New Mexico price increase.

They should end those otc antelope tags immediately and go back to managing the numbers, if pay double to see it go back to a plus..


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Just for some context. Based on the harvest report from 2023-2024, 61% of overall pronghorn tags in NM were given through private OTC sales. Here is a breakdown by each unit, and overall.

Before people use this as an argument to remove those tags and place them in the public draw, consider the cost of doing that and paying LOs in those units that are mostly private for access. I don’t have much of an opinion either way because I see the cost of removing them from the private side being detrimental to the departments overall budget and I see the gain for public hunters and their ability to hunt pronghorn in NM. If you guys are wanting to have those tags back and be able to access private land, I think you’re going to have to be willing to pay for it in some way with some type of private land access fund that is funded through the legislature or paying into that type of fund when you apply whether that be required or voluntary.
 

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Just for some context. Based on the harvest report from 2023-2024, 61% of overall pronghorn tags in NM were given through private OTC sales. Here is a breakdown by each unit, and overall.

Before people use this as an argument to remove those tags and place them in the public draw, consider the cost of doing that and paying LOs in those units that are mostly private for access. I don’t have much of an opinion either way because I see the cost of removing them from the private side being detrimental to the departments overall budget and I see the gain for public hunters and their ability to hunt pronghorn in NM. If you guys are wanting to have those tags back and be able to access private land, I think you’re going to have to be willing to pay for it in some way with some type of private land access fund that is funded through the legislature or paying into that type of fund when you apply whether that be required or voluntary.

The a plus program benefited both diy and pay to play hunters by actually managing the resource, the current disaster has landowners selling tags for more goats than there property ever held..

I’m happy doing pay to play for antelope personally, it’s not for every one though. Besides that the a plus program actually designated a property by population, now they’re essentially travel tickets.. in my younger days, I could’ve definitely been tempted to just trespass and toss one in the back of truck, they’re easy to load and have gone in less than 5 minutes.
 
Just for some context. Based on the harvest report from 2023-2024, 61% of overall pronghorn tags in NM were given through private OTC sales. Here is a breakdown by each unit, and overall.

Before people use this as an argument to remove those tags and place them in the public draw, consider the cost of doing that and paying LOs in those units that are mostly private for access. I don’t have much of an opinion either way because I see the cost of removing them from the private side being detrimental to the departments overall budget and I see the gain for public hunters and their ability to hunt pronghorn in NM. If you guys are wanting to have those tags back and be able to access private land, I think you’re going to have to be willing to pay for it in some way with some type of private land access fund that is funded through the legislature or paying into that type of fund when you apply whether that be required or voluntary.

While this is good information it doenst take into account harvest percentages.
 
While this is good information it doenst take into account harvest percentages.
100% agreed. I was only looking at the percentages alone. I could look into the harvest rates as well relatively easily, but I would need to think more on it and how to frame it. If someone had a solid thought experiment at how that would influence things, I could do it pretty quickly. I'll wait until someone requests before I shoot off into it. Gotta save myself from myself or I'll spend my entire time outside of work looking at these types of things.
 
What he fails to mention is the eplus is essentially a lease as it opens ranch access to the general public. It’s a no cost to the public for access program vs a massive license increase to do it cash lease vs tag voucher…

Massive tag increase…..

I’ve probably hunted 20k acres of it, found elk on a lot of it, none of it was barren.

There’s a 80 acre piece that I know 4 bulls were killed on over the springs on it.


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I
I’ve probably hunted 20k acres of it, found elk on a lot of it, none of it was barren.

There’s a 80 acre piece that I know 4 bulls were killed on over the springs on it.


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I’ve accessed a lot public through eplus, I’ve never killed one on eplus but have accessed in and packed out via eplus properties. I’ve never been on a bad eplus property though
 
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Why does every NM thread have to turn into some BHA dudes complaining about the E Plus system ?

Start your own thread so you can rehash the same argument over and over and over and over.

Let’s move onto some important stuff…

Such as the annual what day will NM results be posted ? Really hoping to draw the Oryx tag this year, have some weird fascination with them lately.
 
Such as the annual what day will NM results be posted ? Really hoping to draw the Oryx tag this year, have some weird fascination with them lately.
Applied from 2012 till 2023 for statewide tags and alas did not get one before I became an NR. I can’t complain though, back then being a youth only hunter statewide tags were easy to draw so I have already shot 2 of them. Had a little bit of a hot hand helping friends put in and then drawing. I’ll cross my fingers, pray for you, or whatever your preferential method for luck is.
 
I’ve seen a lot of Eplus properties that don’t manage them for anything. Water tanks are dried up, any wells that pump water to tanks are broken down. Only run a small amount of cattle grazing on what grass that grows on the property. No hay or alfalfa being grown. They still get tags to sell to hunters. I think it needs to go to a different draw and price for LO tags only. Separate price and draw for public land. No eplus tags at all.
 
I’ve seen a lot of Eplus properties that don’t manage them for anything. Water tanks are dried up, any wells that pump water to tanks are broken down. Only run a small amount of cattle grazing on what grass that grows on the property. No hay or alfalfa being grown. They still get tags to sell to hunters. I think it needs to go to a different draw and price for LO tags only. Separate price and draw for public land. No eplus tags at all.

So you’ve been to those properties in the spring to see that the water isn’t there and there’s no elk?

To get into the lo draw a landowner has to prove elk are use it and a bio has to confirm.
 
South Dakota is governed by a completely different and mirror opposite viewpoint than New Mexico is.

What NM really needs to do is to put those LO tags into the draw with a separate pricing strategy than public land tags.

Yes they are. But they are still appointed by the Governor. South Dakota does a very good job of management with what they have to work with IMO. The SD chapter of the Wildlife Federation is top notch. I have always found the Commissioners to be approachable and responsive. As far as I know Elk hunting is still for residents. The Tribes have their own programs for elk. I believe they have opened up over a million acres to Pronghorn and Mule deer hunting West river.

What he fails to mention is the eplus is essentially a lease as it opens ranch access to the general public. It’s a no cost to the public for access program vs a massive license increase to do it cash lease vs tag voucher…

Massive tag increase…..
Not necessarily. There are various ways to get funding.

With a unit wide - land owner authorization within the primary management zone: Every enrolled e-plus ranch in a GMU is open to public hunting. Conversely anyone with a unit wide LO tag can hunt National Forest, BLM and state lands that are open to public hunting. But private land tags for sale really only benefit the outfitters. Some ranches have their own outfitters or sell the authorizations to other outfitters. I can say for certain I will never again pay $9,000 for a bull tag (authorization) to hunt the National Forest. That tag was resold twice. However I was very lucky to get a last minute cancellation to begin with. But if you are a wealthy non-resident willing to pay the price you can hunt anywhere you want to. There shouldn’t be any privilege to use public lands. That is when it becomes political.
 
Yes they are. But they are still appointed by the Governor. South Dakota does a very good job of management with what they have to work with IMO. The SD chapter of the Wildlife Federation is top notch. I have always found the Commissioners to be approachable and responsive. As far as I know Elk hunting is still for residents. The Tribes have their own programs for elk. I believe they have opened up over a million acres to Pronghorn and Mule deer hunting West river.


Not necessarily. There are various ways to get funding.

With a unit wide - land owner authorization within the primary management zone: Every enrolled e-plus ranch in a GMU is open to public hunting. Conversely anyone with a unit wide LO tag can hunt National Forest, BLM and state lands that are open to public hunting. But private land tags for sale really only benefit the outfitters. Some ranches have their own outfitters or sell the authorizations to other outfitters. I can say for certain I will never again pay $9,000 for a bull tag to hunt the National Forest. That tag was resold twice. However I was very lucky to get a last minute cancellation to begin with. But if you are a wealthy non-resident willing to pay the price you can hunt anywhere you want to. There shouldn’t be any privilege to use public lands. That is when it becomes political.
I’ve bought eplus tags,I’m familiar with system Resident status is irrelevant , regardless to offer them a $10 acre cash lease it’s going to raise the cost of an elk tag for a resident 300% vs no cost to a resident now.

This is also assuming $10 an acre is enough for a land owner too open his land to general public, it may very well not be worth the hassle of dealing with public. Etag system set up for smaller landowners
 
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Not necessarily. There are various ways to get funding.

With a unit wide - land owner authorization within the primary management zone: Every enrolled e-plus ranch in a GMU is open to public hunting. Conversely anyone with a unit wide LO tag can hunt National Forest, BLM and state lands that are open to public hunting. But private land tags for sale really only benefit the outfitters. Some ranches have their own outfitters or sell the authorizations to other outfitters. I can say for certain I will never again pay $9,000 for a bull tag (authorization) to hunt the National Forest. That tag was resold twice. However I was very lucky to get a last minute cancellation to begin with. But if you are a wealthy non-resident willing to pay the price you can hunt anywhere you want to. There shouldn’t be any privilege to use public lands. That is when it becomes political.

Those tags also benefit the land owner to mitigate damage costs etc. it’s pretty easy to buy unit wide lo tags direct if you do any leg work, and lots of them sell to diy guys.

Wealthy residents buy tags just the same was wealthy non residents, it’s a divisive tactic to blame NRs for all your problems.

The private land only tags are a non issue because the general public doesn’t have the ability to access those grounds and won’t on most of them.
 
So you’ve been to those properties in the spring to see that the water isn’t there and there’s no elk?

To get into the lo draw a landowner has to prove elk are use it and a bio has to confirm.
It’s pretty obvious to see a dried up tank and to see broken pumps and windmills. Doesn’t need to be spring to see equipment that hasn’t been used in years and fields that haven’t been plowed or planted in a long time.

You are right that all they have to do is prove that elk use the property…..
 
She already signed the bill but she line item vetoed the part that insulated the commissioners from being removed by the governor. Good bill, but one of the most influential pieces was vetoed to basically keep the power with the governors office. Real reform would remove politics from both the game commission and the agency itself and they are at the whim of the legislature when it comes to how many jobs they are allowed to have despite being funded by tag fees and not the general fund. The agency is almost autonomous with the way it funds itself, yet they have to follow the policy of the governor. There are biologists and researchers who would speak out on the basis of science but they are not allowed to due to fear of repercussions from an administration. That is the true problem.
Some of the larger sport groups have in the past employed their own biologists and researchers just for that very reason. To keep the political “junk science” out of the picture.
 
Some of the larger sport groups have in the past employed their own biologists and researchers just for that very reason. To keep the political “junk science” out of the picture.
Yes they have and yes in certain cases they can be solid but groups have agendas just like politicians and there is no check on those agendas because the people all believe in the same thing. The agencies are forced to take the entire public into account because they are in charge of the public trust. The politicization of agencies makes this difficult and Less likely because the scientists are unable to speak. Agencies could do a better job and scientists could add their science and opinions in for those that want to hear from them if the political whims of the government did not impact them. That should be the focus of the public in the future. Not only working on the commission, but also working on how the director of the agency gets chosen and how much say the governor has in that.
 
Those tags also benefit the land owner to mitigate damage costs etc. it’s pretty easy to buy unit wide lo tags direct if you do any leg work, and lots of them sell to diy guys.

Sort of. I've bought RO tags and it's glaringly obvious repairs are not made. The sale of the tag simply goes to paying their property tax and "pocketing" the rest.

Wealthy residents buy tags just the same was wealthy non residents, it’s a divisive tactic to blame NRs for all your problems.

Again, sort of. Most LO tags are bought by NR's. R's will usually buy cow tags and take a son/daughter or niece/nephew.

The private land only tags are a non issue because the general public doesn’t have the ability to access those grounds and won’t on most of them.

In checkerboard areas or areas with several "hobby ranches" it is. Guess where the elk hang when there is pressure from small swaths of public ground around the small tracts of private.
 
Those tags also benefit the land owner to mitigate damage costs etc. it’s pretty easy to buy unit wide lo tags direct if you do any leg work, and lots of them sell to diy guys.

Wealthy residents buy tags just the same was wealthy non residents, it’s a divisive tactic to blame NRs for all your problems.

The private land only tags are a non issue because the general public doesn’t have the ability to access those grounds and won’t on most of them.
Actually I am advocating better hunting opportunity for the DIY non-resident as well. More tags in the public draw and we have better odds to draw a tag. Land owners would rather have a rock solid lease that pays no matter what the drought conditions are. Some will resist it. The outfitters that own the land for hunting property definitely will be against state leases. If residents and non-residents alike don’t get enough tags to hunt public lands, any wildlife program will crash and burn…simple math. And you can kiss our public lands good bye as well. It’s called privatization.
 
Sort of. I've bought RO tags and it's glaringly obvious repairs are not made. The sale of the tag simply goes to paying their property tax and "pocketing" the rest.



Again, sort of. Most LO tags are bought by NR's. R's will usually buy cow tags and take a son/daughter or niece/nephew.



In checkerboard areas or areas with several "hobby ranches" it is. Guess where the elk hang when there is pressure from small swaths of public ground around the small tracts of private.

Nm is one of the poorest states in the nation, everything looks old and run down there.

As for the hobby ranches, do you think getting rid of tags will make the accessible somehow?


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Actually I am advocating better hunting opportunity for the DIY non-resident as well. More tags in the public draw and we have better odds to draw a tag. Land owners would rather have a rock solid lease that pays no matter what the drought conditions are. Some will resist it. The outfitters that own the land for hunting property definitely will be against state leases. If residents and non-residents alike don’t get enough tags to hunt public lands, any wildlife program will crash and burn…simple math. And you can kiss our public lands good bye as well. It’s called privatization.

Without guaranteed tags, no outfitter will lease ground. Many landowners don’t want the uninsured public on their property.

It might seem like a good idea in your head, but I guarantee it’ll failure in execution.


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