Wildlife depredation/ federal agencies and my frustration

[Oneye]

Hello everyone, I was a member of this forum years back and have not visited it for quite a while. I have raised a small herd of cattle for about 10 years now and used this board as a good place for information when starting out.

I've come back because something has gotten under my skin with cattlemen and ranchers in my home state of Utah in Piute, Wayne, and Sevier counties and I am hoping to have a discussion about the issue of wildlife depredation, public land grazing, and how these issues can be resolved rather than many being on opposite sides of this argument when we shouldn't be. Hopefully there will be a few people from Utah or other western states that deal with these issues that can discuss it.

Over the last couple years I have watched and listened to the constant bashing of the BLM and Forest Service. I've also watched these same individuals criticize the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources over depredation issues on their private lands by deer, elk, and pronghorn depending on the area. My breaking point was a few days ago when I watched some individuals upset with a wintering herd of mule deer coming to their property that had alfalfa on it, and I caught them shooting at the deer with a .22 caliber rifle. Needless to say I turned them in and will do so to anyone who decides they will take the law into their own hands and try to wound animals so they'll go off and die somewhere.

Now some of you may be used to whitetails that reproduce endlessly, mule deer are not like that. Their numbers have been declining for decades and they aren't in a position for every landowner who's field they walk onto to mortally wound them at will.

As I get farther into this discussion pardon me if I get to carried away, these issues have been building up in my state and across the west for a while now and I want to discuss it with the other side to see that point of view and see where we can find middle ground.

My thoughts on these issues are:

1-Wildlife have become big business and the fact that ranchers and cattlemen look at the situation that they come first is completely flawed in my mind. This year alone in Utah a mule deer tag sold for $390,000. Don't believe protected wildlife have their worth? Better think again. Sportsmen and women also contribute $646 billion dollars a year to the US economy which is largely surrounded by the federal lands and wildlife that are under constant attack and it's time that $646 billion is not ignored.

2- The constant attacks on the BLM and Forest Service have to end, along with this foolish idea to turn over federal lands to the state which would be an absolute disaster for all of us. The same people criticizing these agencies on a political level are the same people voting to cut their budgets every time they get a chance. Smart isn't it? Cut their budgets and then complain when they aren't doing a better job. It's easy to make something fail and push forward your personal agenda when your stripping funding from it. Ever since the ridiculous Cliven Bundy situation this constant fight between the federal agencies and livestock producers has just gotten old.

As I said, I raise a small herd of cattle, I am not on the outside of this issue. I simply value wildlife for the value they have which is huge to our nation and its economy. People who view wildlife as a worthless block to furthering their profit I will stand against all day long. I would like to know everyone's opinions on the 2 subjects of public land and wildlife depredation. I'm open to hearing your argument and just want to discuss the issue with those on the other side of the issue.

 

[ram]

I have a couple of questions for you, who owns the deer? And then who owns the deer when their on private property? Then who owns the deer when someone hits them with a vehicle? I'm on both sides of the fence on this issue. I make more money on deer than cows per head. Should you be allowed to sell an animal that belongs to the public? And why should I have to feed a public resource? Just so someone can have fun killing the same animal?

 

[Jogeephus]

Who got the $390,000 for the deer tag?

 

[lavacarancher]

Interesting comments, Oneye. I think I would be upset if someone was shooting an animal (any animal) just to wound rather than harvest. I tried to teach my kids and grand kids that if they shot something they were going to eat it, don't care if it was a skunk. I don't know if it still in the Texas Parks and Wildlife regulations about shooting a deer doing damage on your property and letting it lay (not harvest). This, to me, seems like a waste of resource.

On the other side of the coin what do you think about wild feral hogs? They do millions of dollars worth of damage to private property in Texas every year. They "belong" to the state so what are the ethics about shooting them? You might argue that "we" are the state but don't think that would go very far in a court room. I'm not trying to be contrary, just trying to get a feeling about what others think about it.

About Mr. Bundy. I didn't hear any details on the two side of the issue. I heard rumors that our esteemed Senate leader at the time, Harry Reid, was trying to pull a fast one on a land grab but our media sure put that one down in a hurry.

 

[ram]

Who got the $390,000 for the deer tag?

I would bet a non-profit organization of some kind. With a well paid CEO.

 

[Oneye]

I have a couple of questions for you, who owns the deer? And then who owns the deer when their on private property? Then who owns the deer when someone hits them with a vehicle? I'm on both sides of the fence on this issue. I make more money on deer than cows per head. Should you be allowed to sell an animal that belongs to the public? And why should I have to feed a public resource? Just so someone can have fun killing the same animal?

The public always owns the wildlife in this country. Just because wildlife are on your land does not make them your property. That is what the entire basis of the North American model of wildlife consists of. As for selling animals that belong to the public, I don't agree with it in some ways, but do in others. In Utah the tags that are sold by non-profits that are given to them by the state must spend 90% of funds aquired from the tag on wildlife projects in the state, so the money does return to the public in this instance. Then on what are called CWMU's, where landowners enter into an agreement with the DWR to get a certain number of tags they can sale or keep for themselves, and then allow a certain number of public permits to hunt on their land within a certain time period of their choosing.

As for feeding a public resources, in the west I can say the same about cattle. Why should my tax dollars and the BLM and Forest Service see a $40 million dollar a year shortfall for public land grazing administration? Elk and deer are far more valuable on our public lands than cattle. My tax dollars should not be sidetracked to subsidize wellfare farmers private businesses. They get to profit off our public lands while they are in such undermanaged conditions? And then not get their grazing fees raised to a reasonable price that the BLM and FS don't have shortfalls in their budgets because of this? Another reason I get tired of this is that many of these landowners deal with these animals from November-April in my state when little to nothing is growing, and yet they want fair compensation even when they would not be getting any production out of the fields anyway. I get their needs to be some depredation tags, compensation, and hazing for animals that stay on property year round, but when the deer are only there because they came down to winter and you planted alfalfa on their winter range it is partly your problem as well. Sportsmen have long given, given, and given some more for cattlemen especially on public lands. Now I'm not saying landowners and cattlemen haven't been willing to work with us as well, but it's gotten to a point we are getting pretty divided and things are coming to a head.

A few years ago there was an individual who shot 5 bull elk, and quite a few does on his property. Elk tags on the unit he shot these bulls off of cost anywhere from $10,000-$30,000 to buy, or 16+ years to draw. He shot more elk than I will in 10 lifetimes in my state, and told the DWR to come and get them and wouldn't let them drive their vehicles on his property. His whole issue is the DWR purchased land that he wanted to purchase years before that and he was simply using the laws to get back at them. The DWR was trying their best to work with him and even had volunteers to haze the animals off his alfalfa daily, yet he was still being very difficult. I'm tired of this attitude.

These landowners who act as though they are picked on are given every chance to get help, and then make threats to DWR employees and volunteers if they want to get on their property and attempt to count for compensation or keep the animals off.

Who got the $390,000 for the deer tag?

The state gave it to a nonprofit sportsmen group that auctioned it off at the Western Hunting and Conservation expo. 30% of the proceeds are given back to the state wildlfie agency, 60% are used by the nonprofit on DWR approved projects, and 10% are retained for adminstrative costs of putting on the expo. Keep in mind there are many tags sold throughout Utah for deer, elk, bighorns, etc. that raise massive amounts of money. That was 1 deer tag for Antelope Island and it has sold for over $300,000 all of the last few years.

 

[Oneye]

Interesting comments, Oneye. I think I would be upset if someone was shooting an animal (any animal) just to wound rather than harvest. I tried to teach my kids and grand kids that if they shot something they were going to eat it, don't care if it was a skunk. I don't know if it still in the Texas Parks and Wildlife regulations about shooting a deer doing damage on your property and letting it lay (not harvest). This, to me, seems like a waste of resource.

On the other side of the coin what do you think about wild feral hogs? They do millions of dollars worth of damage to private property in Texas every year. They "belong" to the state so what are the ethics about shooting them? You might argue that "we" are the state but don't think that would go very far in a court room. I'm not trying to be contrary, just trying to get a feeling about what others think about it.

About Mr. Bundy. I didn't hear any details on the two side of the issue. I heard rumors that our esteemed Senate leader at the time, Harry Reid, was trying to pull a fast one on a land grab but our media sure put that one down in a hurry.

I fully agree with you about wasting an animal, it is completely wrong. If you're not going to use it you shouldn't be killing it. As for feral hogs, I do unerstand they can do a fair amount of damage. They are also not a native species to the land, but have become a part of the landscape. I do think if they are shot they should be utilized though. I imagine you can find enough people who would like to hunt them and harvest them for use if landowners are willing to give permission. Also this is a year round issue, not a temporary issue where the animals are wintering and will leave again in spring. Elk and deer are not nearly as destructive as a feral hog and don't eat much in a given time period,especially mule deer during winter. Feral hogs do real damage and it is a constant problem. I do believe in compensation or depredation processes in the situation of feral hogs.

As for Mr. Bundy if you get your information from the news, your just getting the argument with what channel you decide to watch. For Fox Mr. Bundy is a hero and stood up to the federal government and this land grab bull crap is a good idea. Bundy is a wellfare case that has been getting a free ride and hasn't paid a dime for grazing in decades. The BLM already overseen the land and Bundy chose to leave his cattle on the land and not pay. Think of it, this guy didn't pay property tax, for hay, for grazing fees, for water.....NOTHING. He got a free ride on the taxpayers dollars and on the public lands that belong to every American. The BLM finally after decades got fed up with trying to get him to pay and went to remove his cattle. It broke out into an all out war on the BLM and Federal govenrment and those who didn't want a crisis to go to waste have now been pushing hard for federal land transfers to the state ownership which would be an aboslute mess. Bundy is a shameful person, his cattle should be removed, and he should be sentenced to prison time. He essentially stole from every single American. A guy who states he "doesn't even recognize the federal government, as even existing," shows you the type of individual he is. Just because you want to ignore the law doesn't mean you get to evade it or the consequences that come along with it. People don't realize the positions these BLM, Forest Service, and wildlife managers are in. They have groups and people breathing down their necks from every direction. If it's not environmentalists threatening lawsuits, its pissed off grazers yelling at you. If it's not that its the rest of the American public criticizing the wild fire problems we have that have had decades to build up and yet it is the current land managers fault. If it's not them its the same politicians criticizing the agencies, voting to cut their budgets on a yearly basis. Guess what if you want the BLM and Forest Service to do their job..... START FUNDING THE DAMN AGENCIES.

 

[Dave]

There are reasons for battle with the BLM and Forest service. The main one is that you get college educated people who actually have no understanding of local conditions coming in and regulating people who have been on land for generations. That combined with government agencies that bow down to environmental groups because they fear being sued. So the agencies manage or mismanage the land they are in charge of in a way to appease the environmental groups. There have always been wild fires in the west. But over the last 15 -20 years they have become much more catastrophic. Much of the blame for this falls on the agencies which manage the land.

 

[Oneye]

There are reasons for battle with the BLM and Forest service. The main one is that you get college educated people who actually have no understanding of local conditions coming in and regulating people who have been on land for generations. That combined with government agencies that bow down to environmental groups because they fear being sued. So the agencies manage or mismanage the land they are in charge of in a way to appease the environmental groups. There have always been wild fires in the west. But over the last 15 -20 years they have become much more catastrophic. Much of the blame for this falls on the agencies which manage the land.

#1-These educated people you are criticizing usually do live in the area. I know all the Forest Service and BLM rangers in my area and they've lived here almost there entire life with the exception of the 4-6 years they went to school.
#2-The environmental groups get what they want because they fight for it in a civilized manner. Yelling at and threatening a BLM or FS officer is not how you get things done, and that is the path most people on the cattlemens side of the argument take. Defunding these agencies and voting for people who vote to defund them....is not how you get better management. Giving them a shortfall of $40 million a year is not how you get better management practices.
#3-these wildfires have been building up for well more than 15-20 years. We as a nation made the decision decades ago to suppress fire and now the people who have to deal with the results of that are being blamed. Current land managers are not the ones who suppressed fire for 50 years. We as a nation have learned from these fires that suppression is not the answer. The problem is their is 50+ years of overgrown forests ready to go up in flames. You can't turn back time and make things right. Now the FS and BLM do prescribed burns, thinking projects, etc. but their budgets are eaten up by fire costs and their funding has not been adequately increased to properly manage the land with the amount they have to spend on fire suppression. They are given a rotten egg and expected to make gold out of it. It is a failed system because of congress and those who decide we need to spend $700 billion on defense and less than $700 million on our own landscape. Our country has some issues of where our money goes and land management and conservation spending make up less than 1% of the federal budget, yet return $4 for every $1 spent. It's a completely flawed system.

 

[greybeard]

BLM, just like most federal alphabet agencies is just a power hungry egotistical bunch looking after their own self interest that cares little for the land, the water, the forage, the land owner, the cattle or anything else except to guarantee and prolong their own pitiful excuse of an existence. Harry Reid is/was their #1 fanboy and butt licker, but they have plenty more waiting in line to take his place.
How anyone (college educated or otherwise), can publicly crawl up those folk's butts and massage their prostrate is beyond me.

 

[Oneye]

BLM, just like most federal alphabet agencies is just a power hungry egotistical bunch looking after their own self interest that cares little for the land, the water, the forage, the land owner, the cattle or anything else except to guarantee and prolong their own pitiful excuse of an existence. Harry Reid is/was their #1 fanboy and butt licker, but they have plenty more waiting in line to take his place.
How anyone (college educated or otherwise), can publicly crawl up those folk's butts and massage their prostrate is beyond me.

Wow what a childish response. The BLM is given a terrible hand. Would you like to do their job? Would you like to be the officer/employee who has to find common ground between oil&gas, livestock grazers, hunters, environmentalists, politicians, lawmakers, etc.? You better look at the difficulty of their position before you name call like that. You have no clue the process or massive pain it is to do what they do. Just because they don't fully favor cattle grazing in every situation doesn't mean they are power hungry or don't care, it means they are being fair. There is cattle grazing, mining, oil and gas, hunting, recreation, and a ton of other activities that occur on their land every day. Sorry regulations that protect the land and water don't fit into your small mindset but they do a decent job for the hand they are dealt and most definitely for the budgets they are dealt. I'm glad you can repeat the bullcrap that's been handed down to you from generation to generation, but maybe you should look at the situation more objectively before passing judgement on something you only understand one side of.

 

[greybeard]

I understand both sides--I just don't agree with the govt's side and won't kiss their butts just to pretend to.

 

[Oneye]

I understand both sides--I just don't agree with the govt's side and won't kiss their butts just to pretend to.

I'm not exactly sure what you mean here? Kiss their butt how? Giving them credit for doing the job they are supposed to be doing (multiple use)? Land management can improve but it's going to take better funding for better management.

 

[TexasBred]

I understand both sides--I just don't agree with the govt's side and won't kiss their butts just to pretend to.

I'm not exactly sure what you mean here? Kiss their butt how? Giving them credit for doing the job they are supposed to be doing (multiple use)? Land management can improve but it's going to take better funding for better management.

Sounds like you and yours should be contacting your senators and representatives. According to what I found the BLM budget is $1.2 billion per year, yet the lands they manage produce over $5.5 billion per year in oil and gas revenue alone. :shock:

 

[Oneye]

Our national defense budget is $610 billion, that should put things into perspective as to how much as an agency managing million of acres of land is given. And yes they return $4 for every $1 they are given to spend. They are some of the hardest working dollars in the federal budget and account for less than 1% of our nations budget. Public land grazing causing an administrative loss of over $40 million a year......... why do tax payers have to pay for private individuals businesses they profit from? My point is since when is any government program that effective in returning revenue? Sportsmen contribute $646 billion to the economy every year and yet conservation and improvements of the places that cause all that revenue are given less than 1% of our nations budget. Does it seem wise to spend less than 1% of our budget on such an effective industry and money making agency? The BLM employ's over 10,000 people and manages over 245 million surface area of land. With such a relatively small budget in our nation they do a decent job. Much of that money gets spent on fighting wildfires. By having to spend more than half their annual budget on just wildfires it further backlogs projects they want to complete to improve the lands they manage. Yes our parks and federal land management agencies are not given the tools they need to succeed by congress and our representatives. Congress needs to treat wildfires as the national disasters they are and fund them appropriately. It should not be borrowed from the FS and BLM's annual budgets that are already strained to fight what is a natural disaster.

 

[greybeard]

I understand both sides--I just don't agree with the govt's side and won't kiss their butts just to pretend to.

I'm not exactly sure what you mean here? Kiss their butt how? Giving them credit for doing the job they are supposed to be doing (multiple use)? Land management can improve but it's going to take better funding for better management.

Sounds like you and yours should be contacting your senators and representatives. According to what I found the BLM budget is $1.2 billion per year, yet the lands they manage produce over $5.5 billion per year in revenue. :shock:

Or, the BLM could just be dissolved, all it's bureaucrats and employees turned loose to find civilian jobs and the ten$ of billion$ worth of land the feds stole from the states returned to those states. Last thing this country needs is more $money$ thrown at liberal burrowrats.

 

[Oneye]

Or, the BLM could just be dissolved, all it's bureaucrats and employees turned loose to find civilian jobs and the ten$ of billion$ worth of land the feds stole from the states returned to those states. Last thing this country needs is more $money$ thrown at liberal burrowrats.

Why don't you explain how they "stole" it? The states willlingly gave up the land and forever forfeited the designated lands within their borders. You obviously understand very little about the situation and have had your mind littered with right wing bullcrap. I look at both sides and decide which makes more sense. Public lands that are valuable to both our country and the public are not worthless lands and should be better taken care of by congress and our representatives.

 

[greybeard]

Riiiight! :roll:
Spoken like a true socialist and deep seated big govt liberal.
Obama would be proud of ya, as will be Bernie.

(Is it working--you finding any of that "common ground" you so desperately seek?)

 

[Dave]

Things which make the BLM so popular in the areas they work in..... how about when the locals put together a petition to remove a BLM manager and that petition is in a local store. An armed BLM security agent shows up at the store and threaten the store owner about the petition. Last I knew the constitution guaranteed the rights to petition the government about a grievance. Or recently with the Hammond case someone from a BLM computer on BLM time wrote comments to the website of a regional Ag newspaper about the case claiming to be a former BLM employee. The person who they claimed to be came forward to say they never wrote the comments. The BLM won't give up the person who did this or tell if anything was done about it. The whole Hammond case in itself is an absolute miscarriage of justice.
Do you not find it strange that 20 years ago nobody and I do mean nobody at the BLM and Forest Service felt it necessary to have armed guards but they do now. And it is because of how they have treated people. They have been systematically shutting down the economy in many western towns.

 

[Jogeephus]

If my math is right that's one employee for 24,500 acres. I'm in land management and that's a pretty light work load if you ask me. That's interesting.