>
LAST EDITED ON Jan-15-15
>AT 03:47?PM (MST)
>
>So ill bite on this one,
>even though I've been outfitting
>for a long long time
>and this isn't our MO
>I really don't have an
>issue with it but I'll
>ask a question and then
>give you my 2cents....
>
>My question back to you is,
>would you help the guy
>(big money guy, the guide/outfitter)
>for free? Your family,
>friend, fellow hunter for free
>but not a guy who
>pays--so what if we doesn't
>pay you?
>
>Isn't the guy who bought the
>tag a "fellow hunter"?
>If not, please define 'fellow
>hunter' for me so to
>clarify.
>
>I'm with Muley 73 on this
>one, I fail to see
>the difference on doing something
>helping family and friends who
>may not have money for
>free vs. doing something for
>a bit of cash from
>a guy who does, its
>still a dead bull.
>
>If morally and ethically you have
>a problem receiving $$/cash/dollars for
>providing information, working etc. when
>it comes to wildlife that's
>fine and that's your right.
>However it is not illegal,
>it is a business model
>some employ to be successful
>at what they do not
>unlike many other business out
>there who I would wager
>you support. Its no more
>immoral or unethical when you
>a bonus or tip for
>doing something at above and
>beyond at work.
>
>What this really comes down to
>(I would wager) and I
>believe where your real root
>of concern is, is you
>don't care for the way
>someone makes a living, maybe
>even envious of what that
>one outfitter does for a
>living, but maybe not, just
>my opinion.
>
>Try not to loose to much
>sleep over it
>
>
>Todd Black
>
>Visit our YouTube page
>
http://www.youtube.com/user/bulls4bto?feature=mhum
First I appreciate Todd for being honest. Todd your right I do have a problem with "professional" guides. I think most of us that do have a problem with it is the "buisness model" discussion. Wildlife is not like any other natural resource. We don't spend years watching coal. We don't spend years trying to draw tree cut permits. We don't live a lifestyle devoted to a mineral. We do all the above with wildlife and to have folks such as yourself turn it into a simple commercial transaction cheapens something we live to to. Honestly, I don't envy you. The ammount of butt kissing and nose wiping you have to do in pursuit of an animal so some shooter can pull a trigger I have no interest in doing. Most of us have to do this for a living and don't want to do this for our passion.
Once you reduce this passion to a "buisness model", you loose the majority of us. The fact that you have been guiding for so long that you simply look at an elk or deer as a paycheck, in short makes us feel sorry for you, however, that sorrow does not mean that we turn a blind eye to your methods. I believe you that this isn't your MO, I have had people close to me that have been around you and I believe you don't "pay to play". The fact that you don't understand how commercializing hunting has and is destroying it shows your level of jadedness(probably not a real word). To a majority of us the "professional" guide is not much different than a livestock rancher, the only difference being that your butcher is dumb enough to pay you to do it, the livestock rancher still has to pay his.
But lets be fair, you guide CWMU's and in doing so you have locked gates and guaranteed tags year after year. Other guides that freelance don't so they are more desperate for clients. Easy for a Deseret guide to not have to "reduce" himself to those tactics, but lets be honest, you would if it meant getting paid or not. Your right, its not illegal, and I won't comment on your ethics, but paying finders fees and for info shows just how far away from the passion for hunting the "pros" have drifted. We aren't fellow hunters. You are a middle man for a trigger puller. You have no emotional connection to the sport, or the game, you simply like your "job" and will hold your nose on any legal method to keep it. Most of us won't.
"The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun"
