Annual pronghorn elation/sadness/confusion thread

I don’t think COVID created an unnatural bump in applications. I think increased demand is here to stay.

$100 for a couple of type 6 doe tags is a bargain western hunting adventure where you see animals and get to take home some meat. Expect WY to take notice and double the price or more.

In regards to all big game hunting opportunity across the west - when states cut tags for self-guided public land NR hunters (NM elk/MD, SD MD, WY MD/antelope), jack prices (CO, UT, ID), cut OTC opportunity (CO archery elk) and increase the fee to obtain points (CO), hunters look “elsewhere” for an affordable hunting adventure where you have a good chance of getting a tag. Combine this with more and more new people wanting to hunt big game in the west.

It’s not all bad news, as there is new land opening to public hunting all the time, some tag allocations increase, and some game populations expand and recover. However, these positives are often small, isolated, and don’t nearly counterbalance the forces of dwindling opportunity and increased hunter participation in western states.

GoHunt effect or no, I think we set ourselves up for disappointment when we do the following:
-box ourselves into one species in one state
-compare current and future hunting opportunity to past glory days (before OnX, before Fresh Tracks, before the wolves came back, before my hider-hole got “discovered”, etc.)
-Focus on the negative of what we can’t do, what’s becoming harder to do, bad trends, etc.

Personally, I’m happy with a WT doe tag in my pocket and any weapon in my hand. Opportunity for this is infinite, so no matter what the future holds I’ll never be any less happy.

I also look into many other game species in many different states as an opportunity to increase my fun. While there are no secrets anymore, there are still units across states that turn up zero hits on any internet search, and have zero discussion in any online forum, and haven’t been featured in any hunting media. These places might be favored by locals, or not produce trophy animals, or they’re small or have low game densities. But as of today they might be a little undersubscribed and they make my short list of hunts to research.

Bottom line - you can always be more creative, more versatile, work harder, scout more, more mobile, and get a tag and kill an animal.

Mostly gone are the easy days of easy tags, easy and cheap western big game hunts, little research, little preparation, and little effort. But what are we, a bunch of schlups? Maybe we can hold a funeral if that’s what’s needed.

I’ve got a backup hunt to every tag I don’t get, and a backup to every backup down the line so I always have something fun to plan and look forward to. It’s all in our heads.
 
Wyoming does the best job of any state I've hunted at managing their wildlife. I'm sure if they reduced tags it's for the health of the herd and not in response to Covid19. I'd bet many of those reductions had been in the works before the "Covid crisis" even hit.
 
Wyoming does the best job of any state I've hunted at managing their wildlife. I'm sure if they reduced tags it's for the health of the herd and not in response to Covid19. I'd bet many of those reductions had been in the works before the "Covid crisis" even hit.

Agreed that heath of the herd is what they are focused on. You can see the state rationales by unit in the proposed hunting season presentations on the regulations landing page at WGF; They are not setting the season structure based on COVID.
 
The doe tags are way to cheap for NR. I hunt turkeys in WY as a NR and those run $85 bucks so obviously something is way off when you can go shoot a antelope for around $50. Dont get me wrong its a great deal but its going to naturally draw attention as the 'cheapest and easiest' big game hunt. There is such a perception that you can drive around in your truck for a couple hours, size up a couple hundred animals and then pick out the one you want to shoot that a ton of what i would call lazy hunters are going to want to try it out. We know that isnt reality in the low point units typically - i do wonder if things will change as more people hunt these low point units with no experience and have thier butts kicked because all they did was stick within 100 yards of the truck on the 3 pieces of public they had access too.
 
Any unit that had a 25-50% chance in random drawing in the non-resident special experienced a 10x-12x increase in special 1st choice applications. I think most people better reconsider their application strategy. You are better off gunning for a unit with crap odds the year prior if your intent is to have a shot at a random tag.

What your seeing is the same thing that used to happen with Hunting Fool when they would list a unit years ago. You would see a spike in apps, not just for that year but for a couple years after. Smart players started using the lemmings to their advantage and moved to units specifically because they were not listed in HF.

It's the same thing now, only with GoHunt making data available to so many more people the effect is much worse. Their reach is much greater than that of HF. Smart players again though, should start using the GoHunt data to their advantage....
 
... i do wonder if things will change as more people hunt these low point units with no experience and have thier butts kicked because all they did was stick within 100 yards of the truck on the 3 pieces of public they had access too.
It won't change. Every year there will be new ones to replace the ones from last year.
 
It won't change. Every year there will be new ones to replace the ones from last year.
So then it will change? ;)

If you dont ever put all your eggs in one basket you wont be as disappointing...apply in multiple states, find states that get less pressure , etc
 
The only thing that will change is point creep will continue to get worse.

What I meant about things not changing is that every year there will still be people applying in low point units and hunting public land. Some will be successful and some won't. Some will say the heck with it and never apply again. Some will realize they need to find another unit and then they will start buying preference points further increasing point creep.

The next year the cycle repeats and point creep grows some more.
 
So then it will change? ;)

If you dont ever put all your eggs in one basket you wont be as disappointing...apply in multiple states, find states that get less pressure , etc

That’s what we do. Multiple species in multiple states. It helps to keep the different hunting adventures flowing over the years.
 
Any unit that had a 25-50% chance in random drawing in the non-resident special experienced a 10x-12x increase in special 1st choice applications. I think most people better reconsider their application strategy. You are better off gunning for a unit with crap odds the year prior if your intent is to have a shot at a random tag.

Didn't you Americans get a stimulus cheque? I have a feeling a lot of dudes spent that in the special draw. With the economy getting in the shitter, people may feel it a lot more next year and not be so inclined to apply in the special draw as much as they did this year. Again, I could be wrong.
 
You gotta believe at some point people will start to say "what are we doing to ourselves for 40 pounds of butchered meat?" and point creep will end right?
 
No, we got a stimulus check. 🇺🇸
I forget, you guys can't spell!

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