ORIGINAL: Zim
ORIGINAL: Wolf killer
Most non-residents do not have everything they need to make a good wilderness hunthappen on there own. Horses, wall tents, wood stoves &Wilderness savy to make it on there own when things go bad.
Every year resident & non-resident hunters get lost & die in the mountains. Wilderness or not, resident or non-resident,some people need a full timebaby sitter.
I stand behind Wyoming Game & Fish.
That's nice, because you are about the only one who feels that way, including most every WY resident Italked to out there. Nonresidents are allowed to hike, backpack, camp, bird hunt, small game hunt, pick daisies, etc, etc, etc. The state thinks they are all qualified to do these things.......just not hunt big game. It's just another liberal entitlement program set up for a special interest group. Politics at it's best.
I backpack hunt into wilderness areas almost every year, and I live in Illinois! Did two this year, Nevada & Colorado. I don't need politicians telling me where I can't go. Don't build fires to scare off game. One man bivy, no wall tents needed.
Definitely not interested in horses. They are noisy and have to be babysat. Hell two years ago I had to babysit the outfitters camped next to me when one of theirs got out of it's rope fence and bighorns were gorging on his oats. They'd have emptied the saddle bags in an hour. The next day I packed up and moved around to a basin where horses could not enter. There were no outfitters in there, just elk.
I'm with Wolf Killer on this one. Sure, there are people like you who know how to handle themselves in the wilderness, but what about all of the other guys who come out from back east and don't know the first thing about hunting in the wilderness, let alone navigating the mountains? I've seen guys from flat-land states get lost in the hills. Chances are they don't understand late season weather at those elevations either. They could go to bed one night and wake up in 2 feet of snow the next morning and be in a real jam.
Typically, the only people going into wilderness areas during the fall and winter are hunters. Backpackers, daisy-pickers, and photographers all use the wilderness areas during the summer when the weather is more predictable. I have yet to hear of anyone using wilderness areas to hunt birds or rabbits.
By requiring non-residents to be accompanied by an outfitter in wilderness areas, the G&F is limiting the number of search and rescue missions that tax payers have to fund. I'd support a revision of the law that allowed non-residents who could demonstrate wilderness survival skills and knowledge of high-elevation weather to use wilderness areas without the company of an outfitter. But until then, I support the G&F's attempt to keep individuals without any wilderness savy out of wilderness areas.