Trail Access Restrictions - No UTVs = No Horses

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NMJM

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New Mexico
I wish there were *more* restrictions on ATV’s and UTV’s and I haven’t been on a horse since I broke my arm (for the second time) on dads barrel racing horse I wasn’t supposed to be riding in the fourth grade.

Keep wild places wild. There is nothing more out of place and disheartening than being in the middle of nowhere, miles from a road and having a quasi biker gang of overweight suburbanites come screaming around the bend on their expensive go-carts.

Mountain bike? Cool
Horses and mules? Cool
E-bikes? Yeah alright
Motorized vehicles? Negative. Ride them on the national forest roads with the cars if you really want to get them out of the culdesac.

Just my opinion.
100% agree
 

TaperPin

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Jul 12, 2023
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Not at all! It was a great learning experience and I look forward to going back next year.

It amazes me how entitled some residents are here on this forum. Heaven forbid someone show up with a different point of view or point out where people have used the system to give themselves an unreasonable advantage. It's certainly not all of them, but if you're not one of them you know who I'm talking about. If you don't then you're probably who I'm talking about.
Not everyone that grows up in family with horses automatically hunts on horseback. An outfitter’s son I know is plenty happy to avoid horse hassles, and hunts areas horses can’t access. I park next to a lot of horse hunters, but it makes no sense hunting next to them.

Trying to compete with horses on major horse trails is like walking down a 4 wheeler trail and complaining about what an advantage they have. Do painters with only a brush complain about those who have a sprayer? Lol
 

Mtndawger

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Replace side by side with horses and your statement is equally true.

It is a big leap. Everything else is fair. If horses aren't native to the area they should be banned too.
Every one of those is a straw man argument. You are missing the logic. There has to be rules. We have to agree on the rules and to a large extent we have agreed on them which is why we have some trails that you get to use your motorized vehicle on for 9 months (or 6 or what have you) of the year but not during hunting season. That is fair. “Wild” in the modern world is a relative definition. True Wild excludes man entirely and it may get to that someday, but for now horses are animals, as is a man on foot and as such is much less of an impact on game. Once again, it’s not about you and what you think your rights are, it’s about how best to manage the interest of the game with the interests of man. It really isn’t a leap. There are plenty of places to do what you want to do. If it makes you feel better, I’m a really fit dude backcountry telemark skiing and mountain biking and hiking and hunting during muzzleloader, duck (mountain duck hunting) first rifle, second rifle and this year fourth rifle, all weekly year round and even I don’t hike or backpack in more that a few miles off trail or road (I try to avoid trails during hunting season) in the Colorado mountains. Its really hard work. Anymore it is a feat to get away from people in the mountains into truly wild country. The place is over run with people. So again, let some places be.
 
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Idaho Falls,ID
I hate SxS's and couldn't even begin to list all the reasons why. My hatred for them has more ties to problems within our population than to hunting. I see hunters using them in some creative ways, and in some ways that should get them jail time.
I grew up hunting about 25% on foot, and 75% on horses. I got to feed the horses twice a day, and my brother and I got to ride them 3 times a week all year. I learned how to fix tack, replace a shoe occasionally, buy good hay instead of junk. The most important skill I learned from horses was WORK. It's pretty damn rewarding to have a horse (or horses) that you fed, watered, doctored, trained, and kept in shape return the favor by putting an elk, deer, moose, bear, etc that you killed on its back and carry it back to the truck for you. Increasingly fewer people will deal with the work that owning USEFUL horses requires.
I see none of that accomplishment in owning a SxS. Drop 30k-50k (usually dealer financing or part of an ill-advised HELOC), drive it home, show it to your friends while getting a little chub because yours is newer than theirs.....ya, not my thing. Horses are just about as native to the West as Caucasians are, and have a huge place in a lot of Native American culture. I don't think the same thing can be said for UTV's.
They will be banned slowly but surely, along with trail cams, Bluetooth scopes, Drones, thermal units. I won't care a bit when it happens, and all of us will know why it happened. It won't matter to a lot of hunters who have used boot leather and/or horshoes for most of their lives to bring meat and antlers home. UTV's and horses are not the same thing.
 

wyosam

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Not at all! It was a great learning experience and I look forward to going back next year.

It amazes me how entitled some residents are here on this forum. Heaven forbid someone show up with a different point of view or point out where people have used the system to give themselves an unreasonable advantage. It's certainly not all of them, but if you're not one of them you know who I'm talking about. If you don't then you're probably who I'm talking about.

It’s not even residents, pretty sure there are people from all over in this thread. For a trip you say you enjoyed, it just seems like you’ve been complaining about most every aspect of it, generally blaming the world because you “put in the work” and didn’t find elk.


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Bachto

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Dec 13, 2018
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Location
Benton City, WA
This has kind of been touched on with the work aspect of horses but OP doesn't realized how restricted you actually are on where you can take a horse in the backcountry. You need graze and water and some areas are way too steep and you really can't take them off trail too much sometimes (area dependent). They are a lot of work outside of hunting season but they are a ton of work during the hunt. There are so many other places you can get to on foot that a horse hunter can't get to. As a person on foot all you really have to do is leave the trail a half mile or go through a patch of blowdowns and can probably get away from horse hunters.

Just like most people plan on pressure whether that is from SXS's, other people, bird hunters or whatever it sounds like you didn't take into account that you were in F***ing Wyoming and that there would be people on horses.

I kind of understood your argument like a tiny bit. Until some of your reply's and now I feel like you are just complaining. so I don't really have much sympathy.

It's also a slippery slope as well. I run pack goats. Am I not allowed on closed trails either? where do you draw the line on what pack stock is allowed?
 
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Don’t even get me started on those sniper wannabes at the range every weekend shooting their rifle when I’m at the golf course.

It would be a lot more fair if you couldn’t legally shoot animals past 250 yards. /s
Actually 250 is way too far of a benchmark. I want to see a pre season shooting test implemented, and if you pass the test, then you shouldn't be allowed to hunt. Just because I choose to stay home and chug beer all year, why should some guy who practices have an advantage over me?
 

Nockdown

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Feb 2, 2014
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MT
ATV/UTV people are weird. Never understood people pulling their fancy toy haulers to the hills, tearing the shit out of the roads all weekend and then having to bounce down the ruts they made on the way out.


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BowBaboon

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“Wild” in the modern world is a relative definition. True Wild excludes man entirely and it may get to that someday, but for now horses are animals, as is a man on foot and as such is much less of an impact on game. Once again, it’s not about you and what you think your rights are, it’s about how best to manage the interest of the game with the interests of man. It really isn’t a leap.
Just for funsies, is “wild” truly the absence of man? Or is it the absence of technology? Should we take wilderness restrictions back to atlatls and recurves?

Based on some recent discoveries, it’s looking like man has been on this continent for 15,000+ years. I think it was wild when man existed.

Not at all disagreeing with your thoughts on impact of man on animals these days. I’m just trying to make a decent conversation out of this cess pool of complaining.
 

Rich M

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Jun 14, 2017
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Orlando
Don't hate the player.. Hate the game.
The game has rules. Some folks master the game, others fuss about the game.

Some players fuss with the rules as you well know w children who always want to change the rules to benefit themselves. If we’d all just know and play by the rules…

Access, preference points, hunt draws, season dates, antler restrictions, Ford vs Chevy, whatever.
 

Mtndawger

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Just for funsies, is “wild” truly the absence of man? Or is it the absence of technology? Should we take wilderness restrictions back to atlatls and recurves?

Based on some recent discoveries, it’s looking like man has been on this continent for 15,000+ years. I think it was wild when man existed.

Not at all disagreeing with your thoughts on impact of man on animals these days. I’m just trying to make a decent conversation out of this cess pool of complaining.
Good questions. Probably absence of technology. No we shouldn’t take it back to atlatls and recurves. There is a happy medium in there somewhere…not for everyone but for most. The thing is, everything touched my man seems to require management of some sort. We are a menace to the natural world.

Craig Childs, Atlas of a Lost World, is a great read about our historic presence in North America. We’ve slowly and surely been making it less wild.
 
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