Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation Sucks for snowmobilers, Mt bikers and ORV users!

[Houndhunter]

i dont like all that they do and i wish they would stay outa washington. sure they do some good, but they shut down some big areas for hunting and i dont agree with that

[Bigfoot]

I say support RMEF and keep all ORV's off the trails on public land, especially in wilderness areas.  If you want to hunt where there are no roads, walk your ass in there.  If you want to ride your quad, go do it on timber company land.  My 

well lets say we kill off all the forest service roads to motorized rigs of all kinds....which is the vibe I recieved from your post...my father who served 2 tours in vietnam and is unable to walk, will never again enjoy the view from any of the several mountain tops we can now drive to. firewood will be a thing of the past....timber co.s don't have enough dead and down to keep us all warm and the wood cutting pirates that uesd to buy wood permits on fs land would need to rob from the timber co lands.....more closed gates. the average guy is never going to walk the 10-20 miles to any of my local high mountain lakes.....which will not matter if f&g can't drive there to stock them. it goes on and on....

I am a serious backcountry hunter. I have a diesease that makes me want to go where most folks won't and I do it on foot. I am also a backcountry snowmobilier. I live in an area that has seen closures for a caribou that have never beens seen and never been able to have a shed produced....but it is still closed for the grey ghost. I am most overwhelmed by the trapper burn closre at priest lake......caribou eat lichen from trees, old silver trees do not have lichen.....the burn is composed of those very old silver trees.

any time you close an area to any specific crowd they are going to try to get it reopend.....which almost never works, then they will try to get it closed to other groups.....it sux, but it is fact. roadless area are great for hunters, but it also compounds the use on the open areas increasing reosion and traffic. wilderness areas are a great thing if you are lucky enough to be able to use them......my dad, who put his life on the line for all of us will never know what it is to sit in rainbow falls or see the sun rise from the willam douglas, or......well it does not matter.
we as a country need to realize that it was diversity that founded this country and made it great. partisanship is killing us, be it political or otherwise, there is more to life then bandwagons and fire sales.

I hope everyone gets the chance to pack in to a backcountry trip and come out heavy.....it really gets you in touch with your inner salts, as does parking on top of south baldy with your dad remembering all the fish you caught in the lakes below, as does being totally alone at 7k feet on top of a mountain that you have no idea what the vegitation may be because it lies 30 feet under a snow drift. thoes are what make life for me. I sure get sick of having to defend it.

I wasn't saying to close the Forest service Roads to all motorized access, just the trails.  There is not a lot of Wilderness area in the National Forest I hunt, so 90% of the trails are open to motorcycles and ATV's.  I'm just saying that I think it would be nice to have more of those trails limited to non-motorized travel.  I just get a little irritated when i've walked for 10 miles and here comes 15 motorcycles buzzing down the trail.  There are plenty of roads to ride on and I think that's where motorized vehicles should stay.

P.S. I have a friend in your area that saw the "Gray Ghosts" a few years back.

[Clark33]

An area becoming wilderness is in no way "Shutting us out" It just means you have to get off your ass and hike a little... After working 3 summers on the wilderness trail crew out of Naches for the USFS, I would not be upset at all if they decided to designate more land as wilderness, we need it.  There are already to many ATV and Jeep trails in this state.

[bullchaser]

thats because snowmobiles and Orv's are suck for elk.

[high country]

I say support RMEF and keep all ORV's off the trails on public land, especially in wilderness areas.  If you want to hunt where there are no roads, walk your ass in there.  If you want to ride your quad, go do it on timber company land.  My  

well lets say we kill off all the forest service roads to motorized rigs of all kinds....which is the vibe I recieved from your post...my father who served 2 tours in vietnam and is unable to walk, will never again enjoy the view from any of the several mountain tops we can now drive to. firewood will be a thing of the past....timber co.s don't have enough dead and down to keep us all warm and the wood cutting pirates that uesd to buy wood permits on fs land would need to rob from the timber co lands.....more closed gates. the average guy is never going to walk the 10-20 miles to any of my local high mountain lakes.....which will not matter if f&g can't drive there to stock them. it goes on and on....

I am a serious backcountry hunter. I have a diesease that makes me want to go where most folks won't and I do it on foot. I am also a backcountry snowmobilier. I live in an area that has seen closures for a caribou that have never beens seen and never been able to have a shed produced....but it is still closed for the grey ghost. I am most overwhelmed by the trapper burn closre at priest lake......caribou eat lichen from trees, old silver trees do not have lichen.....the burn is composed of those very old silver trees.

any time you close an area to any specific crowd they are going to try to get it reopend.....which almost never works, then they will try to get it closed to other groups.....it sux, but it is fact. roadless area are great for hunters, but it also compounds the use on the open areas increasing reosion and traffic. wilderness areas are a great thing if you are lucky enough to be able to use them......my dad, who put his life on the line for all of us will never know what it is to sit in rainbow falls or see the sun rise from the willam douglas, or......well it does not matter.
we as a country need to realize that it was diversity that founded this country and made it great. partisanship is killing us, be it political or otherwise, there is more to life then bandwagons and fire sales.

I hope everyone gets the chance to pack in to a backcountry trip and come out heavy.....it really gets you in touch with your inner salts, as does parking on top of south baldy with your dad remembering all the fish you caught in the lakes below, as does being totally alone at 7k feet on top of a mountain that you have no idea what the vegitation may be because it lies 30 feet under a snow drift. thoes are what make life for me. I sure get sick of having to defend it.

I wasn't saying to close the Forest service Roads to all motorized access, just the trails.  There is not a lot of Wilderness area in the National Forest I hunt, so 90% of the trails are open to motorcycles and ATV's.  I'm just saying that I think it would be nice to have more of those trails limited to non-motorized travel.  I just get a little irritated when i've walked for 10 miles and here comes 15 motorcycles buzzing down the trail.  There are plenty of roads to ride on and I think that's where motorized vehicles should stay.

P.S. I have a friend in your area that saw the "Gray Ghosts" a few years back.

did he get a pic?

[high country]

An area becoming wilderness is in no way "Shutting us out" It just means you have to get off your ass and hike a little... After working 3 summers on the wilderness trail crew out of Naches for the USFS, I would not be upset at all if they decided to designate more land as wilderness, we need it.  There are already to many ATV and Jeep trails in this state.

unless they plan on making wilderness wheelchair accesable I can't see shutting down anymore land. I am all for seasonal closures for erosion, wildlife, and any other reasonable excuses for closure.....but there are a lot of folks out there that fought hard for this country and now can never see parts of it except in the pics we take for them.

[Bigfoot]

[/quote]

did he get a pic?
[/quote]

No, no pics.  He grew up in Newport and has hunted the Selkirks his whole life and said that's the only time he's ever seen them.  I want to say he saw 13 head.  He talked to a local game agent right after he saw them and was told that they are migratory and only sometimes come that far south.

[colockumelk]

I think it's funny.  You can tell who's a closet road hunter and who isn't.  Anytime someone on here defends closing some roads the closet guys come out saying what about the elderly and what about the disabled!  It's kind of like the liberals always screaming "But what about the children!"  Why don't you come out and say it.  You couldn't hunt there anymore because you'd have to put your boots on the ground. 

When people say we need less Wilderness areas or that we don't need anymore than you are definately a road hunter.  There is far more areas that you can ride your ORV all over than we have wilderness areas.  In the Colockum the vast amount of road access is a direct result of why that herd is being eliminated.  The roads are killing our elk.  If you don't believe that road accesss affects our herds you are either ill-informed or truly ignorant and lazy. 

Maybe we don't need more wilderness areas but we do need to close down alot of roads that lead to nowhere.  Especially in the Colockum. 
When most of us talk about road closures we are talking about two things.  1.) Physically closing, using barriers and gates to close the roads that are already closed, instead of relying on signs.
2.) Closing alot of the roads that go absolutely nowhere and are just there so lazy people can go into the bottom over every draw and gully. 

For you ORV guys GMU's 328,329,336,340,342,352,360 and 368 are covered with roads that you can damn near drive all over the place.  There are few areas you can't drive too.  Is this not enough places for you to drive around?  And the small amount of places such as in 346 and 336 that does have closed roads we have to put up with people ignoring the laws and driving past gates.  As for us high country folks only a small portion of 346,356 and 364 is a wilderness areas where we can escape other people.  So who has it better?

So I'm sorry but when I see people on here complain about road closures and how it will affect the elderly and handi-capped I just have to laugh.  Because there are more than enough places they can drive.  I think people should just come out say what they really think.

[Gobble]

 

My thoughts exactly. I'd love to see more roads blocked off 

[sako223]

I clearly don't believe public land should be closed access. Public land should be equal access and often it is not. Gates make it difficult to access an area and often at a high cost. People with atv's and orv's still get around them day & night.
Many GMU's have road restrictions during fall & winter. They also are subject to winter closure which may slow poaching or tribal hunting.

All disabled hunting access areas are open to Non disabled hunters, but not all Non diabled hunter access areas are accessible to disabled hunters.
We are fortunate to have public land for hunting, lets keep it free and open.

[ScottyG]

I can see things from both sides.  My family owns some property that accessess an old logging road system.  Its steep country.  Our family has been hunting the area for most of my life.  My Dad is now 70 and I've got two kids that are under 10.  Today, we get to drive to some beautiful spots, where we get out of our vehicle and do day hunts.  We can do a number of short, but sweet hunts, but we don't hunt from our vehicle in any way that could be considered "road hunting".  If this area were closed down to vehicles, it might not stop me from hunting (at least for the next 20 or so years of my life) but I guarantee you that my father and children could not make it into the areas that we hunt today.  To top it off, the area is best hunted in the late season when conditions can be very severe.  Only the hardiest of backcountry hikers would do well overnight backpacking in there during the times that we hunt it and day trips without the use of vehicles would not be possible.  So, close the roads to this area and the hunting is accessable for only a few extremely hardy souls.  Perhaps I would be one of them... but my father would certainly not be one of them, nor my children.  Would the hunting be improved for me... maybe, but its already pretty darn good.  And, it would only be improved if we measure the quality of hunting by the ability to be one of a few people hunting many animals.  To me, that is not the only measure of a quality hunt.

I would not trade my time with my Dad and my kids in this area that we've been hunting since I was a kid just so I could get rid of a few other hunters.  How is it that we are going to teach our kids to hunt, if we create more barriers to their entry?  I guess we could wait to introduce hunting to them until they are in their late teens and able to handle the rigors that wilderness hunting requires, but I'd bet we'd lose more potential hunters by waiting.  I agree that their should be wilderness hunting areas, which there are today.  In my opinion, the areas that are wilderness are already adequate to give a quality hunting experience to the folks that want that level of adventure.  I'm not in support of closing more roads to create more of these types of areas.  I do believe that people should be following the rules that are established and not driving where roads are currently closed.

[high country]

clockum, I am sure you were excluding me from your term "closet road hunters" if not perhaps you should go back and read some of my success and failure posts. the climb from lake chelan to triplett lakes is hardly easy.  I defend the disabled because I am kin to them. truth be told I love road hunters, they keep critter pushed up where I am.  read about my past few bucks in wa, not a single soul was seen on the mountain I hunted.....nor a road.

I agree whole heartedly wih closing a road because it shows an impact on wildlife, I can't agree with closing it because it goes nowhere. I am sure that nowhere to you is somewhere to somone else.

I just wish we could release wolves and caribou in central park.

[colockumelk]

high country I definately was not referring to you in my last post in any way.  I also agree that there is not enough disable, senior and junior hunting in this state.  A perfect example of this is the use of master hunters to keep the elk out of the hay fields in the Colockum.  IMHO I think instead of using able bodied men to do this why not give the disabled and the youth hunters a crack at these cows.  Most master hunters have the ability to chase elk all over the mountain.  So why allow them to sit on a fence post and smoke cows in a hayfield.  I would rather see a kid or a disabled hunter get that chance.  Also the only disabled only area that I know of is on Mt. Clemens.  I think there should be an area such as in the Quilomene open only to the disabled, youth etc. 

As far as road access in some areas there is far too much.  The Colockum is an example.  This is why 85% of yearling bulls die every rifle season.  They don't have anywhere to escape to.  I also don't support making the Colockum a wilderness area.  I would rather see alot of the roads closed but keep all of the main roads open. 

[washelkhntr]

high country I definately was not referring to you in my last post in any way.  I also agree that there is not enough disable, senior and junior hunting in this state.  A perfect example of this is the use of master hunters to keep the elk out of the hay fields in the Colockum.  IMHO I think instead of using able bodied men to do this why not give the disabled and the youth hunters a crack at these cows.  Most master hunters have the ability to chase elk all over the mountain.  So why allow them to sit on a fence post and smoke cows in a hayfield.  I would rather see a kid or a disabled hunter get that chance.  Also the only disabled only area that I know of is on Mt. Clemens.  I think there should be an area such as in the Quilomene open only to the disabled, youth etc. 

As far as road access in some areas there is far too much.  The Colockum is an example.  This is why 85% of yearling bulls die every rifle season.  They don't have anywhere to escape to.  I also don't support making the Colockum a wilderness area.  I would rather see alot of the roads closed but keep all of the main roads open. 

 

[Clark33]

An area becoming wilderness is in no way "Shutting us out" It just means you have to get off your ass and hike a little... After working 3 summers on the wilderness trail crew out of Naches for the USFS, I would not be upset at all if they decided to designate more land as wilderness, we need it.  There are already to many ATV and Jeep trails in this state.

unless they plan on making wilderness wheelchair accesable I can't see shutting down anymore land. I am all for seasonal closures for erosion, wildlife, and any other reasonable excuses for closure.....but there are a lot of folks out there that fought hard for this country and now can never see parts of it except in the pics we take for them.

You got a good point, but if you look at it, the amount of wilderness we have is vastly out weighed by the amount of NF, BLM and state land that is accessible by vehicles.  All I was trying to say was a little more designated wilderness area wouldn't hurt at all.  My broth in law and best friend are both vets of OIF and OEF so I'm well aware of the sacrifice they and their families make, and I thank all of them.