Here’s the conundrum…….When they passed the legalized baiting rule they should have went ahead and passed stricter buck harvest regulations of some kind in conjunction with that change in order to balance out the impacts…..From a herd management standpoint that would have been the best way of preventing what just happened…….
However, there’s more to consider than just the deer……there’s people management…..I get that…..Hunters would have pitched a fit back when baiting was legalized if the state reduced the buck limit or issued tags, etc…..They would have had their pitchforks out hollering “No new rules!!”……..A lot of hunters will still have this attitude when the drum beat starts for change in the coming years……But they have you by the short and curlies now because most people….even the ones who would protest new rules now…..will eventually concede over time if their hunting gets bad enough or if your tracking calls remain a fraction of what they used to be……Its just a matter of whether you concede now or whether you kick and scream for a while…..The baiting genie isnt going back in the bottle even if folks wanted it to……
