New Mexico Privatization. Nuthin like it

Letthemgrow said:
I don't think that's even close. 12-13% more likely.
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Thank you for digging in- I saw estimates of 20-50% in my quick research so I went with 50% to be safe.

Your data would suggest that as many as 85% of Montana benificiaries are not hunters. That is very important context when we discuss things of this nature.

Balkanization of hunting presents a huge risk. There is strength in numbers.
 
Treeshark said:
Thank you for digging in- I saw estimates of 20-50% in my quick research so I went with 50% to be safe.

Your data would suggest that as many as 85% of Montana benificiaries are not hunters. That is very important context when we discuss things of this nature.

Balkanization of hunting presents a huge risk. There is strength in numbers.
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Did a quick look thru open gate properties in our state. NMGF only list 20 of them and not a single one is open to elk hunting. So my question is if landowners truly are so worried about elk damaging their property and eating to much grass why don't they put it in open gate? They get paid to have open gate property. Is it cause they can make more money selling their elk permits instead? I'm guessing that the answer? Can you not be open gate and get eplus permits both? Still not a fan of unit wide tags. My buddy was in a gila unit last fall hunting elk and they were hunting some national forest next to a unit wide ranch for elk. Gates were locked up and no hunting and no trespassing signs were up all over and it was elk season. I'm not here to say either side is right or wrong I think both sides have issues and there's something that needs fixed. But I don't believe either side has the right and completely perfect answer
 
abqbw said:
Collectively the 6 intermountain west states of NM, AZ, UT, CO, NV, and MT issue 515.2k total elk licenses.

This includes only 19.2k transferable (sellable) private landowner elk tags.

New Mexico issued 36.6k (7%) of the elk tags but an astounding 13.8k (72%) of the private landowner tags. That is 10x our share of landowner elk permits. It’s almost incomprehensible. Unless you know New Mexico.

Anyone that tries argue that there are features unique to New Mexico that even remotely justify the enormous number and share of private elk tags is talking out of their rear-end. And probably working for a billionaire or centi-millionaire.
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Having taken 2 New Mexico elk I'm all for it. And we pay a lot of money that adds to the economy more so than locals, who still can get plenty of tags. New Mexico is beautiful.
 
abqbw said:
Collectively the 6 intermountain west states of NM, AZ, UT, CO, NV, and MT issue 515.2k total elk licenses.

This includes only 19.2k transferable (sellable) private landowner elk tags.

New Mexico issued 36.6k (7%) of the elk tags but an astounding 13.8k (72%) of the private landowner tags. That is 10x our share of landowner elk permits. It’s almost incomprehensible. Unless you know New Mexico.

Anyone that tries argue that there are features unique to New Mexico that even remotely justify the enormous number and share of private elk tags is talking out of their rear-end. And probably working for a billionaire or centi-millionaire.
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Other states should have more private elk tags.

If e-plus went away, a significant portion of those tags would just evaporate into thin air, and some private land would not longer be huntable by people who draw tags in the public draw.

Your neighbor to the west doesn’t issue private land elk tags and as a result AZGF is waging war on elk in unit 3A, and parts of units 4 and 5. I talked to a biologist who said “by the time that season occurs, there will be no more elk on 3A”. Why? 3A and portions of 4 and 5 are about 50% private and it’s checker board, and the elk do nothing but cost the land owners money. In contrast elk in NM are expanding their distribution, and largely without landowner complaint. Why? Because elk are more than just a cost to the landowners in NM.

Could the e-plus system be modified to benefit the public while still benefiting landowners, and perhaps in a more “fair” way? Yes. Should elk on private land cease to be of monetary value to landowners? Only if you want to see fewer elk tags and fewer elk just because you can’t afford a piece of that particular pie.

I can’t afford a private land elk voucher and have never paid money to hunt private land by the way. I just don’t see how giving private land owners tags for property the public can’t hunt anyway, or in exchange for public hunting access to the private ranch, as is the case for unit wide tags, is hurting anyone.
 
Valley1320 said:
Did a quick look thru open gate properties in our state. NMGF only list 20 of them and not a single one is open to elk hunting. So my question is if landowners truly are so worried about elk damaging their property and eating to much grass why don't they put it in open gate? They get paid to have open gate property. Is it cause they can make more money selling their elk permits instead? I'm guessing that the answer? Can you not be open gate and get eplus permits both? Still not a fan of unit wide tags.
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This is the crux of these discussions in my view. Landowners want to complain about elk problems, but won't let public hunters on to help solve the problem. When the landowner wants to sell property, elk (and wildlife) are the first thing he advertises as a selling point to his property. Hell, I've heard of New Mexican landowners including their eplus tags in the advertisement for the property. So, are the elk actually a problem? Or is the landowner just looking for a way to monetize?

It's probably a little of both. No doubt, elk can cause problems that can be quantified in dollars by a landowner. I don't blame them for wanting to make a buck where they can. But, they could at least be honest about the variables that contributed to how they got there. Crying about elk problems while not allowing any public access, makes it hard for me to feel sorry for them, and they conveniently don't want to talk about that when they're at the legislature asking for transferable elk tags. Likewise, putting a pivot or a cornfield in a spot where grass has been for centuries, and then playing victim when elk show up, is a little puzzling to me.

To your question, it's a combination of money and convenience. Letting the public run wild on your property via block management, PLOTS, Walk-in, or Open Gate programs comes with a set of headaches. If they can get multiple bull tags to sell at $20k+ per, without having to give anything back to the public, that is an easier and more profitable pill to swallow. Throw on top of that the guide or ag lobby offering them a shoulder to cry on, who is more than happy to pay a lobbyist to fight for their cause under the "property rights" flag, and it's not hard to see how these efforts manifest themselves.

npaden said:
I don't know. The arguments comparing the New Mexico elk herd to the ones in Nevada and Arizona are pretty compelling. All 3 of those states have water as a limiting factor. New Mexico directly rewards landowners for habitat improvements, and they have 104,000 elk on the landscape compared to 17,000 for Nevada and 35,000 for Arizona. That's double those 2 states combined. It really seems to be working from that perspective.
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I would be very curious to know if that relative comparison holds any water. Somehow, I find it hard to believe that simply "rewarding landowners" could triple or quintuple an elk population at that scale (10s of thousands). Rewarding Nevada landowners with a small percentage of transferable tags helped grow their herd from the 3 or 4,000 it was, to the 17k it is now. But that's a far cry from 100k.

My suspicion is that New Mexico just has better and more elk habitat that allows for higher carrying capacity and wider geographic distribution, and not to mention 1/4 of the population of Arizona. Perhaps, what the e-plus system has created is not necessarily habitat driven incentives, but tolerance through monetization of a public resource. Monetization which comes in the form of multiple transferable tags per landowner, unit wide and good on public land in some cases, with little requirement to give anything in return to the public.

Unless I am mistaken, my understanding is that the largest elk herds in NM are in areas that have pretty sizeable, even majority acres in public land. Perhaps I am misinformed? Certainly elk are utilizing private land at different junctures. But it would seem to me that when there are landowners who own 2 acres, or 15 acres, and they're getting elk tags from the eplus system, and there are New Mexican residents waiting multiple years for a tag, this system is not even remotely intended to be a fair distribution of tags for the New Mexican public, and it is geared heavily in favor of the landed gentry. Regardless of other variables.

I do think the conversation is much trickier when we talk about units like 55B, 46, etc. Virtually 0 public land and still elk to be hunted. The public owns the elk but none of the land. The public and the GF agency are unlikely to able to compete with multiple high dollar elk tags, guided hunts, rich clients, etc. But shouldn't the New Mexican public get something in return? Even some type of controlled access? Instead, hunting in those units is basically Europe. If you want to hunt, you have to be able to write a big a check or you don't go.

What confuses me is that so many HTers on this thread support that model and are just willing to let the landowners draw up the contract on whatever terms suit them while getting nothing in return for the public, on a resource the public owns. "Concern" for privatization while supporting the European model, is speaking out of both sides of your mouth and one or the other must be a disingenuous statement...

It's just my opinion, but it I find it...funny for the lack of a better word, that the crowd that stands on American values and American exceptionalism, is quite quick to abandoned that when given the opportunity to cash a check.


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brocksw said:
What confuses me is that so many HTers on this thread support that model and are just willing to let the landowners draw up the contract on whatever terms suit them while getting nothing in return for the public, on a resource the public owns. "Concern" for privatization while supporting the European model, is speaking out of both sides of your mouth and one or the other must be a disingenuous statement...

It's just my opinion, but it I find it...funny for the lack of a better word, that the crowd that stands on American values and American exceptionalism, is quite quick to abandoned that when given the opportunity to cash a check.
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Don't confuse people disagreeing that the current model needs to be completely thrown out and all those tags should just be transferred to the public draw with saying that the model is perfect and doesn't need tweaking.

There is a lot of room for improvement. There are some ways the system is easily manipulated and there for sure should be more emphasis on opening up land for public hunting if you are receiving these tags. I really like ImBillT's idea that if you buy one of these tags you can't apply for the public draw also. Not sure that will go anywhere if suggested though.

I think some opponents of the program throw out people getting tags with 5 or 15 acres but when you actually dig in and look that isn't the case. For sure not on a large scale. There may be one or two of those situations in the entire state, not hundreds of them.
 
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The SCR is for "Small Contributing Ranch". Those are not guaranteed tags, those are drawn through a different drawing. That would be a good place to start if you want to change the system.
 
npaden said:
The SCR is for "Small Contributing Ranch". Those are not guaranteed tags, those are drawn through a different drawing. That would be a good place to start if you want to change the system.
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Just over 2,000 landowners vying for ~12,000+ elk tags available to them through outfitter set asides and the Eplus system. Are you saying the drawing odds for those SCR landowners is anything less than stellar?
 
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