I just read an email from PF outlining the Summer of 2019 accomplishments. One thing I took away from it is PF is now backing this program as long as half the revenue taken in from selling $25 to $15 Pheasant Stamps to ALL who hunt any non shooting preserve pheasants must go into habitat. Looks like pheasant hunters will be funding this mess both with tax $$$$ and stamp $$$. No hard details as to the actual cost of the stamp yet, or the details of the shoot. There is also mention of extending this program beyond the current two year time frame. Wonder if the stamp will drive away the relatively few pheasant hunters that still exist. The cost isn't huge, but it is a blindside to those of us who thought the state funding and a fee to participate in the shoot was all there was. Think I'll let my reps know I'm tired of being nickel and dimed.
Pheasant Stamp for Put/Take
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I hate being nickel and dimed, also. The stamp is no surprise because the whole program is being modeled after some of the other states like I think Wisconsin, being one. Hey, DNR personnel needs their fat checks and benefits, too. I'll gladly pay my license fees and keep my mouth shut as long as they leave me and my lab alone while i"m out in the field.
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The stamp has always been the plan to finance this. Pheasant Forever is just saying they don’t support releasing birds to improve pheasant numbers but if they can get money to do habitat work they can compromise. Dollars are hard to come by and work on habitat is expensive. Sometimes you have to bend a little to get what you want. Personally I don’t see this working because even at $25 high point of the stamp that leaves $12.50 minus administrative cost to buy and stock birds That won’t buy many.
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If its money towards habitat im all for it(the stamp not rhe release). Heck, they should start a grouse and woodcock stamp.
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I’m not a big proponent of this change and definitely feel it wasn’t well thought out before implementation. Although I will say R3 is real and needed. Maybe not for those old enough to remember everything but for future generations to experience what you love. And at least this is doing SOMETHING. I wish we could come together as hunters and do more. So I do support the fact they did something. Failure maybe but at least it’s a idea and followed through.
BTW I’m not that young
BTW I’m not that young
Grouse and woodcock habitat management doesn’t need a stamp. They sell timber and actually make money managing for those species, with an additional plus of deer habitat taboot.
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Yes cutting makes the state money. But to be exact, cutting is only done when it is profitable. The state is never going to sell its timber at a loss. Timber can be a very boom and bust industry. Sure when they are cutting hard and the market is good they make money. But when timber prices are low cutting does not get done. Or less profitable trees like aspen are not cut, which are the ones that we really need taken down when they age out. This is an area where a grouse and woodcock stamp could be used to subsidize cutting. There are also areas that dont get cut because they are a great distance away from saw/paper mills, and trucking costs make the cut infeasable.. For instance southern michigan forests. This could be subsidized by the stamp. Money could go towards more studies on grouse and woodcock to better understand them. I could go on and on but i guess what i mean is that it is a priveledge to have the bird hunting that we do here in MI and I think we should be willing to buck up to keep it that way. Any money towards habitat is a great thing!
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While I agree with you about being willing work to keep what we have I also feel that the state has been tasked with managing these as well and the solution can't always be add another stamp or tax something new/more.
There is constant talk about hunter numbers dropping, the more stamps/taxes you add the higher the barrier of entry is. I will spend over $150 on licenses this year, thankfully I have the means to do that but could an 18 yr old? What about someone who didn't grow up in a family that hunts and is buying there gear. Something to think about.
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I see what youre saying. Sometimes i forget that not everyone who hunts upland birds has an absolute passion for it. I personally would be willing to spend a lot on a license to hunt grouse. At least now I would. However looking back on my former self it woild be a different story. The grouse hunt that really got me hooked was during college when a buddy asked me to go. I had hardly any cash and if it was 50 bucks to hunt i probably wouldnt have. Well it wasnt, and we went. Now im a die hard and he is my best hunting buddy. I suppose if i want to give more money for habitat RGS will never say no haha.
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This will be the final demise of pheasant hunting in Michigan quite possibly.Failure after failure so far with the put n take program and the szechuan program.So now here we are with another put n take program with a pheasant stamp.They claim the program is designed to help with hunter recruitment but the additional cost is saying your in or out and you can still hunt small game including grouse at no extra cost.This does not make sense to me.I can't say where this is going but I have reservations about it.
I have spent some time reading Pennsylvania forums and it seems like a lot of folks are dropping out.The one story was one guy with a dog and a few friends that get together and pheasant hunt once or twice a year as tradition.The tradition ended with the stamp program because they (5 guys) didn't feel it was worth paying for five small game licenses and stamps to maybe shoot one bird and after a few years the tradition ended.
I have spent some time reading Pennsylvania forums and it seems like a lot of folks are dropping out.The one story was one guy with a dog and a few friends that get together and pheasant hunt once or twice a year as tradition.The tradition ended with the stamp program because they (5 guys) didn't feel it was worth paying for five small game licenses and stamps to maybe shoot one bird and after a few years the tradition ended.
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The loss would be to high.Pennsylvania releases around 200,000 birds and the harvest is around 50% and I would suggest that if they released during the time frame you mentioned it could easily go 80%, or higher.There program costs about 4 million and the stamp doesn't even come close to supporting it.4 million for a 100,000 thousand bird harvest with no long term value.Rinse,wash,repeat.
Michigan has potential if habitat is addressed in ag areas.We ranked 7th a few years ago for pheasant hunting in the US.It will however never be what some remember ever again.
The past few years have been really good for me and I hardly hunted grouse after the 20th and I hunt only public land.
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No penned birds won't become wild. They will be thinned out heavily by predators because penned birds are really stupid. I believe only about 2-5% released make it. I an sure someone on here will know the numbers.
I live 1 mile from a hunt club. When the season is in full swing I see the unshot birds walking the edge of the roads pecking gravel. It is not uncommon to see 3 in a day hit by cars on one streatch. They are pretty dumb. I get a handful that make it on to my property. In the winter they become balls of feathers left behind from fox.
You are absolutely correct. Less than 10% will make it under ideal conditions. However, from what I've read that's how some of the successful releases were made here in the USA. Pen birds from England were planted here and survived. Farming conditions have changed considerably over 200 years. Instead of wasting the money on put n take why not use it for research to find out why the birds are down across the country? Once we have science proving the cause/s we can better address the issue. Right now as far as I know, there are few if any experiments being conducted. Someone mentioned earlier that the DNR is concerned about bird flu in pats. How about pheasants? I don't know the answer, but planting birds to be shot is a political move, not a scientific one. It is a doomed program just like the last one.
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Less than 1% will live 6 months.Average life of a wild pheasant is 1.5 to 3 years of age.
The game birds that were established years ago (pheasants,chukars,Hungarians) for example had the genetics and diversity and were wild.The new science is genomics,(genomes,genetics) for endangered species.
Today's pheasants are genetically devoid and have been breed for so long they have become domesticated.There survival would be equal to a farm chicken which have to be cared for,immunized,medicated.
The science seems to show that if a pen raised pheasant actually does survive to breed which we used to think is a plus actually is possibly not beneficial.This can actually enter the gene pool and have long term effects on wilds.
Once a population gets low restablishment of endangered species even with restored habitat has been a problem.Genomics seems to have the clues to why.Here is a article from USFWS.
Species of management concern often have small population sizes and are subject to threats such as loss and fragmentation of habitat, and disturbance. We conduct genetic and genomic studies to identify populations with low genetic diversity and small sizes, and populations that are isolated because natural dispersal and migration patterns are inhibited. These populations may be more vulnerable to local extinction without management action. Work focuses on animal and plant species in California and the desert southwest and spans seven ecoregions. Science objectives include describing metapopulation structure and function, estimating gene flow and dispersal rates, effective population size, and the number of breeders, and testing hypotheses on the impacts of fragmentation and disturbance on population structure and the maintenance of genetic diversity within populations. Another objective is often defining evolutionary relationships among cryptic species or lineages (phylogeography and systematics). These studies typically represent the first genetic surveys for these species, and significantly add to existing system knowledge. Results guide species management actions such as habitat restoration, translocations and re-establishment programs and developing long-term genetic monitoring plans.
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5,245 Posts
Posit this.
You give 10 million people an email that says there will be X number of pheasants in this field on such and such a date.
How many do you think are going to show up?
How many of the released birds do you think are going to survive until the following reproductive season?
You give 10 million people an email that says there will be X number of pheasants in this field on such and such a date.
How many do you think are going to show up?
How many of the released birds do you think are going to survive until the following reproductive season?
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