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35% NR Cap Poll

OneCam

OneCam

Well-Known Member
Please be sure to vote your opinion regarding the current 35% Cap for Non Resident Iowa Bowhunters on the entrance page

Currently there is a cap of NR tag allocation for NR bowhunters of 35%. This infact mandates that no more than 35% of the NR tags can be allotted bowhunters. For example if 7,000 NR bowhunters apply for tags and 6,000 gun hunters apply - Bowhunters would draw 2,100 tags for a 30% success rate and NR Gun hunters would draw 3,900 tags
for a 65% success rate.

Would also like to here your thoughts discussion here as well.
 
Using the numbers in your example, if the cap is lifted, we would have about a 46% success rate for both the bowhunters and the gunhunters. That equates to about 1,131 more bowhunters and fewer gunhunters. While the number sounds high, it is only about 11 more hunters per county on an average during the bow season (and 11 fewer during gun). I'll start some thoughts and discussion and list a couple of reasons why to NOT have the cap. What are some other pros or cons to lifting the cap?

1. This small number of more bowhunters is no big deal.

2. If we are fearfull of the non-res taking too many deer, the bowhunters have a lower success rate than the gunners.

3. Quit discriminating against our fellow bowhunters.
 
150,
I look at it a differnt way. The 1131 extra bowhunters are probably not spread out evenly across the state. Instead they are going to be mostly concentrated in lets say the best 45 counties at a rate of 90% of the total 1131. So, that gives us 1018 bohunters per the 45 counties for a total of 23 per county. Then you take into consideration that those 23 guys/gals have a chance of getting onto 50%(which I think Is high) of the total hunting land in the County. Then your average doubles.

I guess you could crunch the numbers any way you want. To me though, it would end up giving the Out-of State bowhunter a lesser Iowa bowhunting experiance on average. If you go by the theory that most non-residence bowhunters either hunt public land or hunt with an outfitter(non resident landowners are excluded of course).
 
But bow season is 8 weeks long compared to a one week gun season. Not all the "extra" bowhunters will be in Iowa at the same time. Most will hunt in November but not all.

The last time I crunched the numbers the bowhunters were receiving the max 35%. I can't believe any one would vote to support the current 35% cap but a lot of you are after looking at the poll. Why?

Better yet, why not just have bow tags and gun tags? Just set the number of each and forget the percentage.

Tim
 
Tim,
They may not be in Iowa at the same time, but we all know that the more a spot gets hunted the lower your chances are at tagging out. The added pressure during bow season could then decrease your chances.

Here is one reason some may vote for it. If your a gun hunter, by removing the cap you would decrease your chances of getting drawn.
 
Stats are useless when your favorite public honey hole gets crowded. I think all Iowans should have the inalienable right to find a quality trophy bowhunt with a little effort. As a reformed Minnesotan, (been down here over a decade) I know I am living in pig paradise and selfishly enjoy as much elbow room during my annual rut vacation as possible and as long as possible. Would prefer more NR bowhunters, however than more total NR buck hunters. Keep the cap on please.
 
Couldn't disagree more but at least you're honest.

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I think all Iowans should have the inalienable right to find a quality trophy bowhunt with a little effort.

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I think the liitle effort part is where a lot of guys are having the problem.
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Tim
 
vman, your math is off a little. It is 36 square miles per township not county. Cass county were I hunt has 16 townships. I say the bow cap should be done away with, and I gun hunt.
 
I tend to lean toward keeping the cap. My vote in the poll was undecided but it seems to me that the cap has a real function of creating a balance across the seasons and if a combo tag where put in place I believe gun hunters may fill their doe tags with more ease and therefore increase NRs contribution to herd management.
 
Is it a 36 mile square or 36 square miles?

Maybe calling it a 65% gun cap would remove some of the confusion. Any time I hear or read "cap" I think it is inplace to restrict, not ensure. In this case the 35% bow "cap" is inplace to ensure 35% of NR licenses are bow, not restrict it to 35%. Have I got it right?

The 'Bonker
 
Non-residents come to Iowa for the experience of hunting big whitetails. As Vman said, if we lift the cap the quality will diminish dramatically. Nonres bowhunters have a much greater effect on the numbers of trophy deer than shotgunners would. I stand behind keeping the cap.
 
wibirdhunter - You are correct. 55,875 square miles of Iowa are land areas (plus another few hundred square miles of water area).

vman - In the 45 counties using 90% you would have more like one extra hunter per 25 square miles, about 1/15th of your example (.04/square mile instead of .6), but my math should be checked and I hesitate to put this in here.

Most of our hesitation to allow more NR bowhunters is fear of the unknown and the human nature paranoia, some justified and some not.
 
I can see both sides to this debate, but have to agree that more NR bow hunters would mean fewer does harvested...bottomline
 
Fishbonker - actually as I understand this 35% is the maximum (not minimum) number of tags that can be allotted to NR bowhunters. In other words currently NR gun hunters are receive no less than 65% of the tags with potential for more.
 
Good points and good discussion. But, I still look at the math and say big deal! As for the doe harvest part of this, using my extra 1,100 or so bow hunters and vman's 90% in 45 counties and assuming that all NR's have 100% success and the bowhunters shoot only bucks and the gunhunters shoot 50% does, then you would have about 11 fewer does per county shot and we all know that there is not 100% success nor do we think that 100% of either hunting group kills mostly does. We are talking fractions of fractions of those 11 does per county.

This cap thing in my mind does not play into to the management of our herd. The amount that it does is hardly measurable.
 
Boy its been a long week. I thought that was rather large. Thanks for clearing that up.
 
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Non-residents come to Iowa for the experience of hunting big whitetails. As Vman said, if we lift the cap the quality will diminish dramatically. Nonres bowhunters have a much greater effect on the numbers of trophy deer than shotgunners would. I stand behind keeping the cap

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i agree

the DNR said last year that the deer herd numbers were improving, and that results wouldn't appear overnight. the plan they have in place, needs a couple more years to show actuall results. i think NOTHING should change. doe tags in problem areas will increase, and tags in area with high harvests may decrease. this fluctuation will help keep the herd in check. more anysex tags, especially for the non-res. would most likely result in more bucks harvested, and that isn't solving anything
 
NR's only make up 2% of all deer hunters in Iowa. Therefore NR bowhunters only make up 0.7% of the total deer hunters. I think it would be safe safe to the NR bowhunter harvest isn't even statistcally significant in the final harvest numbers.

Tim
 
I don't think its the harvest by NR hunters but the land/hunting ground they could potentially control through direct leasing or outfitter leasing.

The 'Bonker
 
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I don't think its the harvest by NR hunters but the land/hunting ground they could potentially control through direct leasing or outfitter leasing.

The 'Bonker

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BINGO
 
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