Time to Legalize High Fence Hunting in Manitoba??

umchorn2

umchorn2

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For a majority of us who have lived and hunted in Manitoba you will have seen the quality and quantity of hunting opportunities steadily decrease over the years, especially for big game like moose, elk and deer. It is now a fact that a licensed hunter in manitoba will have to wait about 9 years for an elk opportunity and may never have the opportunity to legally harvest a moose.

It is now more obvious than ever, how desperately we need change in how we manage our wildlife/hunting. From the incompetent goverment managers and their inability to protect and grow our herds to the unlicensed and uncontrolled free for all harvest of wildlife by so called rights based hunters like the Metis, to the thousands of animals killed by vehicle collsions year after year, Manitoba is now without question the worst run province in terms of wildlife management...including fisheries, while ontario is a close second.

I cannot help but bring up the facts that private landowners, many of whom are longtime hunters and conservationists along with the tens millions of dollars that hunters would contribute to preserving animals under controlled conditions would alleviate the incredible stress caused by the unsustainably high harvest rates both illegal and legal of many of our wild cervid species in particular as well as the irresponsible policies set by provincial game managers.

There is no doubt that a big game closure of all cervids in Manitoba is imminent unless we decide against such measures but we first must conclude that the only way we can assure our love of all things wild is forever preserved and protected, is under our own direct control and supervision as hunters, landowners, and conservationists.
 
High fence, like an enclosure........doesn't seem very fair chase or am I missing something. Certainly controlling the amount of animals taken needs to be addressed but high fencing doesn't sound like a natural way of managing the game. High fences sound better suited for zoos IMOP.
 
You know what I find crazy.. Even I could go get my Metis card, and I never even met the family member that was "Metis." Why should that entitle me to anything?
I also know a girl that is adopted and somehow got a Metis card using her adopted father as her biological father..
It's Ridiculous..
When they say they want equality.. I can't help but think, so do I.
 
Funny how some can pant a whole race of people with a tainted brush, but those same people don't like the brush touching themselves.

Nothing wrong with a discussion on game management, but when it starts attacking a race and lifestyle of said race it stepping into dangerous territory.

How many people knew their ancestor that moved to Canada and became Canadian, and why should that entitle you to anything?


I'm outta here before it turns ugly, which it will if those being insulted take offense.
 
bearkilr said:
We don't need high fenced hunting, we need to get rid of the NDP. After that, we can work on regulation changes in regard to FN/Metis. The current government has no interest in the well being of our wildlife.
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FN hunting has nothing to do with the Provincial government its a federal treaty
 
umchorn2 said:
For a majority of us who have lived and hunted in Manitoba you will have seen the quality and quantity of hunting opportunities steadily decrease over the years, especially for big game like moose, elk and deer. It is now a fact that a licensed hunter in manitoba will have to wait about 9 years for an elk opportunity and may never have the opportunity to legally harvest a moose.

It is now more obvious than ever, how desperately we need change in how we manage our wildlife/hunting. From the incompetent goverment managers and their inability to protect and grow our herds to the unlicensed and uncontrolled free for all harvest of wildlife by so called rights based hunters like the Metis, to the thousands of animals killed by vehicle collsions year after year, Manitoba is now without question the worst run province in terms of wildlife management...including fisheries, while ontario is a close second.

I cannot help but bring up the facts that private landowners, many of whom are longtime hunters and conservationists along with the tens millions of dollars that hunters would contribute to preserving animals under controlled conditions would alleviate the incredible stress caused by the unsustainably high harvest rates both illegal and legal of many of our wild cervid species in particular as well as the irresponsible policies set by provincial game managers.

There is no doubt that a big game closure of all cervids in Manitoba is imminent unless we decide against such measures but we first must conclude that the only way we can assure our love of all things wild is forever preserved and protected, is under our own direct control and supervision as hunters, landowners, and conservationists.
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High fence, high density populations proved devastating in Alberta where disease ran rampant through their captive elk and bison herds.

PS I have got Elk tags 3 out of the last 5 years, I have only been applying for 5 years
 
It seems extreme, but in the long run it may be the only way to preserve some of our cervids. It has worked and worked well in places like South Africa and Namibia. But we are not talking farmer Joe with some moose in his fenced in 500 acres. Thousands of acres privately managed and protected is different. Unfortunately, most of us couldn't afford a hunt at a place like this anyway.
 
Gillshot said:
It seems extreme, but in the long run it may be the only way to preserve some of our cervids. It has worked and worked well in places like South Africa and Namibia. But we are not talking farmer Joe with some moose in his fenced in 500 acres. Thousands of acres privately managed and protected is different. Unfortunately, most of us couldn't afford a hunt at a place like this anyway.
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remove paying hunters in RSA and SWA and i want to see how long before working well will last ...
 
You'd be farther ahead by giving the landowners more rights to the animals on their land. Give them first crack at what animals there are; and transferrable landowner tags to sell. If you can only get an elk licence every nine years, neither can he. That probably seems fine to the "If I can't have it nobody can have it" crowd, but that isn't the whole story. The whiner can't do anything about it, but when a landowner decides that the crop damage, fence damage and habitat he preserved isn't worth it he can start clearing bush, draining sloughs, changing cropping practices, inviting "extra curricular hunters" and otherwise making sure that there will never be another elk on his land. Conversely, if he gets his own tag automatically to use or give to his son or nephew, and another one to sell for whatever he can get, all of a sudden those elk are a prized asset. That bush can stay, a bit of alfalfa here and there is looking better and say some peas over by the bush. Everything likes peas. Next thing you know there's more elk than there were before, and they spread and the once every 9 years hunter is a once every 7 year or every 3 year hunter. Market being what it is, hunters will pay more for a chance at bigger and older bulls so he wants to let them grow. Elk are elk, and a big 6 pointer walks out in front of Joe Average somewhere else.

Or to shorten it up considerably, let the landowners have their piece first and the pie will get a lot bigger.
 
Dogleg said:
You'd be farther ahead by giving the landowners more rights to the animals on their land. Give them first crack at what animals there are; and transferrable landowner tags to sell. If you can only get an elk licence every nine years, neither can he. That probably seems fine to the "If I can't have it nobody can have it" crowd, but that isn't the whole story. The whiner can't do anything about it, but when a landowner decides that the crop damage, fence damage and habitat he preserved isn't worth it he can start clearing bush, draining sloughs, changing cropping practices, inviting "extra curricular hunters" and otherwise making sure that there will never be another elk on his land. Conversely, if he gets his own tag automatically to use or give to his son or nephew, and another one to sell for whatever he can get, all of a sudden those elk are a prized asset. That bush can stay, a bit of alfalfa here and there is looking better and say some peas over by the bush. Everything likes peas. Next thing you know there's more elk than there were before, and they spread and the once every 9 years hunter is a once every 7 year or every 3 year hunter. Market being what it is, hunters will pay more for a chance at bigger and older bulls so he wants to let them grow. Elk are elk, and a big 6 pointer walks out in front of Joe Average somewhere else.

Or to shorten it up considerably, let the landowners have their piece first and the pie will get a lot bigger.
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There are special land owner tags but they are not saleable or transferable
 
Seems there is considerable opposition to protecting large populations of animals using fence. I hope these members opposed to such management techniques are prepared to forego their hunting opportunities once each and every species is under draw or closed. And since landowners are under no obligations to grant hunting permission, don't be surprised when you find yourself unable to locate a hunting spot without the use of a cessna aircraft and a week of your time.

And, with 195,000 people in Manitoba who self identified as aboriginals, (78,830 of that being Metis), growing at 4 times the rest of the Manitoba population (2011 Statcan), Manitoba now has 14% of their 1.282 million peolple who can hunt without license or limit at any time they wish. Perhaps these rights could be extended to all Manitobans? Nobody could claim then that things would not be equal. Do you see the problem now "cleftwynd"?

As for the gentleman "razorbeck" that claimed to have been drawn for elk 3 out of the last 5 years in Manitoba...this isn't the case for the majority of applicants. Just because you drew a tag, it doesn't mean there are a sufficient number of animals. Governments sell more tags than there are animals, which they then claim provides increased opportunities. Real wildlife managers grow herds before they take such measures. Only additional animals can provide added opportunities. Did you apply for elk draw as a landowner? There is a trend in Manitoba and it seems that draw opportunities are going toward resident landowner tags.

Gentlemen, don't let pride and morality cloud judgement and reason. Fencing large productive areas of habitat to prevent poaching and losses from vehicle collisions (which can top 10,000 annually according to MPI and cost many human lives) is not only intelligent, it's practical. No more farmers complaining they lost a few bushels of grain or a couple hundred domestic animals province wide.

It also makes it much easier to monitor and control diseases including chronic wasting disease as these animals are already contained any outbreams are already quarantined. This also addresses "razorbeck's" assertion that high fenced elk and bison in Alberta had a rampant epidemic because of high fence. This couldn't be farther from the truth. Wild populations of animals have a much higher prevalence of disease and this includes bovine tuberculosis and CWD. A few cases of CWD in a captive herd that was contained in a very short period of time is hardly an epidemic. However CWD in wild herds of bame across Alberta and Saskatchewan spread across a huge geograpic range and affecting multiplt herds sounds more alarming to me.

If we hunters and landowners aren't the ones to protect and conserve our wildlife, who will? A fence is just a reasonable response to a confluence of factors that have gotten out of control and put the future of wildlife and hunting in jeopardy and called into question current accepted game management practices within Manitoba.

Is that so wrong, come on?
 
I am opposed to the further commercialization and private/commercial "ownership" of animals. I don't believe we need to, or should want to, follow the African or European models.
 
1899 said:
I am opposed to the further commercialization and private/commercial "ownership" of animals. I don't believe we need to, or should want to, follow the African or European models.
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Bingo!! THIS^^^. First of all,the South African and European models are not "high fence" operations. African game parks are hundreds of thousands of square miles which aren't fenced,at all,as opposed to hundreds of thousands of acres,at the very most, which would be the largest we could ever expect in this country from sheer cost,alone. Europeans are more into exceedingly strict supervised hunting on private property where game managers show a hunter which animal they want taken,specifically. Try to "sell" a high-fence operation to anti-hunters is an absolute impossibility. We may as well put a gun to our heads. They have the juice to drive the anti-hunting agenda. Something like this would make them all absolutely apoplectic. We would be handing them the most valuable weapon of all,that being fuel to ignite a normally blase public into a political frenzy which,given the current left wing reactionary crew in Ottawa and most provinces,would more than likely drive the elimination of most forms of hunting and firearms ownership in all forms quicker than we could blink.
The general public wouldn't be the only opponents either. The very vast majority of hunters find the concept of high fence hunting immoral,unethical,repugnant,dishonest and dishonorable.
 
I don't know how I feel about this - but will agree that at some future point (just hopefully not in my lifetime) it may be the only form of hunting.

I have Texas ranch hunted for deer (brother-in-law lives down there and we went out during a visit).

While it's not exactly "caged animals" (the ranch we were at was a few thousand acres) the deer were just kinda all over the place.

We sat in a (solid/wood) ground blind, the deer wandered back and forth. We each picked out a buck.

When the deer were shot, the guys came and got them with a Gator - took them back to the main building - measured the racks/weighed the deer, looked on a chart and figured out the "cost".

Now, if you have absolutely no where to hunt and nothing to hunt even if you had a spot I guess this was "better than nothing".

But coming from the reality of hunting for years on either crown or private land, observing fair chase, and often going home "without any game" (which is part of hunting), this just seemed like "production line killing".

It's one thing to pay to use/hunt land - it's something else to also have them "supply the deer" (or whatever animal). These things were "fed" (hay trucks, feed etc) and lived their whole life "inside the fence" - they weren't truly "wild animals".

So while I tried it, mostly for the experience, it just never sat completely "right" with me and glad, that at least for now, it's "not the way it is", at least up here.
 
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