Next BGSS meeting, Sterling Colorado, June 29th NE Junior College, 6 - 7:30 pm
I would highly recommend that those that have not, Go to Engage CPW on their web site and fill out the poll and add your comments.
This is exactly why it will be VERY IMPORTANT that residents answer the Engage CPW.com surveys, add personal comments, and then email the Commissioners concerning archery elk going to all draw or not and then also the issue of Banking and PP Averaging, all three of these issues will be determined outside of the BGSS. Even CPW staff recommends not allowing Banking and PP averaging. There are as least two Commissions what want Archery elk to go to all draw.
The August Commission meeting will be very important to all bow hunters in Colorado. [email protected]
Im not hopeful
Got some good Q and A time though. We discussed some alternatives to limiting OTC such as a 6 point antler restriction for OTC only with then a "any bull" limited draw tag made available. Answer was; Accepted at first with the biologist saying it would have to be across the board and not just for one method of take or season specific. But then they determined that hunters are too stupid to know the difference. (actual words from the horses mouth) Especially rifle hunters. Which there is some validity to that, but the 4pt restriction had the same pangs of implementing and it is now well accepted and adhered to, and that it produced a healthier herd and it didn't limit opportunity to hunt. So lets take it to the next level. Maybe the biologist is wrong and it could be for NR OTC only. Why should a OTC NR be allowed to take a 2 yr old 4pt that a resident could harvest as a 5pt the next year? Then why should a OTC NR take a 3 or 4 yr old 5pt when a res could harvest it as a 6pt the next year? Studies show on average 90% of 2 yr olds are 4pt and 90% of 5 yr olds are 6pt.
We talked about private land to public land access and landowner incentive programs to allow the public to simply cross their land, to ease congestion at trailheads. Answer was; There's already programs like RFW and lots of State Trust property leased for public access. And anything more may not be accepted by enough private LO's
Talked about in certain areas the possibility to use your elk or deer tag on a lion if you have an opportunity on one. Answer was; Accepted (after a few seconds of cricket sounds) They agreed that it was a good idea but seemed like they wouldn't know how to handle the legality of it because your tag says "elk" on it, not "Mountain Lion". Generally though, they agreed that there could be more regulation lifted in areas where lion populations are above objectives. But the elder badge of the group made mention that any additional lion hunting opportunity in this political (polistical) climate would result in an uproar from "them". He said that the "lions and bobcats are next" in "their" agenda. And that as sportsmen, if we are concerned about the future of cat hunting in CO we best show up to any commission meeting where lions would be on the agenda and be a voice, otherwise all the commission will hear is the other voices.
We also talked about the problem of beetle kill and how it has caused the elk travel patterns to drastically change. And caused a lot more hunter congestion in popular OTC units. Meaning, that most all the hunters are restricted to hunting the trails or driving roads and not pounding the woods anymore, and this causes hunters paths to cross resulting in the ill reports of too many hunters.
We discussed other ways to allow hunters to disperse and one way was to allow for reciprocity between units that border on a mountain range above a specific elevation to allow hunters to continue to pursue elk that are using the top of the range more often due to the lower elevations of the S,E and W facing slopes where the beetle kill and deadfall is more evident and restrictive. We all know animals follow the path of least resistance.
All in all, I did get a sense that all the badges there were all hunters and supported more opportunity to hunt and did not like the idea of limiting OTC tags. Albeit this was eastern CO CPW managers. They made it a point the loss of revenue they would incur from that kind of action. And they also made a point that the general consensus of hunters saying "what we say doesn't matter anymore, they wont listen to us anyways" is false and will be the demise of hunting if it continues.
If you have the time, please get involved, at minimum take the surveys and fill out the questionnaires, attend the meetings, voice your thoughts and ideas to the commission in person or via email, band together as fellow hunters. If we loose our voice we loose our rights. I'm not hopeful with a lot of this either, but I still have faith.
