1sagittarius

Iowa has a $428 Non-resident deer license fee total going through the state legislature for 2006.

Illinois has started to pass a $504.25 NR deer license fee total for 2005.

Wisconsin raised its NR deer license to $160 in 2004.

Minnesota started a $135 minimum reciprocal NR charge for 2005.

mammasboy

Are we a good deal or what!

IL-Cornfed

I see IL, IA, KS and some other big buck states starting a price war! Hunting is certainly pricing the workin' class man right out of the sport. [&:]

Pro-Line

Ohio is still cheap...($125 + $20/deer, up to 3 in some parts)...and we're producing some of the biggest deer on earth.

We also have hundreds of square miles of public land...Some doesn't receive much pressure especially during bow.

torontohunter

Is there any plumbing jobs available in Ohio????

WA Shooter

My in-laws live in East Central Ill. I have had the opportunity to hunt there twice before I decided it was out of my budget. I make an above average salary, but to pay $700 to fly my family of three out, $700 to rent a car for a week, and the $300 or so for the tag and license was not worth it.
The first time it was not too unreasonable at about $250 tag and license, then they capped the NR's and I ended up buying a Turkey tag to be in the woods the following year, my brother in law was going to tag the deer if I shot it. The following year the price jumped to $356 for the tag and $50 for the license.
I think they will figure this out when the NR numbers drop, and the deer population continues to climb, without the additional NR hunters the DNR willl not harvest their quota and they will continue to see more vehicle kills, crop damage, and starvation.

I like the idea of earn a buck programs to increase the harvest of the does, but keep the fees reasonable.

QTompkins2005

wow, and i thought my $30 for hunting lisences and $30/tag was expensive. I agree that the dnr will soon realize prices are too high, but do you think they will decrease them or just not increase them anymore?

IL Rancher

I'm sure the DNR's feeling about NR's and the deer herd is that most NR's are coming to shoot bucks and not does so they feel that it will have little affect on deer herd populations. I even want to say at one of the hearings farm bureau was saying that they needed unlimted tags for NR's to control the population but the DNR responded that was the reason for the antlerless tags being unlimted at $25 a pop. Of course, not many people are going to pay the rest of the fees involved to hunt, travel 500+ miles just to shoot a doe.

Is the fee a bit much? Yeah but they are not going to drop it anytime soon. The people who set the prices and policies are politicians and until they see a huge drop off in demand they won't budge. The NR's without a lot of money are going to be the first so suffer and than it will be the residents who don't have a lot of money or have family with land because they won't be able to afford leasing. Already starting. Still puiblic land to hunt but there is not a lot of acres per hunter available in Illinois.

justhuntitall

Pro-Line

I yeah I think your right I would love to see every one go to Ohio instead of IL.

Realy if these $ keep going up in other states it wont be long and the same will happen there.

We as residents should do what we can to try and keep our states fees down it will end up like the western states where they would rather sell a tag to a NR then its own people becuase of the money.

BagginBigguns

Good LORD! I used to think that buying a Colorado elk tag was an act of sodomy at almost 500 bills apeice. What exactly are they trying to accomplish with these prices? The problem that I have with this is that a majority of that revenue will be used for things other than conservation; On one hand you have sportsman being raped by high prices, while on the other hand the governement uses it to buy condoms to hand out in public high schools. Although, I have a hard time believing that the revenue gained from these inflated prices will offset the money lost from driving away out-of-staters that would have otherwise come in and spent even more money, patronizing local businesses. Talk about shooting yourself in the foot.