Hunter Reports

[elkchaser54]

So how accurate do you think the state's information is on the harvest success reports?  When you dive deep in to the state's reports on the special permits side, its amazing how many of the tags go UN-Hunted.  I wonder if this is people just being lazy by not reporting and paying the penalty or do people draw these tags and just not care.  That is a huge waste, maybe the state should switch to a second draw for unclaimed tags.

[MrSmallington]

I will admit that when I do not fill a tag i just pay the penalty... but this was only last year and I didn't have a draw tag. i paid for my deer tag.

[bobcat]

Well, there's no such thing as an unclaimed special permit. They are mailed out to the successful applicants. But apparently many people never use the permit they drew. Either that, or they simply do not do a report at the end of the year. It's hard to say. You'll notice in the data that the harder to draw permits, generally have a much higher percentage of completed reports. Permits for antlerless animals, especially, seem to have a very low percentage of submitted reports. In those instances, I'm not sure how the WDFW number crunchers determine the actual number of hunters. Do they just assume that those who didn't submit a report, did not hunt? Or do they use some sort of mathematical equation to calculate those numbers? I don't know. I don't rely on the data too much but I think for the quality permits it's somewhat useful as the compliance rate with submitting reports seems fairly high. But most of the other categories, not so much.

[lamrith]

That is a huge waste, maybe the state should switch to a second draw for unclaimed tags.

Problem is, the way reporting is now, they would not know they are "unclaimed" until after the hunt, so cannot do a second draw?  Life happens and things can change overnight as well (look at fires that closed areas this year), so even if people had to "claim" a tag rather than it being mailed to them automatically, I am not sure it would really be feasible to have a redraw when they planned to hunt right up until a few days before season?

I know I fill out my reports every year.  Cheap/broke to point I do not want to have to pay more next year because I could not take 5min to jump online and do a quick survey.

Don't get me wrong, I am all for cleaning things up and reducing wasted opportunities with our limited hunting resources, just not sure how to improve it or get a set-up to allow redraw on special hunts.

[Seahawk12]

That's a good question.
I think the percentage that the numbers are off is going to vary quite a bit for individual gmus.
Going through it earlier in the year I saw ridiculously low success rates in gmus that hold decent amount of deer.
Those numbers are not from people who didn't report. They are from people that took the time to report and gave false information.
I think people do this on purpose because if a gmu has high numbers/success rates then there will be more hunters to complete with the following year. So, they may decide to say they harvested the animal in a different gmu.
When enough people don't report their lack of success coupled with people reporting false information the numbers become useless.

[Bob33]

I am certain that WDFW assumes that only a portion of the permits drawn will result in harvest, either because the permit holder did not hunt or because he hunted and did not harvest. If the process is changed to somehow increase harvest, I would expect the quota of permits would be reduced.

[tgomez]

Draw or not I ALWAYS  turn in my hunter reports. I didn't put in for any draws this year,  but I did submit my reports for bear and deer the day after I shot my buck. I think we as hunters have a obligation to do so responsibly and who wants to pay the extra fines as well?

[Gobble Doc]

I was drawn for an archery hunt but ended up getting my deer using muzzy with multi-season. The archery tag will reflect that I never used it, i.e. Un-hunted.

[X-Force]

I assume that unhunted permits are that way because people don't really want to hunt that permit anyway, more than life getting in the way. Why not apply for x,y of z permit when the threshold to apply is only a couple dollars and if you do draw you maybe you have time, maybe you don't but your only put a couple bucks.

This is one of the reason I like idahos draw system. People really have to think about where they want to spend there time.

[fishnfur]

In my mind, WDFW doesn't care if you hunt your permit.  They just want the money.  I don't think there is a way to determine in advance who will not hunt their purchased permit, but they do (did?) have a second draw for unpurchased tags for special permits.  Perhaps this is not the case anymore.

People are definitely gaming the system to change the numbers.

I've also felt that WDFW might be intentionally misreporting the numbers to show higher success rates than actually occurred.  That would keep unsuccessful hunters coming back and spending money again next year, thinking that their chances are actually better than they really are.

[bigmacc]

In my mind, WDFW doesn't care if you hunt your permit.  They just want the money.  I don't think there is a way to determine in advance who will not hunt their purchased permit, but they do (did?) have a second draw for unpurchased tags for special permits.  Perhaps this is not the case anymore.

People are definitely gaming the system to change the numbers.

I've also felt that WDFW might be intentionally misreporting the numbers to show higher success rates than actually occurred.  That would keep unsuccessful hunters coming back and spending money again next year, thinking that their chances are actually better than they really are.

I agree 1000%, especially the "misreporting the numbers to show higher success rates" paragraph. As I said in another thread, I,m interested in how "great" the Methow harvest was this year, the most people I,ve ever seen(in fact dangerous/scary most, was even seeing people in places that I have never seen people in before) and the least amount of deer I,ve ever seen in 50 plus years, on the hoof or hanging!

[Alpine Mojo]

When enough people don't report their lack of success coupled with people reporting false information the numbers become useless.

WDFW might be intentionally misreporting the numbers to show higher success rates than actually occurred.  That would keep unsuccessful hunters coming back and spending money again next year, thinking that their chances are actually better than they really are.

I would suspect that it is most likely a combination of the two.