MT - Changes in Hunting Regs/Units/Seasons coming this month

[Carnage2011]

Not all of it

Ya I just noticed that. That sucks for sure.

 

[tjones]

I can’t even fathom the work that was put in to make those changes.

Back in the mid 90’ it took 3 years of work from a dedicated group.

Today no way.

Also look at the proposed permit increase levels.

 

[timmy]

Back in the mid 90’ it took 3 years of work from a dedicated group.

Today no way.

If you suggest changes in some parts of the states you get laughed at. Much respect to you guys getting it done.

 

[joelweb]

Lots to consider here.

Looking at mule deer, I like the idea of some of the three week units. I think that approach is worth looking at.

I worry about eliminating or combining many of the permit areas and how that could make it even more difficult to draw a permit. It is interesting to see 213, 215, 291 south 293 and 298 become a giant HD 222 permit area, while the HD 103, 324 and 261 permit areas get dropped.

 

[timmy]

My point is that it doesn't make sense to compare different parts of the state. The Bitterroot gets an unbelievably high amount of recreational pressure and has very few mule deer. Of course the regulations need to be more restrictive in the Bitterroot than on the Custer. You can't just say that making our seasons less restrictive than they were isn't a big deal because it's still more restrictive than other parts of the state.

Regardless of recreational pressure and population eastern montana doesn’t need to be exploited or be the relief valve for the rest of the state. You can’t have it good over there and pound deer over here if it’s not good enough. I understand your frustration but the decline I’ve seen in the last 30 will continue to get worse and is not sustainable. During hunting season eastern montana public land use would rival any use in western montana. That’s not right. Any cut in season would be welcomed by me.

 

[mtmuley]

I almost hate to say this, but if these changes go through, I already have my mule deer hunt planned for next year. mtmuley

 

[Gerald Martin]

I almost hate to say this, but if these changes go through, I already have my mule deer hunt planned for next year. mtmuley

Does this mean you aren’t going to give me any suggestions on where to find a mule deer?

 

[tjones]

In 2019 HD270 had 45 permits for mule deer bucks. The new proposal is to up it to 50 permits and 20 permits for 3x's.

Increase from 45 total to 70 total. Add in the poachers and the tribes take in a heavily roaded, mostly public land and hints of more permits to come in the name of CWD prevention.

More meetings coming up to formulate a plan. We are still in the fight but doesn't look good.

Within a state where were mule deer get pounded we had some little gems still hanging on from years gone by. Keeping them will be a challenge.

 

[Sytes]

I almost hate to say this, but if these changes go through, I already have my mule deer hunt planned for next year. mtmuley

May be a Clearwater Junction shed hunting based entry... heh!



Hopefully they are scoping in the variances for select species and the meaning of developing quality over excess quantity of fork horns...

"Hopefully" is a light dimming each day that passes. I don't understand the increase of tags - it would seem that light is fading.

Amazing.

 

[MTLabrador]

I’m really glad some of my favorite places to hunt have a couple great biologists that really care about what they do. I’m somewhat glad to see the 900 units get chopped up too, and I was relieved to see that a few places I was sure would go to general bull hunting did not.

 

[Ben Lamb]

There's obviously some really disappointing proposals in this (especially with mule deer). That said, I keep thinking to myself when I'm going through these that this could have been A LOT worse, especially with elk. I was not expecting the 900 elk units to go to individual tags, that seems like a very reasonable decision. I very much expected the Lewistown area units to go to general bull hunting with what I was hearing. There are a handful of limited entry mule deer units in Western Montana that are getting much larger also, which I think is a good decision.

It seems like Helena did make a few changes from the proposals submitted by the local bios, but not as many as I feared they would.

I still can't wrap my head around the "Why" for this whole process though. 90% of hunters have ONX and a copy of the regulations on their phones these days. It's very easy to know what unit you're standing in and what the regulations are. All this shuffling for the sake of catering to the lowest denominator just feels like a waste of time and energy for everyone involved. Not to mention how much we're handcuffing our local bios for future management decisions.

If you're commenting on any of these changes you feel strongly about, be blunt and to the point. If there's any nuance at all to your comment they will throw you in to the "indifferent" category rather than support or oppose.

On the 900-20 tags going back to LE individual districts, yeah, it could have been much worse, but reinstating the districts is what the UPOM and Paul Ellis crowd have been pushing for. This allows easier marketing to NR outfitted clients and helps outfitters when it comes to client management through points, etc. The main reason that 900-20 was brought in was to deal with a massive misallocation of harvested bulls in some of those districts as well as spreading out resident hunter pressure. With OTC B tags, and now a bunch of split up districts, I think it makes sense to track this and ensure that the data on harvest is kept. I'm not sure they will this time.

None of this happens in a vaccuum. With the big expansion in requests under the 454 program, increased pressure for transferable licenses, etc, eliminating the 900-20 is a first step towards increasing bull poermits in over-objectiver districts, and if FWP gets their way on getting 505 or other transferable licenses put in place, this could very easily result in resident hunters losing a ton access to lands that hold elk as leases and exclusivity become the standard operating procedure even moreso than currently.

 

[Sytes]

I still can't wrap my head around the "Why" for this whole process though.

I recall from the R1 meeting, Worsech held up a tag with all the regs and Region(s) / district(s). It was a 3 fold, green, thick(er) stock paper. It's a R1 "relic" ( ) of the simple process of the past. It wasn't intended to say that's how it should be though I got the sense over time... it's simply been a build up over and over...
He stated the simplification is necessary to alleviate excess material and confusing multiple lines of detail within so many districts. I believe he or one of those working on the project, shared many concerned phone calls and in person visits over running their staffing and the simplification will reduce that burden. Basically, my impression, to streamline the work flow process.

I took it to be sincere and seemed well received by the staff members present. Whether they were under pressure to be supportive or not is beyond me to assume... though my impression... I believe it is well intended.

Personally, I've been at the FWP R1 (and R2) Office and stood in line for whatever reason. While present there was a ton of very simple questions holding up the process and staff. (Hopefully I wasn't one others behind me thought the same for my interest) I'd imagine the same goes for Biologist and Wardens receiving phone calls and having phone messages to return phone calls, emails, etc.

I don't believe it's simply for the geographic aspect. My two cents.

 

[Carnage2011]

On the 900-20 tags going back to LE individual districts, yeah, it could have been much worse, but reinstating the districts is what the UPOM and Paul Ellis crowd have been pushing for. This allows easier marketing to NR outfitted clients and helps outfitters when it comes to client management through points, etc. The main reason that 900-20 was brought in was to deal with a massive misallocation of harvested bulls in some of those districts as well as spreading out resident hunter pressure. With OTC B tags, and now a bunch of split up districts, I think it makes sense to track this and ensure that the data on harvest is kept. I'm not sure they will this time.

None of this happens in a vaccuum. With the big expansion in requests under the 454 program, increased pressure for transferable licenses, etc, eliminating the 900-20 is a first step towards increasing bull poermits in over-objectiver districts, and if FWP gets their way on getting 505 or other transferable licenses put in place, this could very easily result in resident hunters losing a ton access to lands that hold elk as leases and exclusivity become the standard operating procedure even moreso than currently.

While I’m sure there are some shenanigans going on behind the scenes; breaking up the 900 tag is a good thing in my eyes. I’m not going to be upset about something just because Paul Ellis is an advocate for it. We can’t possibly manage the sweet grass hills and bull mountains on the same tag. The FWP is already stating they will push for mandatory reporting.

We sit here and share our concerns about combining HD’s into one and then also complain about breaking up a bundled tag. It seems like we are looking for every doom and gloom scenario sometimes. Perhaps the Custer elk can be managed now and so can the highwoods…without having to try and guess which units people are hunting. I am also a big proponent of limiting people to hunting the unit they draw for elk. If you draw the 447 elk tag them no general hunting for you.

 

[Carnage2011]

Sorry, I'm not following this. Can you dumb it down? The 900 tags have been very easy to draw up until now. How is it easier for the outfitters now with individual unit tags?

They are still easy to draw just not quite guaranteed. The only thing I can think is the Sweet Grass Hills will likely be easier to draw than the Custer or Highwoods. Therefore the outfitter will have a better chance. However, they still have to draw the general combo tag first.

 

[Ben Lamb]

Sorry, I'm not following this. Can you dumb it down? The 900 tags have been very easy to draw up until now. How is it easier for the outfitters now with individual unit tags?

10% of LE permits going into 20 different districts with varying herd objectives that can likely be increased based on "landowner tolerance" makes it easier to increase NR opportunity through LE permits, and especially when you layer the landowner setaside/transferable tag/ outfitter welfare tags on top of it all.

Easier to secure more land that way, versus a larger distribution of licenses and LE permits. Those LE permits have been easy for residents to draw up until now. Not as much for NR's. This helps NR's get more LE permits for those areas when objectives go up in districts with high elk numbers and super low public opportunity.

 

[Mtnhunter1]

10% of LE permits going into 20 different districts with varying herd objectives that can likely be increased based on "landowner tolerance" makes it easier to increase NR opportunity through LE permits, and especially when you layer the landowner setaside/transferable tag/ outfitter welfare tags on top of it all.

Easier to secure more land that way, versus a larger distribution of licenses and LE permits. Those LE permits have been easy for residents to draw up until now. Not as much for NR's. This helps NR's get more LE permits for those areas when objectives go up in districts with high elk numbers and super low public opportunity.

Spot On, as usual.

 

[Ben Lamb]

But wouldn't the current set up create a much larger pool of Non-residents for the outfitters to cater to? 10% of the 900 permits is a much larger number than 10% of whatever these individual units will be set at. And they can't increase the 10% without increasing the 90% of residents that will get tags, right?

But that's spread out across all 22 districts, rather than allowing for individual district increases through objective manipulation and smaller increases in permits. I am trying to dig out the data from 2007 or so that showed when we had the individual districts how some of them were 90% NR opportunity for bulls, regardless of the quota system.

 

[Sytes]

I am also a big proponent of limiting people to hunting the unit they draw for elk. If you draw the 447 elk tag them no general hunting for you.

As with drawn tags. I agree 100% Step further would be selection of Archery or Rifle for each species. I'd add OR traditional muzzleloader as well.

Do you have specific examples of changes they're making in this proposal that will clear up confusion? The vast majority of the changes I'm seeing have to do with the mandate to combine smaller units to create larger ones.

If/When I have an opportunity, I'll review the audio I have from the R1 meeting.

 

[Carnage2011]

But that's spread out across all 22 districts, rather than allowing for individual district increases through objective manipulation and smaller increases in permits. I am trying to dig out the data from 2007 or so that showed when we had the individual districts how some of them were 90% NR opportunity for bulls, regardless of the quota system.

No matter what the NR are still limited to 10% of LE permits though, correct?

 

[Carnage2011]

90% of the bulls were killed by nonresidents because they resided on outfitter controlled private land?

And if that’s the case it’s not going to change at all based on us managing by unit. We aren’t going to get any more access to private land…