I was gonna ask about the acreage change in Missouri since i just saw an article on it yesterday. In Illinois the minimum requirement is 40 acres which I dont think is fair. It all really depends on the terrain. In some places one acre might be all one needs and in others, 80 acres may not be enough.
I think one of the problems is an administrative/enforcement problem. For example, my family (previously) qualified for the no-cost landowner tags by owning thirty acres. However, we didn't just hunt our property - i.e. we had permission to hunt neighbor's property. But the landowner tags were limited to the property that we owned. To legally harvest a deer on the neighbor's farm, we were legally obligated to purchase a resident deer tag.
The administrative/enforcement issue: How many people get free landowner tags for owning 20 acres, but then hunt/harvest deersomewhere else? When they cannot(legally) use theirlandowner tags in that manner! How many people limit their hunting to 20 or 30, 40 etc. acres?
Full disclosure: I know several local hunters whose spouses and/or dependent childrenreceiveno-cost landowner permits and mysteriously harvest/tag/and check-indeer without everleavingthe house.A system with such a low acreage requirement can easily be abused.