True spike an spike rule

[Stein]

I agree it is likely financially driven.  It's pretty much the least you can allow and still say you can shoot bulls on a general tag.  Once you sell the general tag, many guys will throw a few bucks into the special draws as well.  If you can't hunt a bull on a general tag, my guess is a bunch of people wouldn't buy a tag and the state would lose the general tag revenue plus any special permit revenue for those people.

Same thing happens with permits, they get cut quickly, but once they get to only one or two permits they tend to stay there.  Is one or two tags the right number from a biological perspective or does it have more to do with selling chances at a draw?

There doesn't seem to be much of a management strategy and certainly no recovery strategy other that cut permits and limit the general hunting as much as possible without closing it.  When I look through the prospects every year, it seems there is a bunch of cut and paste from prior years and best case you have some survey data although that is getting to be less and less.

I think they know they can't go to a 3 or 4 pt rule as the harvest would go up substantially and they can't go to permit only because they would likely see the pitchforks come out as well as a huge budget hit.  Which one is the driving factor is up to anyone's guess as WDFW certainly won't discuss it in any meaningful way.

[HUNT JR]

It would be a slaughter, the first few years there would be some awesome bulls killed. I think the herd numbers might not change a ton if we don't kill any cows. What would happen would be a lot like Idaho where we would lose our top end quality and the average age of the bulls in the herd would drop substantially.

[jason stevens]

Thanks for all the responses I appreciate all of you. I wish there was more we could do for our opportunities an protection of the herd an management of our game.

[jeffro]

What about a 5 point minimum, both sides, and no one, absolutely no one hunts until after the rut?

[85yota]

Interesting topic..my opinion its about the money and they really are good tags to draw of that ever happens to you.. what i don't understand is why true spikes..last year my buddies found 2 left for dead and an arrogant  game warden chastising  people for hunting true spikes because  so many non trues get shot.. I hunt Westside  and think 3 point works there but I agree it would  be a slaughter  on the east..what i wonder is if we can get some new ideas in there.. like every 5 years you get a 5 point min tag.. even double the price.. or a few years do 3 point min to save spike genetics  and than switch back..in reality predators and the "other" group won't allow this to happen imop

[85yota]

And really what actually caused the switch to go spikes..I hear the stories of killing bulls back in the day usually small 3s  but still what went down with the switch and did we as hunters approve of it?

[avidnwoutdoorsman]

I'm no elk expert that for sure.
But one thing I do know is ,and this apply to deer,elk,all game animals really.

If you want the herd to grow its all about the cows or females.

As long as there is enough bulls to breed all the cows than the herd grows.
If you think about genes as long as there are cows in the herd that carry that old bulls genes ,then his genes live on.

That's why sometimes it's so important to protect cow,does,females, but when you give out way to many permits or OTC cow tags,poaching,ect,ect, it is possible to erase or completely take out certain genes through female harvest.
Just like humans ,whether you have a son or daughter ,your genes are passed on . They may be more prominent from father to son,but make no mistake your genes are passed on son or daughter makes no difference.

Correct about the cows and females. A little off the mark on genes. Genes dont make monsters and play almost nothing into the size of a mature bull. What matters is a fat momma. A stud bull breeds a cow who has a hard winter and she will birth a bull with "stud genes" that wont grow to its stud potential due to momma not being fat while in utero. Alternatively, you have an average bull breed a cow who has a great winter and she will birth a future stud bull.

Genes mean almost nothing for producing big mature ungulates. Having a fat mama means everything. 

[jason stevens]

All valid points keep them coming.

[str8meat]

I sat at a table at a non profit fund raising banquet with a director that sets the season’s and bag limits. He informed me that for every 1 elk in Washington state there is 1.3 elk hunters. We the state have to set elk hunters up for failure. But we need the money from license sales. We all can agree or disagree on the management of the elk herd. All of us have our own ideas, killing the young bulls is foolish on the east side and west side shoot mature bulls. Is the glass getting full or empty? Maybe a draw system for any elk and any antler less elk is an option. Don’t draw don’t hunt, many don’t like it but a 900 lb steer is dang near the same price of gas, food etc of a week of elk hunting. Plus the steer is a guarantee kill. Just thoughts. In my opinion the depart couldn’t manage a sack race to the schmit house.

[X-Force]

If we went to anything other than spike/true spike on the east cascade units/blue mountains it would have to be permit only… terrain/elk numbers/survival rate/number of hunters…

I wouldn’t be apposed to state wide permit elk, but I’m 35. It may be a harder pill to swallow at 50 or 65.

[mburrows]

Statewide permit only system is my vote for WA elk, similar to how Colorado does it for mule deer. State doesn’t lose money (least of my concerns the way WA politicians manage the budget) but OTC spike hunting is stupid.

[Dan-o]

I'm gonna say the spike only thing is working.

Personally, I hate only being able to hunt spikes, but I'm old enough to remember when you'd go to the big feeding station and maybe see a couple gangly raghorns.    But you wouldn't see any real brusier bulls.

We didn't have any bull tags this year, but we called in some absolute stud bulls.

It wouldn't take long to wipe them out.

Also, not that many years ago there were a ton of cow tags on the east side.  That wasn't an accident.  The herd was above their desired carrying capacity.    You can argue what the carrying capacity should be, but unless you're actually working with the farmers and paying the claims and looking at the quality of graze from an educated standpoint.....  Well, you're just guessing.

I don't see any alternative to what's going on.   Going to 3-point min on the east side would kill a LOT of bulls for a couple years, but then we'd be back to almost no big bulls.    Personally, I like having the big bulls out there, even if I can only draw a tag every few million years (or at least that's how it feels.)

[cooltimber]

I'm gonna say the spike only thing is working.

Personally, I hate only being able to hunt spikes, but I'm old enough to remember when you'd go to the big feeding station and maybe see a couple gangly raghorns.    But you wouldn't see any real brusier bulls.

We didn't have any bull tags this year, but we called in some absolute stud bulls.

It wouldn't take long to wipe them out.

Also, not that many years ago there were a ton of cow tags on the east side.  That wasn't an accident.  The herd was above their desired carrying capacity.    You can argue what the carrying capacity should be, but unless you're actually working with the farmers and paying the claims and looking at the quality of graze from an educated standpoint.....  Well, you're just guessing.

I don't see any alternative to what's going on.   Going to 3-point min on the east side would kill a LOT of bulls for a couple years, but then we'd be back to almost no big bulls.    Personally, I like having the big bulls out there, even if I can only draw a tag every few million years (or at least that's how it feels.)

Absolutely

[scoutdog346]

Wdfw doesn't make that much money from hunting tags and license.  How do u know its about money. 

It's all about money. If the eastside was all open for any bull or 3pt min, there wouldnt be many elk left and they wouldnt make nearly as much money. Special big bull permits make the state hundreds of thousands of dollars every year. Many spikes dont survive the winter anyways and success rate is so low that it doesnt matter if most of them get killed off. Only a few need to make it through to grow big to continue repopulating. At the end of the day, WDFW is out to make money any way they can.

[Stein]

This is a few years old, but coming straight from the WDFW, it summarizes the issue:

Nearly one quarter of WDFW’s operating budget comes from fishing and hunting license sale revenues. As state General Fund support to the department declines, user fees are more important than ever in helping to avert even deeper cuts to services

Since then, we have seen new fees, maybe the best example is the two pole endorsement.  WDFW initiated that when there was a budget crisis, arguably they could have created that opportunity years ago, or could have made it free.  Same is true in hunting, additional fees and "opportunities" are created when money is needed.  "Opportunities" tend to arrive during hard budget years and always have a fee associated, either new or increased.

Fishing, hunting, same deal.