Originally Posted by Clem
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A. We manage our shared wildlife resources by individuals. This means backing off all regulations to the bare minimum to sustain some wildlife and letting the individual do whatever they want. My issue with this, is the rich are the only ones that can achieve their personal goals. Hunting will start taking the shape of Western Europe


We basically had this for decades: minimal regulations, landowners/hunters managing within the state's laws/regs/guidelines, and it worked well. People were happy and it worked well for turkeys and deer. Argue about it if you wish, but hunter satisfaction was strong.

Then the Management-Trophy crowd got going stronger and began nonstop with the "that chit's outdated, old, won't work, doesn't work, can't work, man can't run this and the pros need to do it, don't keep doing this, we need bigger deer, need real hunting and management" and they got their people in the right places to get what they wanted and what we have now.

We didn't have hunting anarchy. We didn't have "rich European" hunting.

But we have what we have now, so unless the common man gets changes made (unlikely) then we'll move along with it.



The time that it was a near free for all, is when the majority of the damage to the population was done. The 40 years prior to that, doe harvest was regulated county by county. That affects people like me a lot. Didn't make a whole lot of difference to my friend who leases 4500 acres with 6 other people.