Stort fald i salget af storvildt licenser

[ran]

Big game license sales show big fall
Officials wonder if Katrina is to blame analysis

By Bobby Cleveland
bcleveland@clarionledger.com

Deer hunting, whether with a gun or a bow, is big business in Mississippi, but 2006 license sales indicate that 24,000 fewer residents participated than just five years ago.

Looking at the bottom line for Mississippi's hunting and fishing license sales for fiscal year 2006, everything appears quite rosy. Revenues are slightly up.

However, a closer look at the figures above the net total paints a different picture, especially for deer hunting.

It's a good news, bad news, worst news sort of thing for state wildlife officials.

Good news: Sportsman licenses ($31) hit an all-time high, reaching 108,618. That's almost 7,500 more than five years ago in fiscal year 2002.

Bad news: Sales of the other license residents can buy to hunt deer, the All-Game Hunting and Fishing License ($17), fell drastically to 63,243. That's nearly 10,000 less than the previous year and almost 31,000 less than in 2002.

Worst news: The combined total of the two licenses was 171,861, the lowest total in five years and almost 24,000 less than 2002. While sales have been declining since 2002, the 2006 decline (over 9,000) is by far the biggest. Add in a 5,300 decline in 2005, and there were almost 15,000 less resident deer hunting licenses sold in 2006 than in 2004.

Officials at the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks are concerned, and are hopeful that Hurricane Katrina was the cause of that huge one-year dip.

"We won't know that for sure until we start seeing how our 2007 license sales go," said Michael Bolden, who oversees the agency's license bureau. "It will be interesting to see what kind of recruitment we get next year as the Katrina recovery process continues."

Katrina's timing fits the scenario in respect to high Sportsman license sales and low All-Game Hunting and Fishing sales. The hurricane hit on Aug. 29, after most of the mailout Sportsman renewal forms had been sent and returned. Bolden said the All-Game Hunting and Fishing licenses are usually bought in the months prior to the hunting season - September through November, the time when sportsmen in south Mississippi were too busy to hunt.

Yet, the 2006 bottom line is ahead of all four previous years.

Revenue totals from both resident and non-resident licenses stood at $14,727,938 through May 31. Fiscal year 2005 ended last June 30 at $14,655,066.

With a few more fishing licenses to be sold the rest of this month, the state is already $199,197 ahead.

So how can the state sell 13,000 fewer total resident hunting and fishing licenses and a few thousand less non-resident licenses and still make more money?

The answer is simple. The state sold the heck out of several new permits required of certain hunters.

Residents who hunted on state Wildlife Management Areas (WMAs) were for the first time required to purchase a $15 WMA permit. A total of 29,742 were sold raising $446,130.

Non-resident WMA users were required to purchase a $30 WMA permit, and 2,202 did for $66,060. Non-residents were also required - for the first time - to purchase deer permits ($5), spring turkey permits ($20) and fall turkey permits ($20). Total sales from those three added $153,925.

Larry Castle, the agency's chief of wildlife, said that the revenue received from the WMA permits will go into the general pool.

"But, I can show on paper that it was used as we promised, on the ground at our WMAs," Castle said. "No, it is not earmarked for special use. None of our fees are. But yes, I control the WMA budget and I assure you that the WMAs got that money. The permit was created to make the WMA's more self-sustaining and to improve them and that's what we did."

.....nu OGSÅ ejer af en 243win :-)

Favourite Quote: Vi løser ikke vore problemer ved at tænke på samme måde, som da vi skabte dem.....(Albert Einstein)