Big Country, on the surface, it would SEEM that way........

Do you think that outfitters will lose clients because of high tag fees? Think about it..... if someone is willing to pay a few thousand dollars to hunt with an outfitter, is an extra couple hundred bucks going to keep them away? Also, the higher the tags go, the more " average" NR' s it will keep away..... I' m talking about the friends and relatives that already have private land to hunt and a place to stay. The ones that come back and hunt as a family. If the outfitters can keep more people like that at home because of high prices, that leaves more tags for their higher-priced clients to buy who don' t care about the price. Are you seeing the picture now?

The time it took tags to sell out between the two years is irrelevant. Not many people knew about it the first year, hence the longer time it took to sell them out, and the more people that got turned away because they thought they could just buy them over the counter. I do agree, however, that there' s no excuse to not get a tag when you have over three weeks to buy it. Why are there no statistics on how many people were turned away this year? Think maybe because it' s going down? The scenario I mentioned in my first paragraph is starting to come true. I already know a few friends who did not buy permits last year. That' s two more permits that were made available to the outfitters' clients, and the little guy got left out because of the price.

Also, since it' s so easy for you to believe that residents only want NR' s out altogether..... it' s that little guy, OUR friends and relatives, that we' re also looking out for. Why would we want to raise the fees for our friends and relatives who come back home to hunt with us?

So.... now can you see how outfitters would be in favor of a price increase, and resident hunters are against them?