Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Alaska Is this the present law?

2nd degree kinship and new hunting restriction?

http://www.adn.com/article/20160411/guided-hunting-industry-rewards-itself-through-alaska-board-game

Money always talks.

That was a hatchet job editorial by Mark Richards and fortunately Nate Turner was overwhelmingly chosen to sit on the board for another term.
The Alaska Board of Game is not, and never has been, beholden to any special intrest group. Which is why at times virtually every special intrest group from the Alaska Professional Hunters assoc, to Native corporations and village councils, and various other groups like the Moose Foundation and Mark Richard's group has their proposals rejected.

Even Alaska Fish & Game often has it's proposals turned down.

If you want to see NR sheep harvest numbers go down drop the guide requirement. I understand the difficulty in judging a full curl by a novice but if a NR wants to hunt sheep without a guide then require a mandatory class before issuance of a tag. The class can cover judging what is and isn't legal and can scare the beejesus out of what will happen should a sub legal animal be taken. The guide requirements for some animals is a defacto subsidy of the guide industry and is in no way a guarantee that the laws will be followed. It's ridiculous on its face that a non resident isn't capable of hunting some species but a NR guide is an acceptable alternative.

ADF&G is absolutely influenced by the APHA. Area 2 black bear is a prime example. No science was used in making that decision but rather emotion and $$. It's no secret that APHA makes the rules in many cases and anyone that says otherwise is either misinformed, delusional or outright lying.

I fail to see how requiring nonresidents to hire a guide results in higher harvests. I would like to hunt brown bears, dall sheep and mountain goats in Alaska. I'm a nonresident hunter in Alaska, but I can't afford $10,000-$15,000 for the guide. So I'm priced out of the system for those species. I suspect that there would be a lot more nonresidents hunting those species if we could do so without a guide.

I guess that some people think that nonresidents couldn't find sheep, goats or brown bears without a guide. I disagree with that idea. I know several places to find brown bears, dall sheep, and mountain goats and I would have hunted them if not for the guide requirement.

I don't think that there is anything new about allowing a relative of the second degree of kinship to act as a guide, and thereby eliminating the requirement to hire a guide. That requirement has not changed since I started hunting in Alaska in 1987.

The new requirements (hunt only every 4 years and relative gives up his license) only make it harder for nonresidents. They make it better for guides by eliminating some nonresidents as competition.

KC

KC, you actually believe that NRs would kill as many critters without guides? On the average?

Regardless, I'm not thinking the guide requirement is rooted in a desire for increased NR success.

I don't believe it is. It's rooted from my understanding to keep from wanton waste of game.

Brown bears go down easy, sometimes, other times you have to wonder if you need a 500 h&h or a RPG

wounded bears can be hard to recover. they are a valuable resource to the state and the guide industry

sheep hunting can be dangerous and easy to kill sub legal sheep

same with goat hunting, maybe more so than sheep to the danger aspect.


I believe the "reasoning" the state uses to require a guide for those species is to keep from losing animals to wounds rather than clean kills and to keep from losing hunters in difficult terrain.


there's been efforts in the past to do the same thing with moose.


it's a real dilemma, I know guys that live outside that are way more qualified to hunt those species on their own than residents that have lived here from anywhere to 1 year to 30 years.


but it definitely works to the guide industry's favor, which is not necessarily a bad thing.


but still it's a shame for the guys that are qualified to hunt but don't have the fund to obtain guide and services.

Lots of truth there, Randy. Well stated!

I can only think of one thing to add, that being the fact that guided hunting does help to spread the traffic around a bit. Guides can take you into country that you might not otherwise access due to a variety of logistical problems, or do it better at less cost.

those are salient points too Mark

I've been on both sides of the coin.

can really relate to a hard hunting, accomplished outdoorsman that wants to hunt any of those 3 species but just can't stomach the coin to pay for one of those hunts at the expense of his family.

and I've guided guys when I was doing that gig that many of them couldn't have done it on their own.

also guided some gents that could, man I enjoyed hunting with them instead of for them.


any of us that live and hunt here know this country can be mighty unforgiving (re; the thread you posted)


it would take the wisdom of Solomon (which I don't possess) to decide who's fit to hunt here on their own and who's not.

have also done enough hunting remote on my own or with pards that realize getting to good game country ain't cheap.

KK,

To the best of my knowledge, the new regulations will not go into effect until July 1, 2016, so it is not yet the "present" law, although it will be very soon.

As to nonresident sheep, if I am not mistaken all nonresident sheep hunters will be restricted to one sheep every 4 regulatory years, not just nonresidents accompanied by resident 2nd degree of kindred as I believe the article you posted indicates.

As to the second new regulation, this was taken directly from the ADF&G/BOG website:

"Brown bears, mountain goats, and sheep taken by nonresidents that are personally accompanied by resident relatives within the second-degree of kindred will count towards the bag limit of both the resident relative and the nonresident. Implementation of this is expected to occur between now and July 1, 2018, the exact implementation date will be noticed in the hunting regulations and other materials."

IMHO, this regulation was proposed by APHA without any documented biological reason the regulation change will benefit wildlife populations. I fail to see that it accomplishes anything other than punishing the resident hunter who hunts with a nonresident family member. In full disclosure, I have a daughter who essentially grew up in Alaska ( she was 7 when we moved here, and was 22 when she left last year), but found employment out of state after finishing college. She is an avid hunter and fisher, and we've talked about her hunting goats and brown bears with her (resident) brother and I. Now we can't without either myself or my son punching one of our tags as well, and frankly, unless someone can show me a valid biological benefit to the wildlife populations for this I think it's absolute BS. It strikes me that, if APHA could point to an actual biological necessity for the regulation change, the nonresident guided harvest levels should have been reduced as well, but I didn't see that anywhere in the regulation changes.

Chris

I agree. My take has been that it's been more about safety of the NR hunters than anything else. Sheep hunting takes one into dangerous terrain, brown bear hunting takes one into a potentially dangerous situation.

I never thought of the wanton waste angle, but it makes sense too. My brown bear was killed just "down the road a piece" and probably less than 100 yrds or so off the roadway (I closed within 40yrds before shooting). Due to the vehicle restrictions off roadway and the fact the bastid died in a muckhole, recovery was one of the longest and hardest 5 hours I've ever spent. In addition to the muckhole and tangled alders, a storm blew in with 40kt winds and rain.

I was sorry I didn't shoot him on a nice day, on flat, solid ground 20ft from a pickup. About the only thing in my favor, was I was able to to put the hide and skull on a tarp and drag it down hill to the road.

I've killed deer on the same mountain top, not 100 yards from where we've killed goats. \

No guide was needed for the deer, but would have been for the goats. That made no sense to me.

I get the idea behind some of it. I get the money likely behind most of it.

But then again I'm not likely to try to tackle something without a lot of research to see if I can do it.

Its why we cancelled a Kotz hunt years ago as I decided that my inlaws that wanted to go, needed a test.. the test was CO wilderness area.. walk in only. It turned out not good....

But I often wonder about the parts where you can kill something next to something else, same exact area, but one legal and the otehr illegal for whatever supposed reason.

OTOH its not like you couldn't get in trouble hunting deer either...but they are legal.

I certainly believe you and you can have grizzlies show up in your back yard too but it's not a productive way to hunt.
Using isolated examples to prove a point is something National Public Radio does quite often to sway people to their side, but it proves nothing. Ask 95% of goat hunters if they think goat hunting is as easy and safe as deer hunting !

The entire issue the F&G has to to face in order to regulate hunters and attempt to protect the game populations are more complicated than most realize. On top of that they have to respond to public and political pressure, which all too often trumps biology.

I hunted bear and could have taken a full curl ram and a large old Billy goat all in that same "extremely dangerous" area. Good thing I only had a BB tag or I could've died chasing sheep or goats. Lolol

I can climb any of the mountains, including Denali without a guide and can do anything I want in the sheep and goat haunts except hunt them.

The law has nothing and I repeat NOTHING to do with the states magnanimous concern for NR safety and everything to do with NR $$ money. The APHA owns ADF&G.

A once in a lifetime draw for NR's for the "big three" would also decrease pressure. Currently a rich man could go north once a year a take the big three each time. If the resources are finite then allowing NR's the opportunity to buy their trophies year after year isn't a smart management approach. I don't understand why a NR should be allowed any more than one of each in a lifetime. Once again the "science" is trumped by APHA and greed.

I'm not talking about my backyard or NPR. I'm talking about a big [bleep] mountain.

So long as the guides get their money, all is good is what I take from this.

Honestly, who gives a [bleep], ask 60% of the public if Obama is a good president, is that the deciding factor? Accommodating the lowest common denominator? So I've hunted the same frigging mountain for 10 years, but because I moved out of state for 2 years, suddenly I need a guide? Is that the sheit you're slinging?

I know, an NPR example.

I forgot, how do you make the majority of your money?