Wow, spike hunts during LE elk hunt

There are only a few units that this is being proposed.

No worse that other states with cow hunts going on in units it takes 20 years to draw in or cow hunts going on when others are hunting spikes. Or muzzle loader hunts going on at the same time that archery seasons are happening. Then there are states like Colorado where you have deer hunters out at the same time that elk hunters are out.

It's hunting

They trying to shoot out Fishlake again?

Nope its a LE hunt during the GS spike hunt, and its on a trial basis of only a few areas. 2 fold idea, 1, it supposed to help with point creep (not sure how because the permit numbers will be the same), 2, the bulls get slaughtered on the November hunt (most all of this is based on the Wasatch unit) , the success rate is actually higher on the late hunt then the early hunt.

Read the small print.......

Remove tags from the rifle rut hunt......

"The new hunt, which would be held in mid-October, is designed to move some permits out of the early rifle hunt - where demand for permits is highest - and place them in a hunt that might provide better drawing odds, DWR said."

This is the start of moving rifle tags out of the rut........

Clairification. They won't add more "any bull pemits" to the units, just reduce the number of available permits on the early and late hunt.

Huntoholic said:

R
This is the start of moving rifle tags out of the rut........

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Not a bad thing IMO.

Huntoholic said:

Read the small print.......

Remove tags from the rifle rut hunt......

"The new hunt, which would be held in mid-October, is designed to move some permits out of the early rifle hunt - where demand for permits is highest - and place them in a hunt that might provide better drawing odds, DWR said."

This is the start of moving rifle tags out of the rut........

Click to expand...

That would be awesome if the rifle hunt wasn't prime rut.

DallenC, If someone with 20 points puts in for one of these new hunts the only person they should be upset with is themself for choosing that hunt! But for the person with only a handful of points and just wants the opportunity to hunt branch antlered bulls these new hunts are an option to look into.

BradN, I think it will work great on FL. 40% of the rifle tags taken out of the peak of the rut and moved to mid October should mean more of the mature bulls making it through the hunts. It will also mean less competition if you hold out for and draw the early rifle tag. Sound like a win win to me. The trophy hunter will have less people to deal with during their early season rut hunt and the opportunity hunter will get the chance to hunt bulls with a rifle without having to wait 15-20 years.

Personally I think they should move all elk hunts out of the rut. This should remove the in-fighting and should open more tags for branched antlered.

But alas it is more important to give a few elect a bigger selection to choose from.

I saw more big bulls during the general rifle hunt than spikes for sure. If it helps move people through the butt plug why not?

They already do the spike/cow hunts during the Archery LE elk hunts in a lot of areas. Has ruined the LE tags on those units. A friend of mine had an Archery LE tag a couple of years ago.
Was a joke !!!!
I have quit putting in for the Archery LE elk.

Gotta give them a little credit.

What do you do when too many people are applying for hunts that have a boat load of points?

You give them options to disperse those points into more options.

I do think the bigger issue is the inability to for the Utah DWR to manage elk on private lands.

What I would like to see is CMWU's go to a 1 public to 1 private permit, because they would also help push people through.

Maybe have a land owner hunter program where people get certified/vetted as prime candidates for hunts on private land. That way the opportunity is there and the land owners do not have to worry about bullet holes or broken fences.

Huntoholic said:

Personally I think they should move all elk hunts out of the rut. This should remove the in-fighting and should open more tags for branched antlered.

But alas it is more important to give a few elect a bigger selection to choose from.

Click to expand...

I agree! We should not hunt bull elk at all from mid august to the end of December! That's how long it takes for bulls to breed 2nd and 3rd estrus cows. We shouldn't allow cow elk hunting during this time either.

We need to insure that all cows are bread properly before we start killing all of them. This will insure prime genetics stay in the herd!. We need to stop killing older bulls during the rut!

MuscleWhitefish said:

I do think the bigger issue is the inability to for the Utah DWR to manage elk on private lands.

Maybe have a land owner hunter program where people get certified/vetted as prime candidates for hunts on private land. That way the opportunity is there and the land owners do not have to worry about bullet holes or broken fences.

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Agreed! One thing I love about hunting Wyoming, other than the amount of animals, is that your tag comes with a landowner voucher. This provides more of an incentive for landowners to let you on.

Some states also have a list of landowners that have given permission for their names and numbers to be given out to public hunters looking for ground to hunt. This completely facilitates the process since the landowners can be contacted, control who comes and when, etc. I have used such lists to contact landowners and have been very satisfied with the process.

Shooting big breeder bulls during the middle of Sept with a rifle is plain irresponsible, clearly a method to get recognition of being a trophy quality state - nothing more, nothing less.

Pretty much all elk bearing western states have very similar hunt dates relative to weapon choice, except UT, and those states do not suffer in population management and elk herd head count.

And, hunting elk in Sept with archery equipment will not have a negative affect on elk populations or rut activity, especially if you shut it down on the 20th or so. The average success rates for public land multi-permit (100-200) hunts runs about 15% - and that is not all bull kills.

Elkaholic2 said:

I agree! We should not hunt bull elk at all from mid august to the end of December! That's how long it takes for bulls to breed 2nd and 3rd estrus cows. We shouldn't allow cow elk hunting during this time either.

We need to insure that all cows are bread properly before we start killing all of them. This will insure prime genetics stay in the herd!. We need to stop killing older bulls during the rut!

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My comment about removing the hunts out of the rut has nothing to do with the breeding. It is purely to remove the in-fighting and division it is causing the hunting community. The simple fact is everybody wants to hunt the MAIN part of the rut. Solution is nobody gets too.

The other simple fact is that this move will not remove the Butt Plug. The only thing that will remove said plug is to increase the number of tags. With the number of people putting in for LE elk tags, moving tags for one bucket to another bucket will do nothing for the Butt Plug......

MuscleWhitefish said:

Gotta give them a little credit.

What do you do when too many people are applying for hunts that have a boat load of points?

You give them options to disperse those points into more options.

.......

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I give credit where credit is do and with this issue NO credit is do.

The fact is the herd and age of the elk has increased. Not only increased but exceeded their carrying capacity. The solution is to increase the number of permits. Hence the start of the removal of the Butt Plug. But their solution is to remove tags from the hunt of a life time and give you an any bull hunt and charge you more for that privilege. The only groups that this move will make happy is the archers, CMWU, and the people with more than 15 points.

I think it's great. We always complain about those pesky spike hunters that screw things up for the LE hunters (particularly with archery). But why doesn't anyone ever say anything about those gosh darn bull hunters that screw things up for us spike hunters???

I can't tell you how many times I've had to deal with people "scouting bulls" during MY hunts! LE tags just give people a false sense of entitlement.

I'm glad to see some rifle tags moving out of the rut.