YOU GONNA DO SOMETHING...

[kwp]

I may get crucified for the title of the topic and what I am going to say but right now I am more frustrated with the hunting public than the game and fish! There weren't even 15 people at the game and fish meeting last night in Tucson. Come on people, I know that there are a lot more than 15 hunters in Tucson who are concerned with the direction of the department. I, like everyone else on here am frustrated because I feel like the department isn't really listening to what we have to say, but that is no reason to give up. They may have just been blowing smoke up my a$$ last night but I actually feel like they are starting to consider what we have to say regarding hunt quality. I hope that a lot more people show up to the rest of the meetings because with that few, the department has no reason to consider the voice of such a small crowd. It is pretty sad that we can get discussions on this topic that go on for pages and pages yet hardly anybody shows up to the meetings. I say, if you are not willing to go say what you have to say to the departments face, then quit bitchin!!!

 

What have the numbers at the other meetings been like?

[Red Rabbit]

What was said in Tucson regarding the Coues hunts? I figured the Tucson meeting would be more focused on the coues situation.

 

No crucifixion of you from me. I would think most of the hunting public has no idea about the proposed guidellines. Most do not peruse the forums or checked no about receiving emails from G&F. I even know of some ardent hunters that were clueless to the USO situation a few years ago.

 

Doug~RR

[Rembrant]

Yep, the general hunting public is clueless. The general hunting public ain't gonna show up at the meetings. And you bring up a strong point kwp. If all the people that pipe in on this forum with their complaints about the dept. would go to the meetings, the attendance would increase X's 10 - at least.

I didn't make it either. Wanted to, just couldn't. But I'm glad you did and you inputted the right thing - quality.

I don't like the "opportunity" shift either, but I also know that there is no easy answer to the problem of limited resources and unlimited demand. I think what the future looks like is a business-like approach by the dept to create opportunity for its customers (and make money to run the business) at the expense of quality. The best we can hope for is to convince the commission to set aside quality areas. All of the quality hunts will be next to impossible to get drawn for.

This really stinks because those of us that have been around awhile know how good it has been, and now it's going away.

Thanks kwp for going to the meeting.

Mike

[kwp]

The big thing regarding S AZ coues hunts that caught me off guard even though I had already read the hunt guidelines was the possibility of 4 general rifle coues hunts. I guess I assumed that the fourth one shown in the guidelines is the youth hunt that typically overlaps the Nov hunt but they clearly said that this is an additional general hunt. They said that the december hunt would not change at all and that there would not be an increase in the total number of tags but that the tags that are currently allocated to the two earlier hunts would be spread out over three hunts. This is being considered due to the complaint of overcrowding (definite issue in my eyes) during the two early hunts. I would of rather them just decrease tags but that would go against their idea of hunter opportunity. There wasn't much said either for or against this because I think that it caught most of us off guard and we didn't have a chance to think about what it would mean.

 

The other discussion regarding coues was the alternative management units and why these units were selected. The two major reasons were existing quality (more older age class bucks already) and access. They said that 30b was chosen strictly because of access and they felt that an increase in tags would cause to many conflicts regarding access. 31 was chosen as it is considered a quality unit already and 36c was a combination of the two. The other units were not really discussed. There were a couple people that were quite confused regarding the wording of the harvest objective which caused them to oppose the alternative management idea but most were for the idea and stated that they would like to see more units included in the plan.

 

What does everyone think of these two topics?

 

Unfortunately Turkey Hunting took up a significant amount of time taking away from elk and deer

[John O]

Why in the world would they spend the majority of the time at the Tucson meeting talking about turkey management? That's like going to Flagstaff and spending most of the time talking about javelina management. Get real, they are going to do whatever they want, but they have to act like they are interested in the public input before they make it final. That way if people complain after the fact, G&F can site how many public meetings they had, soliciting input on the proposed changes. It is all about $$$$$. As long as the bucks are rolling in, they are happy. If they see a way to squeeze out a couple of more bucks out of us, they will find a way to mask it as conservation, or hunter quality, or whatever, and do it. For example- Out of state trophy bull hunters will pay anything to come here and hunt. G&F saw huge potential dollars in this, but the snag is that you can put in for bull and cow elk on the same application. Solution- Charge all out of state hunters $600 to hunt any elk in AZ (not including hunting license). This is great if you are an in state cow elk hunter, because your odds just went up. However, your buddy from outside the state will never hunt here again for cow, because he can get a combo tag in CO for less than $500. Whatever.

[Red Rabbit]

Looking at the guidelines, I see two October hunts, a late November hunt and a December hunt, plus the junior hunt in Nov. Quite unclear as to G&F making 4 general hunts and a junior hunt.

 

RR

 

From the guidelines pertaining to deer:

 

The Department's Deer Management Goal is to maintain deer populations at levels that provide maximum and diverse recreational opportunities, while avoiding adverse impacts to the species and its habitat. Guidelines for both species are grouped into "Standard" or "Alternative" hunt management.

Season prescriptions:

1. Hunts will be for "antlered mule deer," "antlered whitetail deer," or "any antlered deer." "Antlerless deer" or "any deer" permits may be recommended for units where the deer population requires reduction or stabilization, or when conflicts with other land management uses exist.

2. Separate hunts for mule deer and white-tailed deer will occur in units having substantial populations of both species of deer.

3. General deer hunts will occur on standard opening dates. When stratified, a series of 7-day hunts may occur throughout October and November with all hunts opening on a specific Friday and closing the following Thursday. A December white-tailed deer hunt will open the Friday of week 50 and continue to the end of the year. The following seasons will be available:

Juniors-only (northern Arizona) on Friday of week 41 (October 10, 2008 and October 9, 2009)

White-tailed on Friday of week 43 (October 24, 2008 and October 23, 2009)

White-tailed or Mule Deer on Friday of week 44 (October 31, 2008 and October 30, 2009)

Mule Deer on Friday of week 45 (November 7, 2008 and November 6, 2009)

Mule Deer on Friday of week 46 (November 14, 2008 and November 13, 2009)

Juniors-only on Friday of week 47 (November 21, 2008 and November 20, 2009)

White-tailed on Friday of week 48 (November 28, 2008 and November 27, 2009)

White-tailed on Friday of week 50 (December 12, 2008 and December 11, 2009)

If only a single early deer season is selected in October or November, the season will run for 10 days. Antlerless elk seasons will not overlap with a deer season in units with hunts for both species. Season dates will be selected to avoid such overlaps. If the unit is managed under Alternative Hunt Management, 10-day seasons may also be used.

4. Archery deer seasons may begin on Friday of week 34 (August 22, 2008 and August 21, 2009) and run for 22 days. Archery deer seasons may also begin on Friday of week 50 (December 12, 2008 and December 11, 2009) and run through end of December or January 31 of the following year. An archery deer season may begin on January 1 and run through January 31.

5 "Alternative Hunt Management" will provide opportunities to harvest older age class animals, for lower hunter densities, and for higher hunt success. Alternative hunt management for mule deer will occur in Units 12A, 12B, 13A, 13B, 45A, 45B, and 45C; hunts will be managed in accordance with the parameters below. Alternative hunt management for white-tailed deer will occur in Units 6A, 23, 30B, 31, and 36C; hunts will be managed in accordance with the parameters below. A limited amount of December white-tailed deer harvest opportunity will be offered in most white-tailed deer units, but up to 30% of the harvest will be allocated with December permits in those units managed under Alternative Hunt Management. A total of up to 5% of all white-tailed deer permits statewide will be offered in December.

6. There will be at least one general juniors-only deer hunt offered in each Region structured to provide a season encompassing a school holiday. At least three percent of all general deer permits will be allocated to juniors-only hunts.

[DCMHunter]

I attended the meeting in Pinetop on Tuesday and there was only about a dozen hunters there. Some of the issues that bothered me was the decrease in buck to doe and bull to cow ratio in the standard hunt units. With this reeduction they are also reducing the success percentage for the hunter. They are creating these alternative management hunt units with decent ratios and this is good, but don't decrease your current standards in the other area's. This will eventually reduce the herds to an un huntable population.

 

It was mentioned that they will be shifting hunts from perferred periods to less desired periods, such as reducing the December whitetail hunts to 5% reather than 10%. Also shifting some of the early elk tags to later dates.

 

Was there much discussion in Tucson about the archery recommendations? When they create the permit tag for units with greater than 20% harvest it will put additional pressure on the units with over the counter tags. Those units will then have an increase in archery harvest and with in 3 to 4 years there will no longer be over the counter deer tags.

 

They said these recommendations where from the hunters and said that there information came from the servey that they put out. In Pinetop they where asked why they did not use hard data reather then suggestive data. If they look at the first choice on the hunt applications they would have hard proof that hunters want quaility reather than oppertunity. Thier quality should be in number of animals, size and age of animals and ability to get away from the other weekend hunters.

 

Thanks for reading my complaints and if you are not active, get active

 

DCM

[jnobleinaz]

My brother and I will be at the phoenix meeting on june 18 from 6-8 hopefully everyone else will be there. I have a wife 2 kids and a job like everyone else so there is no excuses unless you work nights.

[coues7]

I feel terrible about not making the meeting. I had it planned, scheduled and the whole nine yards and ended up having to go to PHX unexpectedly and didn't get back until it was over......for those of you that did attend: MY HAT IS OFF TO YOU AND THANKS!!!

[dave]

I was just reading back through the Zoomerang survey the Department paid to do back in August of 2006.

Question # 41 is one of my favorites:

41. Let’s assume that if more permits are issued through the draw, then overall hunt success rates will decrease.

Would you be willing to accept lower hunt success if it meant that you could get drawn and have an opportunity to hunt more often?

 

This is a Dave Sipe question for you all to consider:

Let’s assume 3000 people apply for 75 archery bull elk tags for a September rut hunt. If we were to increase this number by 50 tags and offer 25 tags in September and 100 tags in November, Would you be willing to accept the lower hunt success if it meant you still don’t have a prayers chance of drawing a archery bull elk tag in Arizona for the rest of your life. If you do draw in November, I doubt you can pull your bow and wade through the snow.

This would be your odds for being drawn: .025 for choice number one and .042 for choice number two.

This would work well for the AZG$FD, they would gain revenue and less animals would be harvested.

 

This is what they are saying we all just voted for. Imagine that? So what is the problem we have with hunter retention?

 

No worrys, I am an ingun outlaw, I can shoot a buffalo a 500 yards with my hickory bow, don’t you know?

[Red Rabbit]

Dave,

For that question, 64/67% said yes (Phone/web responses) and 32/33 said no. (this was actually question #98) This may be the most important question/response G&F is using to validate their new direction away from quality towards quantity.

 

Speaking of quality and countering this direction, on the question #105 about how important is harvesting a trophy animal, the mean was 7.2 on a scale of 10 for th ephone respondents, with 37% rating it a 10 (extremely important). Contrast this to the results of question #104 about harvesting ANY animal (results are 6.45 ave and only 22.5% rating it a 10).

 

RR

[DCMHunter]

Has anyone looked at the turkey and Javelina hunts? Don't get me wrong I am all for youth hunts, I have three youth hunters at home fighting for who gets to put in for what. But does any one feel that opening the Spring and Fall turkey seasons up to over the counter for youth is alittle extreme? (Look at page 12 under Management guidelines D,i and D,ii) And they are moving 15% of the javelina tags currently during the fall to a single fall juniors only season. Also making the metro units over the counter nonpermit hunts. With the javelina they want to reduce the herd size down to 6 to 7 Adult or 7 to 10 total.

 

Does anyone have any concerns about making the House Rock Buffalo hunt a 365 day hunt?

 

There are some major problems with these guideline recommendations! Everyone should attend a meeting and send in some written comments. If you enjoy hunting than you had better do something other than whine on a website.

[DesertBull]

The Feds want all the Buff's to be gone, but they won't let you in the park to shoot them. So, they want to make sure everyone who gets a tag gets a buff.

 

I have no problems giving the youth as many tags as they can handle. That is what hunter retention and recruitment should be about, not issueing November Elk camping permits.

[DCMHunter]

Like I said I have no problem with youth hunters or recruitment and retention, I just feel that opening up the hunt like that could be a little dangerous for the turkey population. But then we where told at the Pinetop meeting that after the eggs are layed you could kill 100% of the toms without any problems or inpact to the flock.

 

If you want to issue youth as manny tags as you can lets give them some of the bull tags. My son has killed a cow elk two out of three years that he has been elligable to hunt and know he wants to hunt bulls. Or lets give them some December Whitetail hunts.

 

If you apply 365 days of pressure to the buffs every time they step off the park they will quiet coming off the park. besides that you had better hope to kill one near the road during the summer or you will lose all your meet and it will be a waiste.

 

DCM

[jim]

What is so wrong with november bull tags. I bet you will surprised at what someone who would put the effort into scouting will take on that hunt. Theres a big differnce in hunting units like 1 and 27 compared to unit 22 and 23. I will be using that as my second choice every year. Depending on what units they actually have tags in, it might even be my first choice. The elk are still there it just takes alot more effort to dunk one. With that said I do not hope they take any tags from the early hunts I am only for this if they add these tags as a more opportunity.