What if there were no point schemes?

wllm1313 said:
I definitely see your point, but how to you combat social media wrecking units, i.e. top rut odds show X unit had great harvest rates in 2018, or eastmans publishes an article, etc. and then in 2019 that unit has 3x as many archers. The current systems allows for a massive over harvest in archery season, and because the state has a shit system for hunter surveys it's hard for them to even see it happening. (Obviously this is hyperbolic)

I think a good option would be to keep OTC archery and rifle, but you have to pick a unit when you get a tag, and there is a floating cap set at 10% of 5 year average, so that no one unit can get totally pounded in any particular year.

^ This issue aside, the fact that their isn't mandatory reporting in every western state just blows my mind, it would be so easy to implement, seems like a major missed opportunity to collect data.
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I combat lots of people in my OTC unit by finding another unit without a lot of people, that’s why I no longer hunt in 62! It’s one of the benefits of OTC. As far as a “massive over harvest by archery”. Are you serious? Not going to happen. Unit 61 took 12+ points in 2017 and archery success was 36%. People that wait that long for a permit will hunt there ass off and only about a third succeeded. Archery season is the first season, so rifle success will suffer if archery success increases. If you don’t trust COs harvest numbers, look at other states that have mandatory reporting. Massive over harvest by archery gear is a joke, because when people show up, the elk go WTF and run to the places most people won’t or can’t go. That’s why OTC rifle success is low, just like archery.
If you start capping tags at say 10% or limiting them to specific units, they aren’t really OTC anymore are they?
 
BrentD said:
We have been hitting 40 mph with sustained regularity. And 60 mph is pretty frequent. Do you really need more?

All those relatives can help you get access to private and you can always go hunt elk in Wyoming - which BuzzH tells us is just a screamin' good deal for NR's. :)

I don't see any down side for ya.
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Oh yeah, my family has been getting pounded by snow this winter. Really incredible. My dad drives a snow plow there for the county and I think he could almost coast to retirement on the overtime he's built this year.

I came from a farming family there, so never wanted for more private land to hunt. Plugged my share of whitetails there before the education and job offers took me elsewhere. It was really darn good deer hunting, but I miss hunting with some of those people more than I miss the deer. Luckily they're content to draw doe antelope tags every year out here and I go back there to blast a pheasant or two every fall.

Anyhow, this thread isn't about me.
 
Plow drivers are getting rich this year, but it has been a lot of famine for a the last 5-10 yrs. Back in the 90s, this kind of snow was nothing and even this year, we really have only had one month of snow so far. When I moved here it snowed in September at least once.

It was just about hour GMU thing. It works after a fashion here.
 
Pelican said:
I combat lots of people in my OTC unit by finding another unit without a lot of people, that’s why I no longer hunt in 62! It’s one of the benefits of OTC. As far as a “massive over harvest by archery”. Are you serious? Not going to happen. Unit 61 took 12+ points in 2017 and archery success was 36%. People that wait that long for a permit will hunt there ass off and only about a third succeeded. Archery season is the first season, so rifle success will suffer if archery success increases. If you don’t trust COs harvest numbers, look at other states that have mandatory reporting. Massive over harvest by archery gear is a joke, because when people show up, the elk go WTF and run to the places most people won’t or can’t go. That’s why OTC rifle success is low, just like archery.
If you start capping tags at say 10% or limiting them to specific units, they aren’t really OTC anymore are they?
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Lol I did say I was being hyperbolic... but even if a unit has a harvest 10% higher than normal for consecutive seasons it can have an effect, especially since most archery tags are either-sex. It's possible that in one year there are 20% more hunters in a unit causing the cow harvest to tick up 3-4%, is there a western state that has mandatory reporting other than AK... that one is problematic for lots of reasons including but not limited to subsistence hunting. Other than just being an a-hole I'm not sure why any hunter would mind submitting what unit they hunted in, and if they harvested an animal or not. Just make it a requirement to apply again the next year, and have it online... doesn't seem hard to implement or enforce.

People also make the argument about units feeling crowded. I guess my point would be to work out a way to spread hunters out.
 
bushman13 said:
I hear you, but I think that is a product of not having much available public land in those states. All of the public land is bunched up in the western states. That makes it hard to prove out theories in either direction when it comes to a state with very little public land. My statement still holds true though, there is plenty of trophy hunting in non GMU states. And I do see your point and the necessity for GMU's may always exist for public lands and a low number animals like a sheep. But for deer and elk, give us some freedom back. I want to hunt and put meat on the table, not play point games.
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If you just want to put meat on the table, there are plenty antlerless elk opportunities. And you can draw a deer/elk combo in Montana with roughly 50% odds with no points and 100% with one. I like knowing that by landing 18 months out I can have a tag. (Two draws then the wait until the season).

I just don’t see how every state being a random draw like NM increases my opportunity to hunt. If I’m a nonresident, 5% chance in ten states compared to one isn’t still 5% chance. One hunt in 20 years? Don’t apply in years you can’t hunt per an earlier example and number of years goes up.

Don’t square points and keeps some units managed for opportunity, not trophy but no system is perfect points or no points. I’m too old to ever get a tag in a trophy unit even as an AZ resident. I’ll take my opportunity to hunt elk somewhere every year or two and every year year once I retire. Plenty hunting for birds, small game, and OTC archery deer to go with elk hunts
 
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Agreed, it would really benefit residents though. Especially where I am currently sitting. Imagine a random draw in CO with a % cap on NR. The entire state would turn into a honey hole.

LaSportsman said:
If you just want to put meat on the table, there are plenty antlerless elk opportunities. And you can draw a deer/elk combo in Montana with roughly 50% odds with no points and 100% with one. I like knowing that by landing 18 months out I can have a tag. (Two draws then the wait until the season).

I just don’t see how every state being a random draw like NM increases my opportunity to hunt. If I’m a nonresident, 5% chance in ten states compared to one isn’t still 5% chance. One hunt in 20 years? Don’t apply in years you can’t hunt per an earlier example and number of years goes up.

Don’t square points and keeps some units managed for opportunity, not trophy but no system is perfect.
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wllm1313 said:
There are no whitetail permit hunts in MT you can hang your deer tag on any whitetail in the state. The season dates vary a little bit in a few regions.
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Wrong...there are at least 2 that I can think of where you need a permit to kill a whitetail.
 
BuzzH said:
Yep, I concur. Was thinking of the additional B-tags for unit 260 that allow you to kill a second buck whitetail.
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Let it be noted, never make declarative statements on this forum unless you are 100% certain you are correct because there are a bunch of really smart people hanging around.

Thanks for keeping me honest fellas.
 
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Back when Dinosaurs roamed the Earth,and I was born there was no stinking point system,Hell it was mostly all Otc except for Buffalo!
Even the Kiabab was Otc. with 2 Does allowed.:cool:
 
wllm1313 said:
Let it be noted, never make declarative statements on this forum unless you are 100% certain you are correct because there are a bunch of really smart dudes hanging around.

Thanks for keeping me honest fellas.
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That is absolutely the case!
 
wllm1313 said:
Lol I did say I was being hyperbolic... but even if a unit has a harvest 10% higher than normal for consecutive seasons it can have an effect, especially since most archery tags are either-sex. It's possible that in one year there are 20% more hunters in a unit causing the cow harvest to tick up 3-4%, is there a western state that has mandatory reporting other than AK... that one is problematic for lots of reasons including but not limited to subsistence hunting. Other than just being an a-hole I'm not sure why any hunter would mind submitting what unit they hunted in, and if they harvested an animal or not. Just make it a requirement to apply again the next year, and have it online... doesn't seem hard to implement or enforce.

People also make the argument about units feeling crowded. I guess my point would be to work out a way to spread hunters out.
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UT is the only western state I know of that requires submitting a survey and it is only required for bucks, bulls, OIL permits. It is strongly encouraged for antlerless permits.
I agree, submitting a survey is not hard to do. But when you have say 80,000 OTC elk tags like CO, you are never going to get a 100% response rate because some people are forgetful, lazy, or a-holes. As such, you will have to use a randomly selected subset of the responses. So you would be requiring people to submit data you aren’t going to use in your management, so why require it.

I guess I missed the hyperbolic comment. Maybe I’m being hypersensitive because I feel like people are always trying to screw with something that is very important to me (OTC elk), trying to fix something that I don’t think is broken. To me, it’s tantamount to pissing in my church.
 
Pelican said:
UT is the only western state I know of that requires submitting a survey and it is only required for bucks, bulls, OIL permits. It is strongly encouraged for antlerless permits.
I agree, submitting a survey is not hard to do. But when you have say 80,000 OTC elk tags like CO, you are never going to get a 100% response rate because some people are forgetful, lazy, or a-holes. As such, you will have to use a randomly selected subset of the responses. So you would be requiring people to submit data you aren’t going to use in your management, so why require it.
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If you make it mandatory make having one on-file a pre-req to applying in the draw or purchasing an OTC tag I think you would get a decent response rate... you are lazy, forgetful, or an a-hole well the system has a hold on your account until you do the survey.

Obviously there would be leakage but I bet you could get an 75-80% response rate... even a 40% rate would be a huge amount of data. Plus unlike the current random sampling it would give you a hard floor for number of elk harvest. You could say for certain that in unit 36 there were at least 64 bulls and 22 cow harvested. You would obviously need to estimate the total number harvested, but having that low end data would identify units that were maybe getting a bit to popular.
 
wllm1313 said:
If you make it mandatory make having one on-file a pre-req to applying in the draw or purchasing an OTC tag I think you would get a decent response rate... you are lazy, forgetful, or an a-hole well the system has a hold on your account until you do the survey.

Obviously there would be leakage but I bet you could get an 75-80% response rate... even a 40% rate would be a huge amount of data. Plus unlike the current random sampling it would give you a hard floor for number of elk harvest. You could say for certain that in unit 36 there were at least 64 bulls and 22 cow harvested. You would obviously need to estimate the total number harvested, but having that low end data would identify units that were maybe getting a bit to popular.
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Yeah. Sure. Whatever makes you happy and keeps people from screwing up my OTC archery elk hunting. Hell, I'll even let you check me for a hernia if that will get me another 20 yrs of OTC Colorado elk.
 
I realize I got way of topic in this tread, but I have been trying to maintain OTC archery elk opportunity for 10 yrs and will probably fight it until I'm dead. 2019 will be my 29th archery season which is probably longer than some on here have been alive. I imagine there are many others on here that have a camp, ridge, tree stand, etc that means as much to them as CO OTC means to me. The other faces and locations have changed over time, but I still look forward to that hunt. Choose a cliche (go down swinging, fight to the death, from my cold dead hands), that is how I feel about maintaining this opportunity. The value to me far exceeds the face value, so I'm never going to willingly give up and let a bunch of limp-wristed, front range, flat-billers that are too soft to kill an elk with an arrow dictate when and where I can archery hunt elk. Other hunters unreasonable expectations and lack of success is their problem, not mine. Archery elk hunting is hard, that is the reason some of us do it. wllm1313, while I don't agree with you on this issue, I am glad to see hunters involved in these issues, even if I disagree with them. Rant over - at least until someone brings this up again.
 
Pelican said:
UT is the only western state I know of that requires submitting a survey and it is only required for bucks, bulls, OIL permits. It is strongly encouraged for antlerless permits.
I agree, submitting a survey is not hard to do. But when you have say 80,000 OTC elk tags like CO, you are never going to get a 100% response rate because some people are forgetful, lazy, or a-holes. As such, you will have to use a randomly selected subset of the responses. So you would be requiring people to submit data you aren’t going to use in your management, so why require it.

I guess I missed the hyperbolic comment. Maybe I’m being hypersensitive because I feel like people are always trying to screw with something that is very important to me (OTC elk), trying to fix something that I don’t think is broken. To me, it’s tantamount to pissing in my church.
Click to expand...

Off topic for the thread but I think I remember hearing of a state that you had to turn in your survey or you are ineligible for a tag the next year? Consume too much hunting info on internet to remember where! :)
 
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