Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game Open Letter to the Colorado DOW

I started hunting and fishing in Colorado in 1980. I hunted small game, elk, deer, antelope, and waterfowl.

I was killing maybe 30 or 40 ducks a season. Then Colorado came out with its own state duck stamp. I quit duck hunting and old Chessie never retrieved another duck.

I used to kill a lot of pheasant, having access to some of the best private property in SE Colorado. One year, I found out my recently-purchase small game license was no good until I took a mandatory survey. I took the survey, but I never bought another small game license. My old GSP was getting old by then, so he probably didn't mind too much.

I continued to fish, and hunt elk, deer, antelope, and occasionally bear.

When that idiot clinton, closed off a lot of jeep trails, I stopped hunting elk, after watching a small 6x6 walk by at about 40 yards. No way, I was going to haul him out on a pack.

I then hunted only deer and bear. I received a notice the other day, that unless you buy a DOW product the previous year, you will get hit with a $25.00 "no draw" fee (fine?) on top of the $3.00 application fee.

Well that did it for me. Over the years, I killed a nice 6x7 bull, an uneven 5 muley, and a nice color-phase bear.

But enoughs, enough. Apparently, government agencies are now borrowing from the practises of private business's that were ruled illegal (bundling, unreasonable fees, etc.)

I wonder if PETA has infiltrated their management. I suspect their new policies will do more to hurt hunting, than anything PETA has accomplished.

Well no longer my problem. Thanks for the memories.

I hear what you are saying, but you and I don't see eye to eye on much. For instance:

"I stopped hunting elk, after watching a small 6x6 walk by at about 40 yards. No way, I was going to haul him out on a pack."

I am 51, and I will still be packing them out as long as I can. Packed one about 2 miles down a steep hill last fall, and that one was a cow! And when I get too old to do it on my back, I can always use horses (as I am going to do this fall)

If a stamp charge here and a $25 drawing fee there keeps you from hunting, so be it, but as a nonresident, I have to pay many times over what you pay just to buy the tag. Yep, hunting in your state is tending toward becoming a rich man's sport (at least for nonresidents) but I will keep coming as long as I am able. And all you have to do to avoid the $25 charge is buy a licese each year, somthing I do anyway, so I never pay the fee.

So, yeah, enough is enough, but so far it hasn't detered me. As a nonresident, I have no clout, but if you, as a resident don't like something, pitch a ruckus and organize a group to oppose the fees.

What I am reading between the lines is that you are basically burned out on hunting and these extra fees are the excuse to stop. I love it too much to do that.

+1 tx. When I get too old, I'll have my sons do it.

Several of the above complaints are self inflicted but I understand the gist of your complaints. I simply don't hunt in areas I don't want to or can't pack an elk out of. I know my limitations at age 59 but still am able to get up and down them mountains just fine. I expect I will be hunting till I get the last one.

I can't afford to hire a guide with horses, and they have closed all the roads to the top spots in the high country. It sucks! The fees keep going up and the draw tags keep going down. But I am not ready to give it up yet. KDJ

Very well said......

Bill

I appreciate all the thoughts and opinons.

txhunter58, tx270:
For the record, that 6-pointer would've had to been packed down one steep ridge and back up the next ridge (about 2 miles), before I began the 4 mile (one way) hike down the trail. I would then have to wade across a chest-deep river with another 1/2 mile to get to my truck.

I've backpacked out elk (2 cows and a bull), on that route about 3 times already. It generally takes me 5 trips (plus one more to get my gear down). So roundtrip, you're looking at a total of 6x5x2 or 60 miles of up/down to get out a big bull. Then one more 8 miles to get the gear out. Experience has shown me that if I kill one on Saturday morning, I'll have everything down my mid-morning Monday (provided I work my azz off). And I'll be one whipped pup.

Since I have a bull at home on the wall thats larger, it's not worth the work for me. (I've also taken 3 out with an ATV from that site, that's waay easier!) If it had been a really huge, symmetrical 6-pointer, or a nice 7x or better, I would've taken the shot.

Still, my decision to stop playing the DOW game, is based upon the fact, that the current DOW policies of just squeezing the hunters harder and harder to get their money, just doesn't set with me.

Good hunting to the rest of you!

My open response

Whats the cost of the stamp on per duck per year amount too in a 50 duck season. Thats costs you a whole what $.30

It takes five minutes to do a survey...this hurts you how ? Take up tennis...no surveys.

You prefer that you and your dozens of buddies tear up the forests and create your own trails just for your personal convinience. We won't miss you. Too lazy to cut up and pack out your elk. Again, take up tennis.

For 28 years you bought something from the CO DOW. Now you complain that they want you in the system and expect you to continue. Unless you planned on not buying whats the difference to you. Now that you have convinced yourself not to....again whats the difference.

Silly thread.................

Peole who are to lazy to haul out their game or to cheap to spend a few bucks to support a wonderful sport need to leave hunting, for good.

There are now game farms out there with big elk and no packing.

I can appreciate the issues of a long pack. But then if I am not up to it I hunt where I can make it work. And no further. If I needed to I'd buy horses if I lived in the area etc....

And IMHO IF you open roads into areas like you speak of, the elk will move further back, they are in there now for a reason, open it to traffic and it changes.

The only area I've seen roads seemingly not affect elk much at all is in unit 34 in NM for some reason.

The comment on if it was a "trophy" you would have anyway, sours me greatly. Any animal is a trophy, if you could pack out a big bull then you could pack out a cow or spike as well. Hunt within your limits.

But it does boil down to the fact you are welcome of your opinion as I am of mine....

The compromise I see, but it would not be enforceable, would be to allow ATVs under a certain decible level, IE quiet, and allow them down closed roads ONLY to pick up game, and at that, you'd have to pack the game to a road/trail first, and then only pick up say between 10 am and 2 pm.... that I could see working out by a bit.
Of course for me part of the hunt is getting there, and experiencing it all, trailing after the shot these days is a whining situation but I enjoy the parts of the puzzle and don't require a bang flop. And packing it out makes it part of the experience.... having carried half a mature bull caribou in my pack plus my gear across tundra well over 4 miles, it was a rough trip but well worth it in the end, I"ll never forget it and would never trade it. Not even for a bigger bull on the side of the landing strip.

YMMV as they say.

Jeff

This is no shortage of roads here, acutally...I wish they would close a few more. Everyone and their grandma is running around on an ATV these days.

Colorado needs to change some seasons, IE: get rid of 4th season deer, move muzzleloader to October, and cut back nonresident tags on some of the impossible to draw tags like Moose, goat, sheep, and rifle antelope.

i don't live in colorado, but i hunt elk there every year and have for many years. bow hunting for elk near the flat-tops and gun hunting north of durango this year. so it costs more, i'll pay up. regardles of what the dow does, i'll still be coming to colorado just because i would rather hunt in the mountains than do just about anything else. i'll quit when i get too old, and i'm a young 59.

Dogcatcher.I sure agree. At the last DOW meeting I attended,they said they cut back the length of the 4th season for elk because it pressured deer in rut too much. Also,I can't see why they have 1 month for archery season.It should be the same length as any rifle,or muzzle loader season.

Again, for the record, that jeep trail (I opened up?), started out as a cut timber logging road used to haul men, and equipment up to the logging camps by mule, and then used to skid the timber out. It probably turned into a motorized trail back in the 1920s or so.

rost495:
I've generally respect your comments. Killing game has never been the high point of a hunt for me. It has always been getting up in the mountains and hunting hard (i.e. the hunt). Over the years, I've killed enough antelope, deer, and elk, that eventually I became only interested in killing a really big bull, hunting bear, and trying out a new sniper rifle on a long-range mulie shot.

I've left several nice bulls feeding quietly in the aspens, all within 60 yards or so. I considered those very successful hunts in that the animals were mine for the taking, but I figured they needed to live and grow, more than I needed the extra work or bragging rights.

Still I continued to hunt elk, just for the experience and chance of getting that really big bull.

Some consider trophy hunting a bad thing. Unless you really love and/or need the meat, letting a raghorn grow a couple years is a good thing IMO.

Still it's funny how what started out as a simple declaration, that this hunter, personally has had enough of the DOWs increasingly-stringent and money grubbing policies, has created so much negative comments.

I not trying to convert anyone, if you think the cost and hassle is worth it, then enjoy yourselves.

I wish you all well.

As for me, I'm saving my money for real hunting excitement, a leopard, or a lion, or maybe another BUFFALO!

Good hunting.

Watch out if you gut shoot those buffs on purpose. For some reason I can never forget that comment. FWIW have fun wiht Africa, I choose to spend my money here, not somewhere else.

Me, I won't shoot a raghorn, I generally hunt cows for meat, won't shoot a promising young bull but I've had chances thats for sure, and choose to pass on them instead.

I'd figure that if I'm only trophy hunting then when I finally find that animal, I should be able to take them, and I"ll have either folks to help, do it myself or have the number for folks with horses handy via my sat phone.

You are more than welcome to quit hunting, many of the rest of us have decided its better to expend energy hunting than bitching.

Unfortunately, that usually means he gets whacked as soon as he crosses over the next hill. I read a study that stated 95% of all legal bulls get killed each year in CO. That means almost all of the 2.5+ year olds get smoked...