Two years ago there was a question on the spring hearing ballot that sought to create a $1 deer stamp to raise money to study the buck recovery rate in order to improve SAK. With 650,000 hunters, that would net slightly less than $650,000 since there would be some cost in implementing the stamp system. I'm not sure how far $650,000 would go but now that EAB is shelved and the population is very near goal, there are 49 regular units. The Dept. will be selling a total of 214,000, $12 antlerless tags in 2009. That will raise $2.57 million dollars. This is over and above the unlimited antlerless tags that will be sold in the herd control units. There is no cost to the Dept. except some more rolls of ALIS back tag material.
This $2.57 million could and should certainly be tapped for the funds needed to study the buck recovery rate and other SAK improvements, don't you agree?
