Livestock verse Wildlife (and access)
Wildlife is public property. livestock is private.
The heart of the question for me boils down to who "owns" the animal.
If the landowner buys Elk, Deer, Impala raise it on their own property it is their livestock to do with as they wish. With that right of ownership comes the responsibility insure that the livestock do not intermix with native game. (How tall of a fence???)
The state as the representative of the people is charged with stewardship of the people's resources. The health and well being of wildlife is therefore responsibility of the state. Deer, Elk, Bear,Antelope, have first rights to public land. Hunters fund this protection with the license and tags fees. Yes other tax payers pitch in, but hunters are at the front of the line.
Nutshell, the State should protect the wildlife first and foremost. It may then consider the profitability of private hunting reserves.
"
hijack warning"
Our problem in Wyoming is that the law here does not mandate public access to public land. Nor does it mandate access from private land to public roads.
If there is a (and there are) 250 acres of state land, legal to hunt but the land is surround by private land and there is no public road accessing it, the private land owner can legally control the public access to that land. He can charge a fee for crossing his land, he can prevent anyone accessing across his land. He could only let left handed Lithuanian female bow hunters who worship Diana access to the land.
He (I say he but there are many female land owners as well) is profiting from the state land yet pays no taxes on the land.
The same is true if that 250 acre land was private land.
Have you seen the adds in the back of magazines for 40 acre of wilderness for almost nothing? Guess what, if that tract of land in the middle of the
BIG BAR What's To You Ranch's 10,000 acre spread you better have a helicopter or be willing to pay for access to your own land.
If the "Game animal" is wildlife, then it belongs to the people of the state. I have a real problem with land owners selling state property.
If the land owner wants to charge a fee for hunting the states game on his land, as in an "access fee", that is fair. It may be splitting hairs but the distinction is that he is not selling the animal. ( How much that fee should be is another question)
Charging $3000-$9000 for a bull or $300-$1500 for a cow elk (wild) killed on private property seems wrong. If the land owner bought the breeding stock and raised the animal on his private property then charging these prices would be his right.
A land owner can receive state money for damages done by wildlife, this is because he does not own the animal. If my son breaks your window
I have to replace
your window. If
your son breaks
your window
I don't have to pay for the window.
Drive across Wyoming and one will see millions of acres of undeveloped land. So vast it is hard to grasp, yet when it come time to hunt or target practice gaining legal access is mind numbingly difficult.
Not the whole story but most of one side.
