The latest awful wildlife bill HB 637

[Gevock]

Here's another bill that hunters need to pay attention to. It's tough to digest, but appears to be a dozen bills wrapped in one, including pheasant stocking:

Bill Explorer

Explore, track, and stay informed on legislative bills in Montana with the Montana Legislature Bill Explorer application. Access detailed information, monitor bill progress, and engage with the legislative process easily from your desktop or mobile device.

laws.leg.mt.gov

 

[Deleted member 28227]

So lets see:

1. NR landowners don't have to have a hound license to run cats
2. You can use a vehicle to drive, rally, herd , run, molest game as long as you're not hunting
3. If you want to come to MT shoot a bear then buy your tag, well your in luck because you can buy a tag and immediately use it so...

Man just good stuff all around

 

[Ben Lamb]

So lets see:

1. NR landowners don't have to have a license hound license to run cats
2. You can use a vehicle to drive, rally, herd , run, molest game as long as you're not hunting
3. If you want to come to MT shoot a bear then buy your tag, well your in luck because you can buy a tag and immediately use it so...

Man just good stuff all around

4. $1 million to stock pheasants rather than put it into conservation.
5. CHanges the word possession to hunting on technology, so you can have the latest whiz-bang FLIR or e-calls or anything else that's currently disallowed on you while you are hunting, but you can't use it to hunt.

This is an enforcement nightmare, and it goes backwards in terms of what's needed for upland game bird conservation. It's eerily reminiscent of other Paul Fielder drafted bills that try to solve 14 problems at once, while doing nothing good at all.

 

[BourbonSnowCone]

4. $1 million to stock pheasants rather than put it into conservation.
5. CHanges the word possession to hunting on technology, so you can have the latest whiz-bang FLIR or e-calls or anything else that's currently disallowed on you while you are hunting, but you can't use it to hunt.

This is an enforcement nightmare, and it goes backwards in terms of what's needed for upland game bird conservation. It's eerily reminiscent of other Paul Fielder drafted bills that try to solve 14 problems at once, while doing nothing good at all.

From my brief read and interpretation, I can almost guarantee FWP testifies in favor regardless of political pressure.

 

[sapperJ24]

Some amendments passed including applying hound and cat rules to bears (if bear hound season passes)(17-1), increase Block Management payment (18-0).

Amendments that failed included no free hound handler fee for large non-resident landowner (12-6), retain language that cat and bear licenses need to be purchased in advance (waiting period)(12-6), keep possess as the language for electronic equipment (11-7), reducing the 1mil to 500k for prisoner pheasant farming (12-6).

Bill passed as amended (18-0) and going to the floor.

I missed the earlier discussion so not sure what happened before the amendments were introduced.