Published: April 07, 2009 10:00 PM
Updated: April 07, 2009 10:18 PM
B.C.’s resident hunters are losing out to non-residents in the way the provincial government is allocating Limited Entry Hunting (LEH) permits, and it’s going to get worse if hunters don’t stand up for their rights.
That’s the word from Al Springer, a director for both the Peachland Sportsman’s Association and the Okanagan Region of the B.C. Wildlife Federation.
He’s been involved for a number of years in discussions between hunters, guide-outfitters and the government on policy for allocation of hunting licenses.
He says the attitude of this government is that hunting should be a commercially-viable business, not just a sport that allows local hunters to fill their freezers with meat for their families while they enjoy the outdoors.
That means that trophy hunting by visitors to the province (who are only permitted to hunt here with a licensed guide/outfitter) is being favoured when allocation decisions are made.
And, that goes against the province’s allocation policy, says Springer.
“Hunting should be managed based on science and we should be following the policy,” he says. Yet, non-resident hunters took 14 of the moose harvested in this region in 2007, while residents harvested only 50, a split of 28 per cent for the non-resident trophy hunter, instead of the agreed-upon 15 per cent.
Since the LEH permits are given out by way of a draw, the odds of getting a moose tag are 20 to one, while the non-resident is just given one when he pays for it, slanting the harvest in favour of those with money and against those without.
“It’s not fair, and it runs contrary to what was agreed upon,” he says.
“We’ve asked for an increase in the number of LEHs this year. In many cases, these animals will just die on the highway and the meat wasted if we don’t have an opportunity to hunt them for meat to feed our families.”
Contrary to the provincial government’s policy of encouraging more hunting in B.C., such inequities have resulted in fewer people having the opportunity to hunt here, he says.
Because the government’s policy is that this is “use it or lose it,” Springer says it’s likely the allocation to local hunters will drop even further in future unless more LEHs are up for draw, because only a small percentage of those who get a draw actually harvest an animal.
On the other hand, non-residents using trained guides nearly always fill out their quota.
Guide/outfitters generally prefer the LEH system of managing game because it means there will be fewer hunters participating, and a better quality hunt for their clients, with less competition, he says.
well, I took my recurve bow to the Chad Davis Memorial 3D shoot at the Abby Fish and Game Club this weekend. It was my first 3D archery shoot with traditional gear so it was a challenge, I did good on the first 20 targets, but when I started up the mountain doing the steep up and down shots I ran into trouble. I ended up bending 4 of my Easton aluminum arrows but I still finished the shoot with a lucky slightly bent arrow. Out of a possible 400 points I scored 193. 10 points are given for the center of the vital shot, 8 for the vitals, and 5 just to hit the target, with 0 points for missing the 3D animal target completely.
Even though it was challenging it was part of the process of learning to hunt with traditional archery gear. In doing the shoot, I learnt that I am still not ready to hunt with the recurve bow. Hopefully with a bit of practice, I will get there soon.
I just got this message from a friend doing some good work in British Columbia:
Hello, my name is Joel Feenstra, and I am a member of Ridgedale Rod and Gun Club and a former member of the Chilliwack Rod and Gun Club.
I am gathering information about diseases in the wild, and would like to be notified about any health issues among wild animals observed by any of you.This Study is being done by researchers at the University of British Columbia, and after being contacted by them, I agreed to be a liason between them and any members of the club interested in helping.
We’ve all heard about Tuberculosis, CWD, trichinosis, and a myriad of other diseases that can affect our wild animal stocks. But these can be difficult to detect in the wild, and there is a need for people who spend time out in the woods who can identify and report outbreaks.
This study is only looking at Birds and Mammals, and so any unusual occurrences in these animals are what the scientists are looking for.The animal does not have to be dead to be reported, and reports can be made about animals you have just observed. If you do kill an animal, you can see if it has worms or liverspots.
–This is what we’re looking for:
–Any Wild birds ormammal showing obvious signs of disease
–Any unusual herd declines or behaviour.
–We need to know the location( precise is best, but if it’s a jealously guarded spot, just the nearest logging road or other landmark)
–We are not taking any physical samples, just reports.
–Signs to look forare…
–malnourishment, patchy hair or feathers, odd behaviour, worms, liverspotting, lesions or tumours, etc.
If you can, call or email me to report.You can call me directly on my Cell phone, at 604-835-8986 or email me at redthornboards@hotmail.com.
Even just a vague “ I watched a cow elk who looked otherwise healthy, but was very listless and slow compared to the rest of the herd and was always lagging behind...” is a valid report. We are only looking for signs that might suggest sickness, not concrete proof.
Your Help in this is appreciated. If you have any questions, please contact me via the info provided.
It’s hard to make the argument for the gun registry any better than Steven Chabot, president of the association of chiefs of police,
who wrote in a letter to Harper last month: "All guns are potentially dangerous, all gun owners need to be licensed,
all guns need to be registered, and gun owners need to be accountable for their firearms."
It’s hard to make the argument for the gun registry any better, in other words, than by imperiously claiming it’s absolutely essential without citing any supporting evidence at all. Sadly, that’s pretty much the state of play at One Yonge, on this and several other issues.
There are few op-ed phenomena sadder or more predictable than gun registry fans trotting out the opinions of police organizations to support their case. If the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police defended the use of Tasers, I bet the Star’s editorialists wouldn’t take their word for it. Well, no need to speculate—here they are in February, most emphatically not buying the CACP’s defence of the use of Tasers. The fact is, if the CACP told them it was raining outside, they’d verify it with three independent sources before reporting it. But on gun control, that rare point of intersection between the opinions of the two entities, they give them the benefit of the doubt. It’s less an honest argument than it is a classic debate tactic for dealing with people one assumes are hidebound ideologues. When perfervid pro-gun control types mention they’re onside with the police, they’re really saying, “look here, you pistol-stroking troglodytes, your best friends the cops like the gun registry. You wouldn’t want to disagree with your best friends the cops, would you?”
The CACP indulges in a little of that too, actually, in the letter the Star quoted:
It is our assessment that Bill C-301—by softening controls on machine guns, by allowing the transport of fully automatic and semi-automatic assault weapons to civilian shooting ranges, by ending the registration of long guns such as rifles and shotguns (the weapons most often used in domestic homicides and suicides), and by relaxing the current restrictions on handguns, semi-automatic assault and tactical weapons—would seriously compromise a system that is working to the betterment of personal, community and police officer safety.
“Oh crap, domestic violence,” politicians are meant to say in response. “Everyone back away slowly. Van Loan! Quick! Cut a cheque!” But hang on: how many domestic homicides and suicides are we talking about? Does the gun registry stop them from happening? Does it help police solve the crimes? The letter doesn’t say. Over to the Coalition for Gun Control, whose research the CACP often cites on this issue. The coalition does indeed support gun control (as one would expect) as a “small but important part of addressing the problem of violence against women.” They make a logical and, I think, rather compelling argument that registration goes hand-in-hand with tough, common-sense licencing rules—for example, denying or revoking licences to those convicted of domestic violence offences—in that it’s pointless rescinding a licence if you don’t know how many guns its bearer owns. Of course there will be people who acquire and wreak havoc with unregistered long guns, but for the very little money and palaver a properly run gun registry should involve—it is, after all, nothing more than a dead-simple database—this shouldn’t necessarily be cause for outrage.
Our long gun registry, however, is cause for very justifiable outrage. It will always carry with it the shame of being a dead-simple database the government managed to cock up to the tune of billions of dollars. It will always carry the stigma of having been shamelessly, unforgivably marketed and defended as an urban anti-crime measure, when it most emphatically is not, and of having quite rightly offended great swaths of rural Canada. It’s a disaster. Kill it, I say. If an honest debate concludes a replacement is necessary, we’d be better off starting over from scratch.
Abbotsford campus
University of the Fraser Valley
April 20th 2009
You are invited to listen to Professor Mauser dissect the myths about firearms and gun control.
Does the long-gun registry help police combat criminal violence, as the Chiefs of Police claim?
Is it true that every illegal gun was once legal?
Are long guns a significant factor in criminal violence?
Will the passage of Bill C-301 allow fully automatic weapons to be driven
through residential neighbourhoods for the first time in more than a decade, as Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff claims?
I have alot of bear ribs and it was time to slow cook them so I could actually eat the ribs. I tried to BBQ bear ribs, and boil them but it was a disaster, bear is way to tuff that way.
Slowcooking in a crock pot is the best way to eat bear and other tough gamey meats. I usually like bear sausage but I find the steak, and roasts a little too strong.
This recipe from cooks.com was excellent for my bear ribs, you should try it!
CROCK POT RIBS
3 lbs. country ribs
Salt
Pepper
Onion
1 bottle Open Bit BBQ Sauce
Salt and pepper 3 pounds of ribs. Broil 5 minutes on each side. Put in crock pot with 1 quartered onion and one bottle BBQ sauce. Cover. Cook 8-10 hours on low.
I just received notice that a fellow member of my fish and game club has spearheaded a organization for BC resident hunters. Here is what I found out from this message from the president, Mark Porter:
This association fights for the rights of resident hunters and fishermen of BC. where as BCWF fights for the voice of the guides and non residents. Those that got the money. We want the resident hunter to have first priority on LEH's and area's. Guides and non residents should not take priority. Each and every year they get more and we the residents of this province get the left overs. We need a stronger voice in region 2. As our voice gets louder other regions will follow suite. A great example is the kootney region. We have a strong and growing voice there as you will see on the web site. We can make the BCWF accountable as well as the MOE. Its our freedom and right as BC residents to do so. Join us. We can make a difference!
The Mission statement is as follows: Mission Statement
To ensure the wildlife recourses of British Columbia and the natural habitat they require are conserved and managed for the beneficial use for the people of British Columbia in perpetuity.
Goals
To promote proper management of our ecosystems by best available science that enhances our wildlife resources for the benefit of all British Columbians.
Objectives
In no particular order.
1) To promote transparent and accountable wildlife and habitat management.
2) To promote scientific wildlife and habitat management.
3) To promote a variety of public access to all British Columbia’s Crown lands, water and renewable wildlife resources.
4) To initiate and maintain a representative body in each region of British Columbia representing the interests of all British Columbians to have a direct influence on decision making that effects the management and use of all wildlife resources.
5) To promote, protect and enhance resident priority in the allocation of British Columbian’s wildlife resources
******
It sounds good to me, I am looking at contributing in order to help out!
Anyone interested in getting involved contact: info@rhabc.org
This makes me sick, some guy goes and kills 3 bighorn sheep and a deer without a licence. I dont know why the news calls him a hunter when he is nothing but a scumbag poacher. A hunter buys a licence and follows the bag limits and regulations in the hunting synopsis. The fines and punishment were appropriate, but could have been steeper. Jail time could have been an option. He will not be allowed to hunt for 5 years,a 10 year ban would have been acceptable.
Nanaimo hunter fined $17,000 for killing bighorn sheep
Times Colonist
Published: Tuesday, March 04, 2008
A Nanaimo man has been ordered to pay more than $17,000 for killing three California bighorn mountain sheep and one white-tailed deer.
Walker Rook Addison, 38, pleaded guilty at Grand Forks provincial court in the B.C. Interior to four counts of hunting mountain sheep without a species licence, exceeding the annual bag limit for mountain sheep, hunting white-tailed deer without a licence and using licences which did not belong to him.
Addison was fined $400 and ordered to make a payment of $17,000 to the Habitat Conservation Trust Fund.
He was also ordered not to hunt for five years and to surrender the sheep and his crossbow
I just got this email sent to me by a fellow member of BC wildlife, it is very informative and all true:
Grizzly Bear Fact Sheet
Grizzly Bear Numbers
The current conservativepopulation estimate is 17,000 grizzly bears in British Columbia.
These figures have been established through extensive inventory work by grizzly bear scientists and researchers in representative areas throughout the province.
Estimating the number of bears in the province is not a simple process. Although they are a large, imposing animal, they are also secretive and often nocturnal and their typical habitat makes sightings difficult or even impossible.
Early estimates of grizzly bear populations were based on reports from the field; loggers, hunters, outfitters and others who inhabited the backcountry. Based on this limited information, biologists were extremely conservative, with their 1979 estimate being 6,000 bears.
In the 1980s studies using emerging technology such as radio-telemetry, capture-recapture and more detailed habitat analysis resulted in the population estimate updated to 13,000 bears province-wide. While developing this estimate, biologists continued to significantly underestimate the carry capacity of the more productive grizzly bear habitats.
Beginning in the 1990s, DNA analysis became a new valuable tool for research biologists and used in conjunction with existing inventory procedures resulted in the grizzly bear population estimates being adjusted once again upwards to the current levels.
It must be noted that the figures used are, and have always been, conservative estimates based on the analysis of the studies done by qualified and experienced researchers.
In the past, anti-hunting and anti-use activists have tried to refute the Ministry of Environment’s population figures, saying that there ‘could be’ as few as 4,000 grizzlies in B.C. But there have been no studies done that would give any credibility to these statements. They have no basis in scientific fact.
Grizzly Bear Reproductive Rates:
One of the arguments that we have heard regarding the sustainability of grizzly bear populations is their low reproductive rates.
While mature females produce cubs only every second or third year, what is not mentioned is that the cubs have a much higher survival rate than the young of most other large mammals. This is partly due to the simple fact that the big bears are at the top of the food chain and have few predatory threats as well as the extreme protective nature of the female grizzly toward her cubs. The key to the reproductive success of grizzly bears populations is that is that grizzly bear females are excellent mothers.
Studies that have been done in British Columbia’s Flathead area as well as in Alaska’s coastal and interior regions have documented that grizzly bear populations are capable of showing a 6% to 8% annual increase or higher. This brings into focus the fact that population growth is reliant on both the birth and death rates of a species.
Grizzly Bear Hunting Statistics:
One of the arguments from groups and individuals whose goal is to completely ban all hunting of grizzly bears in British Columbia is that the bears are at risk because they are being overhunted.
To understand this issue, you must first be familiar with British Columbia’s hunting regulations and the fact that all grizzly bear hunting in B.C. is conducted through a Limited Entry Hunting (LEH) system where the number of hunters in any specific area is limited through a lottery system. In this manner wildlife managers can control the number of bears taken by licensed hunters in specifically defined geographic areas through the number of permits that are issued.
Grizzly bear mortalities are analyzed by Ministry of Environment biologists through a detailed procedures manual (http://wlapwww.gov.bc.ca/wld/documents/gb_harvest_mgmt_proc_app1.pdf) that defines what limits must be placed on total human caused mortality of grizzly bears as well as a factor for unknown mortality. These limits vary depending on the assessed quality of the bear habitat in any given Management Unit (MU).
These mortality limits range from a maximum of 5% of the total estimated population in the very best habitat to a low of 3% in the lowest habitat class. Further adjustments are made based on the number of mortalities of female grizzlies in any given Wildlife Management Unit (MU).
Using the current estimated population figure of 17,000 grizzly bears the percentage of grizzly bears killed by all licensed hunters since 2002 is as follows:
year percentile of herd number of grizzlys killed
20021.26%214
2003 1.35%229
2004 1.59%270
2005 1.54%262
2006 1.46%248
These figures are indicative of the conservative harvest rates that have been set by the Ministry Environment professional staff considering bear harvest rates could be established as at least two or three times as high.
Facts on Hunting
One of the arguments for removing grizzly bears from the list of huntable wildlife is that this will automatically give them the protection that they need to increase or at least maintain their population numbers. Although this may appear at first hearing to be an unassailable argument, it is not necessarily so.
If grizzly bears are totally protected – in fact if any species is totally protected – it disappears off the radar of public accountability. The bears will cease to have a positive economic value in most jurisdictions. Groups that insist on maintaining an opportunity to harvest the bear are also the groups that are willing to provide funding for research. This will not continue.
Grizzly bears will certainly still have value in areas where commercial bear-viewing operations are in place, but those are mostly in accessible coastal areas where the big bears congregate during salmon runs. In the interior of the province grizzlies are much more secretive, covering relatively large territories and living in heavy cover and are not conducive the commercial viewing operations. In these areas the grizzly will have little to no economic value and will in many situations assume the status of vermin. It will take us back to a time when ranchers encouraged their employees to kill every bear they encountered in their work.
Without hunting, grizzly bears become emboldened and begin not only to interact destructively with property and livestock but also to become a safety hazard for individuals and communities requiring expensive control measures which result in wasteful agency-caused bear deaths.
It is worth noting that in National Parks where grizzly bears, along with all other species, have complete protection and have lost their wariness and have become habituated to human settlement, grizzly bear populations have significantly lower survival rates compared to bears outside of the parks’ boundaries. This is also true of the areas in the US where grizzly bears are protected compared to adjacent areas in British Columbia where they are hunted.
General:
The guiding rule of wildlife management in British Columbia is that it is based on scientific principles. Decisions should not be made on personal philosophies or emotional perspectives.
This is not what the people who are calling for the end to British Columbia’s grizzly bear hunt want to hear. Although they couch their arguments in pseudo-scientific terms and maintain that their chief concern is conservation, their primary goal is to stop hunting.
They know that they would be unsuccessful were they to attack hunting in general and instead have tried to pick battlegrounds where they hope they can generate some emotional appeal with the general public.
In the late 1990s led by one specific anti hunting group, many in the environmental community supported a major effort to ban all bear hunting, including the hunt for black bears. They were successful in having the government of the day impose a grizzly bear hunting moratorium until a newly elected provincial government reexamined their arguments in the light of the existing biological science and found their claims unfounded. This ill advised initiative collapsed on them because they could not convince British Columbians that bears – both black and grizzly – were at risk of being exterminated by legal hunting seasons.
They have now regrouped and refocused their new initiative on stopping the grizzly bear hunt in B.C. and see the upcoming Winter Olympics as an opportunity to blackmail the Provincial government into acquiescing to their demands.
If we give in to this initiative regarding grizzly bears, their demands will not stop there. They will then move on to the next step in their agenda, which is to stop or at least limit all resource use in this province.
With over 13% of the province in protected areas and more than 90 percent of it unsuitable for permanent human settlement, grizzly bears area in a secure position to survive long into the future with hunting being an integral and important part of their conservation and management.
Thank you very much John for putting together this great resource sheet, I hope everyone will take time to write their local MLA, or other political leader and discuss the facts of grizzly bear hunting, not the emotion of a fuzzy animal being killed.