The issue, which is now getting national attention, boils down local subsistence “food” hunters vs. non-local “sport hunters,” or “trophy hunters.” In this case, the federal government differentiates between sport and subsistence hunting by location of residence, not nuanced individual motivations. So even if you are a hunter from the Lower 48, or even here in the town of Fairbanks, who wants to hunt moose or caribou to fill your freezer with meat, you would be prohibited from hunting in this area. You would not be defined as a “subsistence hunter,” even if your main objective was hunting for meat.
Related: The Proposed Closure of Public Land Caribou Hunting Isn’t About Herd Health: It’s About Hunter Conflict
You can oppose this issue by writing a letter to the Department of Interior, but you must do it today or tomorrow. You can email the DOI at subsistence@fws.gov, or write a letter through the Backcountry Hunters & Anglers site here—just make sure to make the comment your own. Or you can call in to the public hearing later this week:
- Friday, April 23, 2021 from 5-7 p.m. Alaska Time (or until the end of public participation)
- Teleconference, toll free: (877) 918-3011
- Passcode: 8147177
As I mentioned in the article detailing this issue, the push for this closure isn’t motivated by scientific wildlife management or herd population objectives: it’s rooted in conflict between local and non-local hunters. It’s also about whether or not federal public lands really are public for everyone.
For example: After explaining the method for measuring a bear skull, one prominent media figure stated recently, “Now you have successfully reduced an awesome animal to a number,” and went on to talk about how it was better to be in the kitchen cooking and sharing the meat from that animal. I certainly don’t find fault in cooking and sharing bear meat. And while I don’t want to assume intent, I do think this statement carries an implication: If you care enough or are even curious enough about “trophy size” to measure an animal you killed, you reduce that animal’s value to just a number. And that’s absurd. It’s possible to both appreciate a remarkable animal’s trophy qualities and enjoy the meat it provides. The two are not mutually exclusive.
Examples and attitudes like this drive the message that if you live in the right place or follow the doctrine of a pure food or subsistence hunter, you are more virtuous, and therefore more entitled to the wild resources than hunters who may want to travel to specifically target the largest animal they can find—regardless of the fact that they may be just as interested in bringing home meat as you are.
Although the particular regulatory avenues for Alaska’s potential closure are complex and somewhat unique to Alaska, the fact that any federal public lands can be closed off from non-local user groups simply because local users don’t want them there should scare all hunters.
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This has already started happening in Alaska and will likely continue. How long until similar things start happening in the Lower 48? Most hunters in destination states can already relate to a resentment of non-local hunters crowding trailheads and backcountry honey holes, even if they’re only fleeting thoughts—right now.
In much of the western United States, where federal public land is touted as a crown jewel of hunting opportunity and access for everyone, hunting pressure and competition seem to be growing issues in many places. Will we soon see hunting on federal lands across the country be restricted to only locals who are deemed qualified? In other words, will all those non-resident elk, antelope, and mule deer hunters from the Midwest, South, and East find themselves unable to hunt federal land in the West? You can already see hints of this in states like Wyoming, where non-resident big game hunters can only access federal wilderness areas if they have a guide, or in Montana where there’s a proposal to set aside more non-resident, big-game tags for outfitters. Both of these issues simply make it more limiting (or at least more expensive) for non-residents to hunt big game on federal public land.
The precedent set by the proposed closure in Alaska, and those closures that could follow, would at the very least serve to further divide hunters based on the food hunting versus sport hunting divide. The result will be lost opportunity for many. If federal public land becomes closed to hunting for the vast majority of Americans, then is it even really public hunting land?