Iowa Whitetail Forums

[Primosguy]

I’m not saying that at all but what I am saying is MO could allow zero NR licenses and the access for MO residents to private ground would not get much better if any. I don’t believe that the farms IF let go by the AR hunters would not be leased up again. The numbers I am referring to are on the tag and harvest data charts letemgrow posted. 10 less R tags for each one NR increase. If the AR hunters can draw every other year you think they are going to let the lease go? I’m local to the state and I have lost far more permission from locals locking it down than I have from NR leases. No doubt different area of the state but eliminating 100% of the NR tags is not going to greatly open access in several parts of the state. I do think there would be some net gain to the public pressure. My guess is the AR hunters will stagger their draws within their group to keep leases if it comes to a draw system. And what I am saying is the access issue is because of people locking down ground to improve their hunting experience and that is BOTH NR AND R.

I agree, if the MDC stopped over the counter tags and the AR hunters gave up the leases they definitely would get leased again. My point is that they would in turn get leased by residents, thus granting more access to resident hunters. I also agree there could be some strategic staggering of hunting parties to make sure one member a year got to hunt, etc. and would entice them to keep the lease. All valid points. I'd be interested in limiting the tags and dividing them into gun/archery and making them pick one or the other. That way at least there would be reduced pressure in each season. At the end of the day I do agree with what you're saying and I'm not blaming the NR. But access is limited due to the fact that it is based on land, and there's only so much of it. Introducing an additional 80k NR hunters or whatever that number is to that dynamic by default would cause some people to lose access bc again, there's only so much land.