B
BigSmoothSamPerkins
Guest
Thought this was a good opinion. Didn't know about the pending world record buck being taken on a landowner tag.
All I ever needed to know about the current state of Colorado big-game hunting affairs I learned on eBay.
That's where one discovers the opportunity to purchase landowner vouchers that allow big spenders to bypass the normal waiting period, jumping to the head of the line for the state's most prized deer and elk licenses.
Or, if you prefer, simply Google any of several key words and watch the websites offering vouchers pop up on the screen. Or catch the classifieds in the various hunting journals. Maybe even just put your ear to the ground.
Colorado deer and elk hunting has become big business, not just for ranchers, but an entire lineup of businesses living off the animals. You'll find thousands of opportunities to trash the basic principles of fairness in license acquisition. Don't want to wait 10 years for a shot at a trophy buck or bull? Just peel off a few very large bills Colorado offers as rancher welfare - often to wealthy absentee owners who need money like France needs rioters.
Colorado deer and elk hunting also has become big business for a growing lineup of brokers and outfitters who have made what once was sport a commodities market.
Take the recent example of Utah resident Jed Lowe, who in late August, through an admirable display of archery skills, bagged what probably ranks as the largest Colorado mule deer rack taken in velvet.
Thing is, Lowe acquired his tag through a Utah broker who bought and resold vouchers in western Colorado. Lowe leap-frogged Colorado hunters to get the tag, shot one of the state's all-time trophies and didn't even have to surrender any preference points.
Such a deal. Moreover, he didn't even hunt on the property of the landowner who was given the voucher, trekking instead deep into the national forest for an animal he had located on an earlier scouting expedition.
Such examples are at the heart of a flaming debate over a law approved by a cowboy-dominated legislature a quarter-century ago.
It awards landowners 15 percent of limited licenses off the top before ordinary sportsmen get an opportunity to draw.
As if to demonstrate that greed has no limits, ranchers now clamor for more. With escalating prices, they want an even bigger slice of the pie. Although the lineup on a special license allocation committee was stacked in their favor, commercial interests were rebuffed in their latest grab for tags.
Ranchers constantly trumpet their stewardship of wildlife. Listening to the propaganda put forth by the Colorado Cattleman's Association, you would think not a single deer or elk still would be alive but for the heroic efforts of landowners.
It's true many members of the livestock community harbor genuine affection for game animals. But for most, they have evolved into a $5,000 bill on four legs. Stories abound about ranchers actively hazing game or blocking their movement to keep prize animals out of the hands of the average hunter.
Stockmen carp about wildlife living at their expense. This ignores the overwhelming fact that the animals were there long before the human ancestors or predecessors arrived. Time was, dealing with wildlife and other natural hazards were considered a part of doing business. More recently, friendly legislatures at least in part insulated stockmen from risk by requiring the Division of Wildlife to reimburse them from a broad variety of damage - money paid by sportsmen who generally are excluded from these ranches unless they're willing to pay big again.
Landowners don't give up easily. When the Division of Wildlife proposed a modest compromise that presumably carried the blessing of both sportsmen and ranchers to a Nov. 3 meeting of the Wildlife Commission, lobbyists quickly turned the session into another round of pounding away for more concessions.
Timid commission members acquiesced to an expanded study of units in which landowners might be awarded even more vouchers for sale to the highest bidder.
Curiously, not one sportsman representative rose to refute them. As someone suggested, sportsmen thought they put the matter to rest when they beat back a voucher challenge a year ago and simply nodded off.
Nothing could be farther from the truth. Landowners greedy for more of the public's licenses to sell to the highest bidder never sleep.
All I ever needed to know about the current state of Colorado big-game hunting affairs I learned on eBay.
That's where one discovers the opportunity to purchase landowner vouchers that allow big spenders to bypass the normal waiting period, jumping to the head of the line for the state's most prized deer and elk licenses.
Or, if you prefer, simply Google any of several key words and watch the websites offering vouchers pop up on the screen. Or catch the classifieds in the various hunting journals. Maybe even just put your ear to the ground.
Colorado deer and elk hunting has become big business, not just for ranchers, but an entire lineup of businesses living off the animals. You'll find thousands of opportunities to trash the basic principles of fairness in license acquisition. Don't want to wait 10 years for a shot at a trophy buck or bull? Just peel off a few very large bills Colorado offers as rancher welfare - often to wealthy absentee owners who need money like France needs rioters.
Colorado deer and elk hunting also has become big business for a growing lineup of brokers and outfitters who have made what once was sport a commodities market.
Take the recent example of Utah resident Jed Lowe, who in late August, through an admirable display of archery skills, bagged what probably ranks as the largest Colorado mule deer rack taken in velvet.
Thing is, Lowe acquired his tag through a Utah broker who bought and resold vouchers in western Colorado. Lowe leap-frogged Colorado hunters to get the tag, shot one of the state's all-time trophies and didn't even have to surrender any preference points.
Such a deal. Moreover, he didn't even hunt on the property of the landowner who was given the voucher, trekking instead deep into the national forest for an animal he had located on an earlier scouting expedition.
Such examples are at the heart of a flaming debate over a law approved by a cowboy-dominated legislature a quarter-century ago.
It awards landowners 15 percent of limited licenses off the top before ordinary sportsmen get an opportunity to draw.
As if to demonstrate that greed has no limits, ranchers now clamor for more. With escalating prices, they want an even bigger slice of the pie. Although the lineup on a special license allocation committee was stacked in their favor, commercial interests were rebuffed in their latest grab for tags.
Ranchers constantly trumpet their stewardship of wildlife. Listening to the propaganda put forth by the Colorado Cattleman's Association, you would think not a single deer or elk still would be alive but for the heroic efforts of landowners.
It's true many members of the livestock community harbor genuine affection for game animals. But for most, they have evolved into a $5,000 bill on four legs. Stories abound about ranchers actively hazing game or blocking their movement to keep prize animals out of the hands of the average hunter.
Stockmen carp about wildlife living at their expense. This ignores the overwhelming fact that the animals were there long before the human ancestors or predecessors arrived. Time was, dealing with wildlife and other natural hazards were considered a part of doing business. More recently, friendly legislatures at least in part insulated stockmen from risk by requiring the Division of Wildlife to reimburse them from a broad variety of damage - money paid by sportsmen who generally are excluded from these ranches unless they're willing to pay big again.
Landowners don't give up easily. When the Division of Wildlife proposed a modest compromise that presumably carried the blessing of both sportsmen and ranchers to a Nov. 3 meeting of the Wildlife Commission, lobbyists quickly turned the session into another round of pounding away for more concessions.
Timid commission members acquiesced to an expanded study of units in which landowners might be awarded even more vouchers for sale to the highest bidder.
Curiously, not one sportsman representative rose to refute them. As someone suggested, sportsmen thought they put the matter to rest when they beat back a voucher challenge a year ago and simply nodded off.
Nothing could be farther from the truth. Landowners greedy for more of the public's licenses to sell to the highest bidder never sleep.
