New Benelli MRl Is Varmint-Hunting Ready
New Benelli MRl Is Varmint-Hunting Ready
New Benelli MRl Is Varmint-Hunting Ready
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cooNznrs CORNER<br />
alent each year. There's nothing<br />
like being paid to do a job<br />
and then having to fight your<br />
employer every step of the way<br />
to do it properly. Today, computers<br />
play a major jxirt in game<br />
management for all the states,<br />
and computers are both a blessing<br />
and a curse, to say the least.<br />
I guided spring bear hunters<br />
for a number of years before the<br />
liberal "bunny buggers" and<br />
anti-hunters, aided and alxrtted<br />
by some of Colorado's own<br />
preservationist-type biologists,<br />
got it voted out. One of the<br />
last years of the season another<br />
outfitter aiul I took 33 bears<br />
between us in the southwestern<br />
part of the state, Tor the most<br />
|wrt our clients were looking<br />
for trophy bears and one of the<br />
advantages of hunting over bait<br />
and with dogs is the hunter gets<br />
a chance to get a close look at<br />
26 -. : -Kiwatw<br />
the trophy qualities of the a bear<br />
on the bait or treed before deciding<br />
whether or not to shoot.<br />
Of the 33 bears our clients<br />
killed that spring only three were<br />
females, well within the most<br />
stringent parameters computerconsulting<br />
biologists felt wouldn't<br />
impact the perpetuation of the<br />
increasing bear population. By<br />
law, each hunter had to physically<br />
check in his bear with the local<br />
conservation officer for a "hands<br />
on" check and official tagging.<br />
However, when the Colorado<br />
IX)W's annual bear harvest data<br />
came out, both the other outfitter<br />
and I immediately picked up<br />
on the fact that the number of<br />
males to females harvested didn't<br />
jil>e with our kill figures — and<br />
we'd taken a high percentage<br />
of the bears killed in that unit<br />
during the spring season. When<br />
I questioned the area manager<br />
about this seeming discrepancy, he<br />
blithely stated that they didn't use<br />
the actual "hands on" information<br />
provided by the local conservation<br />
officers. Information that consisted<br />
of the l>ear's sex, age, approximate<br />
weight, and if a female whether<br />
she showed signs of having produced<br />
cubs. In addition they took<br />
a tooth for more accurate annual<br />
ring aging. Instead of this, the division<br />
got their information from a<br />
conipiiUT-m
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