Wish WDFW knew how to manage WILDLIFE like Utah

[Ironhead]

In Utah, can residents hunt deer and elk with a rifle every year?

You can hunt spike Elk on a general season tag with a rifle. No OTC Deer hunts with a rifle.

[idahohuntr]

their prostitution of their wildlife should not be idolized.

The way that state manages it's tags in the Expo program...people should be in jail.

[Tbar]

their prostitution of their wildlife should not be idolized.

The way that state manages it's tags in the Expo program...people should be in jail.

I am not sure how they aren't jailed! The corruption and "cooperative partners in conservation" not only rob the wildlife, they pilfer the funds generated from selling the wildlife!

[baldopepper]

their prostitution of their wildlife should not be idolized.

The way that state manages it's tags in the Expo program...people should be in jail.

Utah has worked very hard to get the reputation of being one of the most corrupt states in the union and their tag programs only solidifies that reputation. I have no idea why the sportsmen there tolerate it. (grew up there and love the state, but the politics and corruption make it impossible for me to live there)

[bigtex]

their prostitution of their wildlife should not be idolized.

The way that state manages it's tags in the Expo program...people should be in jail.

Utah has worked very hard to get the reputation of being one of the most corrupt states in the union and their tag programs only solidifies that reputation. I have no idea why the sportsmen there tolerate it. (grew up there and love the state, but the politics and corruption make it impossible for me to live there)

I think it's just in the culture. The citizens want $ out of everything just like the government does. Utah seems to be in a different world.

[Ironhead]

their prostitution of their wildlife should not be idolized.

The way that state manages it's tags in the Expo program...people should be in jail.

Utah has worked very hard to get the reputation of being one of the most corrupt states in the union and their tag programs only solidifies that reputation. I have no idea why the sportsmen there tolerate it. (grew up there and love the state, but the politics and corruption make it impossible for me to live there)

They are mandated by law to give only 30% of the $5.00 application fee for conservation. Nobody (but SFW)really knows what they do with the other 70%.

[Ironhead]

their prostitution of their wildlife should not be idolized.

The way that state manages it's tags in the Expo program...people should be in jail.

Utah has worked very hard to get the reputation of being one of the most corrupt states in the union and their tag programs only solidifies that reputation. I have no idea why the sportsmen there tolerate it. (grew up there and love the state, but the politics and corruption make it impossible for me to live there)

It doesn't bother the residents of Utah as bad because all of the 200 tags for the Expo come out of the Non resident tag allocation, and the residents have a much shorter drive to be in attendance than most of the Non residents. ( you have to be at the Expo in order to  validate your applications).

[idahohuntr]

their prostitution of their wildlife should not be idolized.

The way that state manages it's tags in the Expo program...people should be in jail.

Utah has worked very hard to get the reputation of being one of the most corrupt states in the union and their tag programs only solidifies that reputation. I have no idea why the sportsmen there tolerate it. (grew up there and love the state, but the politics and corruption make it impossible for me to live there)

It doesn't bother the residents of Utah as bad because all of the 200 tags for the Expo come out of the Non resident tag allocation, and the residents have a much shorter drive to be in attendance than most of the Non residents. ( you have to be at the Expo in order to  validate your applications).

I think you're missing the point.  It has nothing to do with logistics or even who gets the 200 tags (NR v R; having to drive to register, etc.)...a state agency giving a private group 200 highly coveted tags and only requiring 30% of the funds be used for conservation is complete and total fraud.  For the state to also reject a bid from another entity that stated it would return 100% of the funds generated from those 200 tags should result in another round of criminal prosecutions. 

[DOUBLELUNG]

Another difference is having elk ranges primarily adjacent to ranchlands versus farmlands, especially with the Colockum and Yakima herds.  Size of these herds is really constrained by the need to limit damage to intensive agriculture that can go into the tens of thousands of dollars per acre, versus elk competition for grass with livestock and some use/damage to irrigated hay crops.  Ranchers can often offset monetary losses from elk by charging for access or guiding on their own lands, whereas orchardists experience orders of magnitude higher dollar values in damage from elk and have much more limited opportunity to recoup those losses from hunting.

There was a huge turnaround in rancher attitudes toward game damage in eastern Wyoming in the 90s, as years of drought and low cattle prices turned hunting from a mostly free or small revenue source and wildlife as a nuisance, to most ranchers making hunting a significant part of their livelihood.  Game damage complaints and costs dropped 90% as landowners saw dollar signs rather than damage from the deer, elk and antelope. 

[Ironhead]

their prostitution of their wildlife should not be idolized.

The way that state manages it's tags in the Expo program...people should be in jail.

Utah has worked very hard to get the reputation of being one of the most corrupt states in the union and their tag programs only solidifies that reputation. I have no idea why the sportsmen there tolerate it. (grew up there and love the state, but the politics and corruption make it impossible for me to live there)

It doesn't bother the residents of Utah as bad because all of the 200 tags for the Expo come out of the Non resident tag allocation, and the residents have a much shorter drive to be in attendance than most of the Non residents. ( you have to be at the Expo in order to  validate your applications).

I think you're missing the point.  It has nothing to do with logistics or even who gets the 200 tags (NR v R; having to drive to register, etc.)...a state agency giving a private group 200 highly coveted tags and only requiring 30% of the funds be used for conservation is complete and total fraud.  For the state to also reject a bid from another entity that stated it would return 100% of the funds generated from those 200 tags should result in another round of criminal prosecutions. 

I was trying to explain why, the Utah sportsmen tolerate it. I fully understand the point.

[wolfbait]

20K people would not be deer hunting and nearly 20k people would not be hunting elk.  Success rates would go up but simply because there would be less hunters.  Washington had 112K deer hunters and 59K elk hunters.  If we wanted a truly good hunting experience here we would need better predator management and way less people in the woods each year.   

 

Watching the decline of mule deer in the Methow the last 10-15 years do to WDFW's promotion and protection of predators, hunting pressure has and will continue to decline in the areas of no hunting success.

Strict predator control by the public would go along way in restoring the herds, we have all witnessed that waiting on WDFW to do the right thing is a waste of time.

Promoting predator control, engaging young hunters in the need of predator control to grow the game herds would be a huge step in the right direction.

Looking back in my early years I hunted practically year around, "coyote" season was always open.

[Skyvalhunter]

Going to be interesting to see what it takes for WDFW to change the Quality hunts into just buck hunts as the quality drops.

[PlateauNDN]

A swing of their mighty pen.

[bearpaw]

Fact Check

Utah has over the counter spike only elk hunts and over the counter any bull elk hunts, sold first come basis, with a quota limiting the total tag sales. There are numerous units that are limited-entry elk units and typically that is where the largest and best quality hunting is found. Until a couple years ago Utah had over the counter deer tags with a quota that were sold first come. In an effort to bring back mule deer in Utah they started limited-entry in every unit style deer management. As a result there are fewer deer hunters but deer numbers are climbing. Utah has also instituted much more intense predator management, we quit doing lion hunts in Utah because we can't keep as high of success rate there as we can in Idaho. Some cougar hunters dislike that you have to hunt harder, but deer herds are rebounding. Utah also implemented a coyote bounty a few years ago, anti-hunters hate that, but deer herds are rebounding.

States Have Various Management Styles
Every state has a different management style and there is probably something that everyone will dislike about every state. It's impossible for any state to satisfy all the people all the time. Look at the opposing views on this forum, there are no two people who agree on everything.

Statistics
The ratio of hunters in WA is one of the lowest in the western states. Only a small percentage of WA residents hunt and very few NR's hunt in WA. Whereas roughly 30%+ of Montana, Idaho, Wyoming residents hunt and hunters from every state and numerous countries flock to these states every fall, including many hunters from WA. Colorado has a high human population and lots of resident hunters, plus hunters from all over the world flock to Colorado every fall. Colorado sells more elk hunting licenses than any other state yet has a higher elk population than even Montana which is probably almost twice as large as CO and MT has one of the smallest human populations. So a graph that shows the number of hunters per square mile might show a much different story. Total elk hunters in CO is roughly 220.000, more than twice any other state and more than three times as many as WA. Colorado has the next highest human density next to Washington, yet there are 3 times as many elk in Colorado.

Reading Statistics, Predators, Disease, Other Variables
So you can look at statistics in many ways. When I look at WA elk numbers it says we have 90,000 elk, more than several other states known to be better hunting, yet only 7600 elk are being harvested by hunters. States with lower elk numbers have a much higher human harvest rate. States with more elk have a higher harvest ratio too. Washington hunters are getting the fewest number of elk per the actual elk population that exists. The numbers tell me that Washington is seriously mismanaging elk and predators, that a larger percentage of the elk being produced in WA are going to predators than to hunters than in any other state. Certainly diseases is another variable, with the increasing presence of hoof rot WA elk hunting seems to have a gloomy future unless many things are drastically changed.

The biggest point here is that even with a high human population WA still has a good elk population. The big difference is that other predators are getting a bigger portion of the elk in WA than in any other state and I think the graphs prove it.

Deer hunting and hunting of other animals in WA face the same types of challenges, mismanagement of the highest level of nearly any western state!

Here are a few graphs that mostly compare data of states with OTC elk tags.

[Bob33]

The number of elk in Washington is closer to 40,000, not 90,000.