go figure 🤷‍♂️
 
I do think that if you made folks apply for a hunt, that you completely eliminated refunds (yes even for death), and that every tag zero'd your points that we'd have a lot less folks participating.
Or at least Front the full tag fee for points. The issue with not being able to buy points is you just force your folks to put in to the hardest to draw hunts and crowd that pool. Buying points at a discount keeps that competition among folks who really want it.

My thoughts, without a particular solution...

Weaning the Western states off of points is going to be tough.

On one hand the State game Dept's really can't afford to CARE about the individual hunter. They have to meet their budget, and demand is greater than supply. Points are free money to them.


Squared points systems (points ^2 chances in a random draw) just make EVERYONE's odds bad . Some are just worse than others. Kinda like divorce, best outcome is when everyone is equally unhappy.

At some point these states WILL have to CAP points. When they do do they make the over cap lottery Random?


Even NM with a random draw has raised the fee on a Quality unit Tag. Making hunters put their money where their mouth is.


keep at least 50% of the tags outside the point scheme and have them as random. It dilutes the benefits of the point scheme of fewer tags are subject of that point system.
I could get behind this. I've drawn 3 really good elk tags in 23 years of applying being the "random tag" 2 of those 3 were in point States.
 
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Or at least Front the full tag fee for points. The issue with not being able to buy points is you just force your folks to put in to the hardest to draw hunts and crowd that pool. Buying points at a discount keeps that competition among folks who really want it.
It's already mathematically impossible for new folks to draw those units so I don't see that as an issue. If someone wants to completely forgo hunting for decades to have a chance at a premium unit 1 time I think that's fine.

There are like 200 premium tags in CO a year and 200,000 hunters... 🤷‍♂️

If your 55 with 30 points, do you hold out or go hunting.

Also... incredibly unpopular idea, all premium tags must be applied for in person with a paper app at the DNR headquarters.
 
If I were King for a day, I’d do the following:

Auction off every available tag. Residents get first chance, any leftover tags go to nonresidents. Set a reserve limit for each tag and then let the bidding begin. Tags are non-transferrable and non-returnable. Put up or shut up.

Money would be rolling through the doors of every wildlife office in every state. Isn’t that what the states want anyway … more and more and more money?!? 😉
 
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It's already mathematically impossible for new folks to draw those units so I don't see that as an issue. If someone wants to completely forgo hunting for decades to have a chance at a premium unit 1 time I think that's fine.

There are like 200 premium tags in CO a year and 200,000 hunters... 🤷‍♂️

If your 55 with 30 points, do you hold out or go hunting.

Also... incredibly unpopular idea, all premium tags must be applied for in person with a paper app at the DNR headquarters.
I think there should always be a portion of the tags that are available in a random draw no matter the point scheme.

IMO, minimum of 50% of available tags should be in the random side...and I could live with even 75% being random.
 

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