Baiting Letter from Commissioner Martin

[bowsniper]

I received this email from Commissioner Martin:

 

February 11, 2009

 

To all who have contacted me regarding the baiting issue raised in the Article 3 Rule Review:

 

Please forgive my use of a blanket response for all of your unique concerns. I am responding this way in the interests of giving the necessary time to all of the many issues that come before me. If any of you feel that your comments are not adequately addressed in this response, please send me a follow-up e-mail requesting further dialogue. I will be happy to look at your individual concerns in more depth as necessary.

 

My considerations are the following:

 

1) Fair Chase

 

I am not entirely comfortable regulating for fair chase. I feel that this may be more appropriately viewed as an individual style choice on the part of every hunter. My primary concerns when considering big game hunt regulations are population sustainability in the context of harvest numbers and ethical/humane treatment of wildlife in the context of allowable methods. I see fair chase as being outside of these two considerations.

 

What constitutes fair chase is subjective, which is one of the reasons I feel uncomfortable regulating for it. One hunter may view use of scents as giving too much of an artificial advantage in the hunt and not being appropriate from a fair chase perspective while another may find it perfectly appropriate. The same can be said of using calls, hunting over water, etc. I am concerned that in regulating these decisions we may be requiring adherence to values that are better left to personal choice.

 

I view humans as natural predators. Humans are exceptionally intelligent predators, and use of bait seems like a natural step for such an intelligent predator to take. While I haven’t researched the history of the use of bait, it would not surprise me to learn that prehistoric tribal practices included use of bait, and baiting has certainly become a traditional practice in more recent history. Unlike advantages that have evolved with technological advances, baiting seems to me to be akin to natural methods used by intelligent predators.

 

2) Hunter success rates vs. maximizing hunters in the field

 

This practice has become a significant management issue in some units that may result in fewer tags being allocated in the future. Considering the well-known decline in hunter participation and the fact that a primary reason for that trend reported by hunters is lack of opportunity to hunt, reducing tags is a very unfortunate step to be forced to take. This scenario is well worth avoiding. I would like to solve this localized problem with minimal increased regulation from a state-wide perspective. It may be that the best way to solve the management issue we are facing without unduly restricting hunters is to allow the use of mineral attractants, but restrict the use of artificial food sources. Despite my discomfort with regulating for fair chase, there is a management issue that must be addressed, and I want to address it without reducing tags.

 

3) Disease transmission

 

Disease transmission at baiting sites is a valid concern. Use of water catchments as a management technique is often criticized and potential for disease transmission is referenced, but it can be argued that since water in an arid climate is localized and catchments provide more water sources across the landscape, risk of disease transmission may actually be reduced. Food sources reflect the opposite situation. Forage is naturally spread across the landscape, and baiting sites focus feeding in one area. While we lack data to show that disease transmission will occur, if we wait for such data to emerge, effects on local populations could be devastating. Again, allowing the use of mineral attractants but restricting the use of artificial feeding could alleviate this concern.

 

4) Law enforcement

 

Many of you have voiced concerns regarding the potential for citations to occur outside of the intent of the language. Our rules are written in collaboration with our law enforcement staff, and this a wordsmithing issue. I am confident that we can identify the intent of this rule clearly enough to eliminate the potential for erroneous citations.

 

These considerations reflect my views at the time of this writing, and should not be viewed as predecisional. Compelling arguments may be presented to me as this discussion continues that could change my thinking on these matters. In light of the moratorium on rulemaking, we have time to discuss this issue and take all viewpoints into consideration. Thanks to all of you for taking the time to contact me. Public input is invaluable to me personally, and critical to the Commission’s decision-making process.

 

JM

 

[Coues 'n' Sheep]

Mark,

 

I responded to that letter with this short note. I thought that her responce was well thought out and not without merrit. I think that she has drawn conclusions but has not made a final call on which direct she will go on this, meaning that we still have an ear to speak to. These commisioners do not respond to angry words, but seem to respond to well thought out responses that get them thinking about the other side of the coin. Here response IMO, leaves the door open to keep after her support.... and that is what I intend to do.

 

 

Ms. Martin,

 

Thank You for your reply and for your, in my opinion, open minded approach to this issue. Based on your point of view on this subject I would only like to bring a couple of points back to your attention from my original letter. "If the real issue at hand is hunter success in the archery deer hunts, then why not implement harvest objectives similar to the bear seasons. We are half way there with mandatory reporting and we keep one more law off the books" and "There are many young hunters, disabled/disadvantaged hunters, elderly hunters, and woman hunters that will be forced out of bow hunting with the passing of this law. That in itself is a direct hit on the Opportunity objective that the commission has laid out." These points might give one more reason for us to not implement this law or one like it, instead to use alternate methods. As to the CWD issue there are many scientific reasons why the spread of disease is not really as much of danger in our state as it is in other parts of the US. And simply stated any natural water source has a greater chance of spreading disease than an man placed "bait". As a whole I am truly against adding more laws if we can work with those we have in place…

 

Again thank you very much for your time and consideration.

[TAM]

Gino, I responded to her with the exact same question. If it's really about managment and creating opportunity then why not manage archery deer like we do for bear? It seems to me like it would be a good idea.

[Coues 'n' Sheep]

Gino, I responded to her with the exact same question. If it's really about managment and creating opportunity then why not manage archery deer like we do for bear? It seems to me like it would be a good idea.

 

Tim,

 

If more people were to get on the Harvest Objective band wagon, I think it will ressonate with the comissioners....IMO. It is such a logical management tool and does not reduce hunter opportunity!! All hunters need to stick together, or it is a house of cards we are building....

 

[elkaholic]

hello - I'm not real clear on the purpose of changing it like the bear hunts - Are you saying that after a certain number of animals are takin to end the season?

[Coues 'n' Sheep]

hello - I'm not real clear on the purpose of changing it like the bear hunts - Are you saying that after a certain number of animals are takin to end the season?

 

 

For that unit, yes.... then you can still go hunt any other unit that is open and hunt, just like bear season.

[elkaholic]

hello - Now how is that gonna benafit me as a guy who needs to plan his hunts and time off work and scouting trips etc. For a guide service its candy !

[Coues 'n' Sheep]

hello - Now how is that gonna benafit me as a guy who needs to plan his hunts and time off work and scouting trips etc. For a guide service its candy !

 

It works exactly the same as bear hunting.... we all get to hunt our favorite unit the opening week... if it gets closed down before we fill our tag, then we just simply pack up and go hunt a different unit... every hunter I know has 2-3 different units that they love to hunt. Bottom line is that we all can hunt anywhere we want the opening week, just like bear, and it is only about 3-4 units state wide that will shut down due to reaching a harvest objective and it probably won't happen in the first week of the hunt.

 

Oh, and it is no easier for a guide to hunt multipe units than a lone hunter.... actually the opposite.

[bowsniper]

It works exactly the same as bear hunting.... we all get to hunt our favorite unit the opening week... if it gets closed down before we fill our tag, then we just simply pack up and go hunt a different unit... every hunter I know has 2-3 different units that they love to hunt. Bottom line is that we all can hunt anywhere we want the opening week, just like bear, and it is only about 3-4 units state wide that will shut down due to reaching a harvest objective and it probably won't happen in the first week of the hunt.

 

Oh, and it is no easier for a guide to hunt multipe units than a lone hunter.... actually the opposite.

 

Sounds like a good solution, and G&F still get to sell lots of tags. A win/win.

 

Mark

[Coach]

This part is a little bit confusing to me...

 

"Considering the well-known decline in hunter participation and the fact that a primary reason for that trend reported by hunters is lack of opportunity to hunt, reducing tags is a very unfortunate step to be forced to take. This scenario is well worth avoiding."

 

The demand for hunting in this state so far outweighs the "supply" in terms of available tags and the harvests that the habitat can support (unfortunately not always aligned). I don't understand this continued argument from G&F about the "well-known decline" in hunter participation. Everywhere I have hunted over the past 20 years looks like a freaking ZOO compared to what it did when I started - and as a result there is a lot less game.

 

During quail season there are hundreds of people where there used to be maybe a couple dozen at the most. We used to regularly see deer and javelina while just walking around quail hunting or driving from spot to spot. Now you have to hike into the nastiest, most secluded canyons you can find because they've been hammered so hard - and then chances are good you'll not even see a pig or deer. While I don't mind that for myself, it's not exactly conducive to getting our young kids or wives involved in hunting.

 

Maybe hunter participation as a percentage of population is in decline, but let's face it - you simply can't increase the number of hunters in the field just because the population of the state is growing - the amount of hunting pressure the habitat can withstand is relatively fixed. If you want more opportunity, figure out how to get our deer, antelope and javelina herds closer to the carrying capacity of the land. Think about it, if we had antelope populations in Eastern AZ that were anywhere near those of Western NM (or even on the Bonito prairie on the Apache Reservation) we would have thousands more big game tags to issue hunters. Solving that ONE issue would do more to generate opportuntity than all of this bogus tag shifting and doubling that they've done for deer. And hunting antelope is a much more attractive way to bring young and new hunters into the sport than starting out with coues - arguably one of the hardest species to hunt.

 

Sure, there are some areas with left-over javelina, and even some deer tags, but IMO, that has more to do with the fact that those units are typically very dangerous WRT smugglers etc. Who wants to take their kids on a hunt where there's a good chance they'll run into armed drug mules?

 

Ok. I think I'm done venting for now.