Interesting concept
Wisconsin
I just drove over to Orange Beach and had lunch yesterday with a guy I play golf with in Roberts. We started talking fishing and he said that what Alabama does is charge whatever the Alabama guys would pay if they came to your state..Interesting concept. I know that we've discussed this before and some will say that "If you do that, we won't come" I think that it's fair-LC
I agree, reciprocal fees for equal hunting or fishing opportunities would be great!
"If you do that, we won't come"
Oh no, a few less ducks and FIB's. What ever would we do;)
Do you guys get FIBs over there by you Rut?
I cannot imagine a more fair way to do it. If people complain, make your home state lower their non-resident fee to $5 and then you will get the deal of a lifetime !! (And so will WI hunters when we go there...)
My question though: So what would an Alabama person pay in Wisconsin? and vice versa? Which came first, the chicken or the egg?
I believe it is already being done by some states,,,,
Usually reciprocity means you pay our NR fee or the NR fee your state charges-whichever is higher.
Minnesota did that with archery deer licenses several years back. Iowa hunters screemd bloody murder when they suddenly had to pay over $400 to get a Minnesota license. Political pressure got the new law cancelled. Iowa was not going to lower their fee to make it more fair.
Don't know what fibs are but I would prefer a super high out of state fee, I live too close to the border and mud ducks are invading!
"Do you guys get FIBs over there by you Rut?"
Tweed, we get a ton of them. I live in Bloomer which is right on 53. We have a lot of Illinois plates year round. Most all of my property maintenance clients are in Chippewa Falls. The amount of FIB traffic around there in the spring/summer/fall is outrageous. You can usually see them coming up the highway from a ways also. They are the ones driving 85 cutting others off with their brand new SUV/trucks pulling a camper and or boat.
Reciprocity means that another state charges you whatever fee your state charges their residents.
One thing with reciprocal fees that is a bit grey. MN and WI do not require a small game (hunting) license to get a deer license, bow or gun. Iowa does require it. Other states do too. So, when Iowa deer hunters came north to MN and faced the new significantly higher price of a deer license then a small game license was also required. And a required doe tag for another $100+. I guess it all adds up. Wish it had lasted at least a few more years so it had time to affect the Iowa prices.
I guess I was OK with it because if Iowa prices suddenly got cut in half or less it would take as long to get an Iowa deer license as it can take to get a bear license in Wisconsin.
I know die hard deer hunters that actually moved to Iowa when they retired and one that quit his job and moved there so they could hunt there every year at reasonable prices. They still hunt MN and probably WI at their reasonable NR prices.
I'm not sure we should be too concerned as to whether or not the Iowa guys, Illinois guys or other are upset if we'd go reciprocal. Iowa and Illinois sure didn't poll the Wisconsin guys (as far as I know) when they went to 500 bucks.We DO NOT need to be the Walmart of deer or turkey licenses...
Good time to contact your local legislative and political reps etc., to get a reciprocal rule passed. Its in the best interest of the Wisconsin residents as a whole. Shouldn't be any reason they would oppose getting this passed. If there is what would be their rationale? The big picture is increase revenue even if there is a slight decrease of license's sales which in time usually rebounds.
Agree with lame crowndip sentiments also.
The only rational I could see is that there is more demand for nonresidents to hunt here than there is for WI residents to hunt in other states.
We get an infestation of Mud Ducks every spring, not so many Fibs up by me.
Tweed- there's a reason for that, it's cheap here. If Iowa, Illinois, etc was the same as Wi the non res hunters in those states would increase dramatically.
Tweed all the more reason to go with reciprocal. Needs to be changed and soon.
The reason Illinois and Iowa have high NR tags is there are a lot of outfitters in those states. EVERY TV show has hunts in Illinois Iowa and now Kansas. They saw the $$$ signs and went with it. People have NO problem paying those outrageous tag fees for deer.
The DNR keeps saying you`re not killing enough deer....add the new call "check in" that half the people are doing....now try getting them to go to a reciprocal tag system. I don`t think they will go for it. They just need to start incrementally increasing the tag fees.
I agree with Franklin,,,,,
It won't happen in MN and WI. What the DNR charges for the license is a small part of all the other economic gains from the hunters that might not come because of the increased license cost. Also why would our reps care about how much we spend to hunt in other states. Not much political pressure to do anything.
States that have limited NR licenses will take as much money as they can for those licenses as long as they can still sell them all.
Maybe WI should go to a draw system for deer licenses to create a shortage, that might justify a higher cost. I don't see that happening either. Also force every NR to buy a high priced doe tag. That won't happen either. Like I said above, MN tried it and it got repealed the next year.
Jeff I disagree ,also reps seemed to care about NR by offering cheaper NR license, time they look at the whole sum and residents. The NR will still spend and come if fees are raised,doubt if the decreased numbers would be that great to have major economic impact. Besides resources and revenue should have a priority also. Anyhow, how many here on this site and state residents as a whole would be against reciprocal or as mentioned increased fees incrementally?
I would be curious what the recent dollar figures are for hunting in Wisc. now. Years back when they would close schools for gun season..lol....it was billions. Politicians see $$$ signs....they look at the revenues NR hunting brings in. Just imagine how much is made in lease fees alone. That leaves landowners to spend more of their money in their communities. Use the lease money for land taxes.
I really don't think it would happen although I cannot see why the guys from Illinois, Kansas, Iowa and other places would complain "How dare you charge as much as we do!!" Things CAN change-remember Kansas??
