Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting MT's 6 month Elk season

Well, for Cow Elk. Start Aug 15th (with rifles) and hunt thru Feb. 15th in many units. All this 'cause the Elk have learned to hide on private, un-huntable land during the regular season and, after these same landowners complain to the F&G about crop damage GUESS WHAT???? The F&G obligingly says "We have too many cows --- let's wipe 'em out."

I'm wondering, if this fails to decimate the Elk population: will we get to hunt cows while they're calving? Would we need two tags? A veal tag? How about no tag at all --- Elk could just be classified as varmints.

I guess that the wolves are not doing a satisfactory job!! memtb

Save the elk. Herd them over the hill to Idaho where we'll protect them.

If in fact there are to many females, it matters not if they are shot pregnant, before, after having babies etc... you are simply trying to have less numbers of reproductive.

I can't comment to the validity of intelligence of your f/g dept though.

Here in TX we are typical, they've made some really great decisions, and some really dumb ones. Luckily they have realized the dumb ones before it was to late and re-mediated the issues

Yeah. I wrote the F&G my thoughts and problems with it. Everyone else must have been writing the opposite since everything I wrote against was implemented.

But then I am one man and no one knows me nor do I have a big bank account.

There was 89% opposition in the public comment period to this, yet the department decided to press onward with the beginning of elkapolypse. Due to the vast influence of large private landowners and politicians, we can treat elk in MT like diamonds AND pests, depending on the time of year and where they are standing. This comes at complete expense to the elk hunters who enjoy seeing/hunting elk on public land. This will result in a much bigger impact to elk in Montana, than wolves ever have.

It is easy to be critical, but you could count on your fingers the elk population in Montana in the 1960's. Now everyone is complaining we have too many elk. It is easy to see that even if you don't agree with elk management, they have thrived in Montana over the past few decades, where the wolf population isn't too great...

The big problem, per usual, is that Montana's game department is ultimately controlled by politics.

"Too many" animals of whatever species has always meant too many for landowners to tolerate. However, one state legislator is an outfitter who managed to keep the shoulder season out of the game unit where he operates.

Horsefeathers

6 of us killed 6 Bulls a year for 5 years running in the Bitterroot ---- starting in 1968. Guess we got them all.

And EVERYONE is NOT complaining about too many Elk. Some large landowners are complaining. Most of these landowners allow ZERO public hunting (maybe a hunting lease).

If one of these landowners stops suddenly, FG has crap all over their faces.

Is that so?

This is similar here in Wy. In this valley they start hunting on limited permit Aug.15th. I know one unit goes til the end of Jan. maybe longer..

NM has the same issues. In private, most ranchers I know will tell you they don't mind the elk due to the income they produce. In public meetings they will jump up and down about how they hate the elk and the state needs to do something about it. In return they receive more authorizations and walk out happy as can be.

Unfortunately, until elk aren't worth what they are the divide between LO's and hunters will never be closed.

Just the opposite in CAL. If we have a good year in a zone Fish and Game shortens the season there next year. The member of the fish and game commissioned just resigned because he said he could not stand the politics of the board and how badly they treated the sportsmen and women of California. Do I need to mention that members on the board are all political appointees. Nobody in the upper eschelons of the fish and game have the hair to fight back some of the BS these people are up to.

Sorry I wasn't specific enough on exactly who is complaining about elk, but there are plenty of people that are affected by larger numbers than we ever had in the 1960's. If you can't tell there are more elk in Montana now, than there were in the 1960's you are blind.

Management of wildlife resources in Montana by FWP, does leave many wondering where they come up with their ideas, then after public input to make the changes they do. I am only thankful that through this bureaucratic ignorance, we are complaining about having so many more elk problems than we ever dreamed of 40-50 years ago...

Would you prefer to have the numbers that MT had in the 1960s?

Funny that some landowners try all hunting season to keep the elk in, and the public out.
Then cry for the FWP to keep the elk from eating their haystacks after the outfitting lease is up.

Elk numbers in the bitterroot were severely affected by wolves a few years back. That has been remedied a bit. Likewise the area around Gardiner, and some areas in northern Montana have been hit very hard by wolves. Over all though,much of the state has a very large number of elk that live,largely, on private ground, and cultivated fields. They need to be thinned a bit,and you can't make large,rich , out of state landowners,shoot them,if they don't want to. Then the neighbors and their hay stacks suffer for it. There is no perfect fix. I'm no fan of many of fwp s decisions,but this is working OK. I do agree that they should get it done quicker and not drag it out 6months. Also,if there are landowners that don't allow hunters on during the season,they should not expect help from fwp with fencing and damage hunts later on.

Oh really? Please supply us with a verifiable cite...

The recent meetings I attended where public comment was taken on the elk 'shoulder seasons', it looked like just about a 50/50 split to me based on the testimony given.

IMO, this is a real problem in all the states I've lived/hunted in. But the real problem is people don't get fully informed about their political candidates before they vote on them. And in most states, the F&G departments are overseen by a board of commissioners with overlapping terms that are appointed by different governors. So the professionals in the agency are consistently getting batted back and forth from one political end of the spectrum to the other.

Under public involvement section..

http://fwp.mt.gov/doingBusiness/ins...nda.html?coversheet&topicId=35774222