Talk w/ Director of Illinois DNR

[WestT]

A few weeks ago I had a chance to meet and speak briefly with the Director of the Illinois DNR. Below is a summary of the discussion I had with him.

https://huntingfit.com/2016/04/17/make-your-voice-heard/

In summary it involves the low hunter harvest numbers of deer over the last several years here in IL. Specifically, a steady decline since 2005. I know several of you are from IL on Hunt Talk so I figured you may have some interest but I believe many other states across the Midwest are in a similar situation.

A question I have to some of you who may have a little more experience in dealing with Governmental Agencies, is where do you go from here? Continue to monitor the changes to address the population decline issue and comment accordingly? Thanks for the help.

 

[IlliniFIre]

Good little post. Was this an informal meeting? Like did the Director know you were reporting this? I would have been very interested in going further into the reasons for the decline in harvest and population. For example, one DNR employee I spoke to regarding harvest was that there were two main reasons for the decline. Those were fewer hunters in the field and the herd taking a large hit in population from EHD or blue tongue during the drier years we had earlier this decade.

I will note that I found one of the last comments to be unsurprising. Farming in Illinois is still powerful on a lobby level, and frankly is why I would say that efforts by RMEF in the 90's were stopped due to this.

 

[WestT]

It was relatively formal meeting with an audience. I do not know if he specifically knew I would be reporting it but I assume that everything he said was "on the books".

He did mention the localized impacts of EHD/Blue Tongue outbreaks which I am sure contributed to declines. However, the decline has been steady since '05 so those outbreaks should have been blips in the data rather than consistently lower harvests year after year.

Lower hunter numbers were not mentioned during the discussion.

 

[Flatland Crusoe]

Here are my thoughts, If I'm not mistaken the current director was a waterfowl biologist rather than a deer guy before Illinois brought him on. Illinois is first and foremost a deer state, but it doesn't help that its also the home of All State and State Farm insurance who hate deer collisions. I don't think collisions are a good indicator, but I don't also think that IL DNR could afford to do anything else. Here are my thoughts and concerns on IL deer especially from a department stand point.

What happened to the conservation congress and the regional meetings to discuss issues at hand? None have occurred on a widespread level since 2014. The waterfowl zone date meetings are the only meetings I have heard of in the last year.

Why hasn't anyone done anything to promote the IRAP program or fund it with a habitat stamp increase? Access is the biggest issue in Illinois, not their blind resource management.

Has anyone evaluated the windshield card program for its effectiveness. If you look back 2-3 years since in was site specific paper sign in the days hunted have dropped by 60% which none on my in person experience backs up.

Why bother having a draw system if they can't publish draw odds, get the leftover tag list right or reduce tags to a reasonable level. Apple River Canyon is a great example in the the last year we have data for they killed 2 deer on 1000 acres in 2014-2015 which was down from 7-11 yet they were still issuing 70 tags over the 4 firearm seasons. The site manager wasn't even aware of how many tags he has allocated when I called him after the leftover list was published. Why even bother with county wide draws for private land tags when everyone gets one if they aren't going to lower quotas?

 

[Gut Shot]

Illinois hasn't had a budget for almost a year, I don't think the gov. is going to do much about access or habitat this year.

It looks like the herd in my area is coming back pretty strongly and, if we can keep disease out of the animals, I expect we'll be back to healthy harvests in a couple of years.

Locally we are loosing a lot of habitat to development. When I moved to my farm, over fifteen years ago, I had no neighbors, now I have four Mcmansions behind me on what used to be great deer habitat. It is happening all over my part of Illinois. As the cities go to crap people are looking for their slice of heaven in the country and trying to make it just like the city.

 

[Flatland Crusoe]

2005 represents the historic population high for whitetail deer in the Midwest and is higher than even presettlement times, it was very much a man made event .

CRP enrollment increased every year in Illinois from 1986-2007 and has gone down every year since 2007. This is a big problem in a state with a lot of food and not very much cover with regard to deer populations. Food, Cover and water is the basis of all habitat, it just isn't always quite as obvious in the Midwest in a land of relative plenty. Since 2007 we had a few bad years of drought and EHD which is a natural phenomenon for wildlife populations to swing cyclically and whitetail are really some of the most stable populations compared to birds like grouse who boom then bust or turkeys that can loose entire hatches in wet spring flooding.

The issue DNR has is they are issuing tags like its still 2005 which is the equivalent of spending every year based on your best year of income and that means eventually you go into debt. DNR lacks the funds to do things and the employees left don't care because they don't have site budgets and probably won't have a pension. DNR has zero political relevance when you can't pay for schools and employee costs despite having every tax and revenue source in the state tapped.

 

[charliebravo77]

The fact that the DNR is still issuing almost 600,000 permits while harvesting 150,000 deer is just ridiculous. Of that, only 5.4% are site specific public land permits and 25% of those are landowner permits which for residents are free. I'd like to think that most of those 150,000 or so landowner permits aren't even used and just taken by owners because they are free, but I'd wager a large number of them are actually filled; probably at least 50% of them given only ~7,000 site specific tags exist and there are only 10,000 or so tags able to be used in other non-specific public areas like Shawnee NF.

I wonder if resident landowners would be willing to pay for their tags. Even charging them 25% of the normal tag cost would at least add SOMETHING to the DNR's revenue. To be literally giving away resources held in public trust is just insane. I'd feel bad if I was a landowner and wasn't paying even just a little bit for my tags, even though I was using them on my property.

 

[1_pointer]

The comments on losing habitat to housing/suburban development and loss CRP acres cannot be overstate IMO for many midwestern states. One thing not taken into account is the number of acres cleared of natural vegetation during that same time to plant more corn. A whole lot of marginal ground that was not farmed was cleared and farmed since 2007. At $8/bu even marginal ground makes one money. Add those three things together and there is a whole lot of habitat lost on a yearly basis. It's only going to get worse in the flatter, more arable parts of the midwestern states.

 

[Gut Shot]

The fact that the DNR is still issuing almost 600,000 permits while harvesting 150,000 deer is just ridiculous. Of that, only 5.4% are site specific public land permits and 25% of those are landowner permits which for residents are free. I'd like to think that most of those 150,000 or so landowner permits aren't even used and just taken by owners because they are free, but I'd wager a large number of them are actually filled; probably at least 50% of them given only ~7,000 site specific tags exist and there are only 10,000 or so tags able to be used in other non-specific public areas like Shawnee NF.

I wonder if resident landowners would be willing to pay for their tags. Even charging them 25% of the normal tag cost would at least add SOMETHING to the DNR's revenue. To be literally giving away resources held in public trust is just insane. I'd feel bad if I was a landowner and wasn't paying even just a little bit for my tags, even though I was using them on my property.

As land owners we get a dozen free tags, my son starts hunting this year and we will qualify for a few more. I have never used all of my landowner tags. I'm perfectly happy putting a deer or two in the freezer and in the past two years haven't tagged any deer in Illinois.

As far as charging landowners for tags, you are only going to piss off landowners who do a lot to provide habitat and the state is only going to piss the money away on something no one wants. I provide habitat for animals and in return I get to eat a couple of those animals I've always thought it was a fair trade. It is a lot of work keeping up a farm, it also costs money if I put a food plot or other habitat in where a cash crop could go. Deer also eat much more than the cost of a tag out of the crops each year. So the tags aren't really free. I also believe a lot of land owners do buy tags so they can hunt other properties.

 

[Flatland Crusoe]

I have always felt like providing landowner tags for free blurred the line of the North American Model of Conservation where in the state controls the animals on behalf of the people gives entitlement to the landowners de facto owning the game on their land. I think most all in state tags don't cost enough money regardless of the state especially compared to non resident tags and represent a huge subsidy to in state hunters who take for granted the true cost of wildlife management. I think most all landowners can afford to the $18 for an in state deer tag. Just because you hunt private land doesn't mean the DNR isn't providing you with services however bad they maybe.

 

[WestT]

Some very interesting comments on here. I wasn't expecting some of these. Some very good points though and I appreciate the comments. I am a little surprised about the attitude towards land owner tags. I am a land owner and have to side with Gut Shot above (don't forget about taxes we pay on our land). And yes, I do purchase additional tags each year because I hunt on property other than my own. As a matter of fact last year I was awarded 4 landowner tags (2 archery and 2 firearm) but purchased 5 additional tags (2 archery, 2 firearm, and one late antlerless). I did not use all these tags nor do I ever attempt to. Even prior to becoming a land owner I never had any issues with the tags allocated for those people. I can't recall 100% but I believe even with landowner tags you still have to purchase a hunting licencse and habitat stamp before the tags are valid for use. So landowners are still paying into the system.

Back to the original intent of this post, lets just hope that in IL and other states changes occur to benefit both deer and sportsmen. Not sure the current trend has either in mind.

 

[Flatland Crusoe]

The issue with landowner tags is that its not realistic to hope that in the next 2 decades that IL DNR will see any funding that isn't direct revenue in the form of licenses and permits. Ideally funding would operate the same way as Missouri and Arkansas where you have a portion of all sales tax going to the department. In Missouri 1/8th of a percent of sales tax goes to the department of conservation and they are able to make long term plans because they have stable funding outside of annual state budgets.

Everyone has to pay more to make IL DNR function whether that's annual car passes for hikers at starved rock, mountain bikers at Kickapoo or duck hunters at banner marsh. Giving away 1/4 of the deer tags in the state for free at the lost of 2.7 million dollars isn't acceptable when you have park shelters being abandoned because they can't afford a new roof or to put gas in the tractor to brushhog.

Landowner deer tags are kind of an anomaly when you consider the guy that owns a slough to duck hunt still has to buy his licenses. The deer on a property are free and mobile and could be shot just as easily on your neighbor's place or a DNR site 7 miles away during the rut.

 

[charliebravo77]

These are the kinds of problems that have Flatland and I worried about IDNR:

Just posted today by IDNR on their Facebook page.

IDNR Announces Closure of Ramsey Lake and Horseshoe Lake
Sites Closed Indefinitely Due to Electrical and Trash Service Interruptions
SPRINGFIELD, IL – The Illinois Department of Natural Resources announced that Ramsey Lake State Recreation Area near Ramsey and Horseshoe Lake State Park near Granite City will be closed indefinitely. Ramsey Lake is being closed due to termination of electrical service. Horseshoe Lake will close April 25 due to termination of trash and electrical service. There is no estimate of when either site might reopen.
Ramsey Lake site staff will report to Coffeen Lake State Fish and Wildlife Area. The phone number is (217) 537-3351. Horseshoe Lake staff will report to Frank Holten State Recreation Area. The phone number is (618) 874-7920.
Ramsey Lake campgrounds and picnic shelters were open at the time of the closure. IDNR will contact campers with reservations to work out other arrangements or refunds.
Camping at Horseshoe Lake was to begin May 1, but will not open on that date. IDNR will contact people with camping and shelter reservations to work out other arrangements or refunds.
The Department intends to reopen these parks as soon as services are restored.
Please email your questions and concerns to
[email protected]

 

[WestT]

I agree. Very sad...