Bounties for predator tails? Probably?
Free traps? Probably not.
That’s my guess after listening to Gov. Kristi Noem in her State of the State address as she praised the controversial nest-predator bounty program she directed the state Game, Fish & Parks Department to implement last year, paying $10 for tails of targeted predators.
“We trapped 50,000 predators,” she said during her address.
It’s unclear what that meant to the state pheasant population, which Noem hopes to boost with a pheasant initiative that includes scientifically supported habitat work and the much-more-questionable predator control program.
The bounty program began last spring prior to the pheasant nesting season and ran into August, when money dedicated to the program ran out at about $500,000. Brood surveys last August by GF&P indicated a 17 percent decline in pheasants from the previous year. And it was 43 percent below the 10-year average.
Hunting reports were spotty across the state during the pheasant season that ended Jan. 5. Some traditional hunting areas in the state’s main pheasant belt were down far below normal. But there were areas where bird numbers were improved.
Overall, it’s hard to say what the population was like because wet conditions left vast stretches of standing corn and other grains throughout the hunting season. And some fields that were never planted were grown up in weeds.
Both provided extensive cover for birds, and the standing corn in particular — sometimes standing in wet, muddy, snow fields — likely reduced hunting success in those areas.
Noem seemed optimistic about bird numbers in her address, however.
“I’m hearing from people all over the state that the birds are more plentiful,” she said.
On that, she didn’t hear from me. I would have told her that in some of the best pheasant ground I’ve ever known in central South Dakota where I grew up, pheasants were as scarce this year as they’ve been since the mid-1970s. And I’ve heard the same from others in areas that traditionally are flush with the state bird.
I’ve also heard, like she obviously has, better news from other areas. But I can’t imagine the final estimate of bird numbers by GF&P will be much of a turnabout from that depressed brood survey last summer.
None of which can in any meaningful way — good or bad — be tied to the bounty program, or to the related live-trap giveaway. You don’t have a measurable impact on a statewide pheasant population in one year by adding a few thousand new traps and some new trappers in the fields.
It’s a lot more complicated than that. And a lot more habitat driven.
The trap giveaway that allowed people across the state — in pheasant country and beyond — to receive free traps also was a Noem directive. She says it not only killed predators but got people — especially kids — involved in the outdoors, giving them a better appreciation for nature and connections with landowners. That part, I agree, is good.
That giveaway program cost about $1 million. Like the bounty money, the funds to pay for the traps came from hunting and fishing license revenues in GF&P’s Wildlife Fund. So understandably, state sportsmen are interested in how their money is being spent and whether it is spent wisely.
Some of them will be in Pierre this Thursday afternoon for the state Game, Fish & Parks Commission meeting at the visitor center near Capitol Lake. The meeting begins at 1 p.m. central time. The bounty program will be among items up for discussion.
Commissioner Chairman Gary Jensen of Rapid City said Tuesday following Noem’s State of the State address that he was uncertain what role the GF&P Commission will have in deciding whether to continue the $10-per-tail bounty on certain predators thought to be particularly harmful to nesting pheasants and other upland birds and ducks.
Last year, GF&P Secretary Kelly Hepler, a member of Noem’s cabinet, implemented the predator bounty and trap giveaway efforts without a commission vote. The commission then considered the issue and listened to public comments, basically after the fact, something that also angered some sportsmen.
Jensen said Hepler had the authority to go ahead with the program again this year. But if the commission is more involved than that, Jensen said he wants to get the public involved, too.
“If they (GF&P staff) are coming to ask the commission for our thoughts, we’ll automatically ask the people,” Jensen said.
The commission — a citizen board appointed by the governor — is scheduled to get a review from GF&P staffers on the first year of the bounty program and the effects of the trap giveaway.
“What I think I know is they’re going to give a complete summary of the live-trap program and the bounty program that was had last year,” Jensen said. “And I think there’s interest in the department to extend that or have a bounty program again. But exactly what that conversation is going to be, I don’t know.”
On the live-trap give-away program, which cost about $1 million, Jensen said: “I’m not aware of any discussion of a trap giveaway again.”
Noem sort of surprised state sportsmen’s groups with the plan last year. In general, they didn’t like it. In general, they still don’t. That’s because wildlife management principles and historical evidence in South Dakota and elsewhere say that available habitat and weather conditions are the main determining factors in pheasant umbers.
While predator control can be useful in controlling pheasant losses to predation in local areas, such as on hunting preserves, it is not considered a viable or affordable option in building upland bird populations on a landscape-wide basis.
Noem promoted the plan as part of her overall initiative to improve pheasant numbers, which are and always have been cyclical — sometimes dramatically so — depending on weather conditions and the habitat base. Programs such as the federal Conservation Reserve Program and the vast habitat base it produced are far more effective than predator control at sustaining pheasants.
But Noem said in her State of the State that the public response to the predator program has been “overwhelmingly positive.” There is, however, strong opposition to it among some conservationists and wildlife advocates who say it rejects scientific management principles and could for not good reason hurt targeted populations of raccoon, skunk, fox, possum and badger populations.
Jensen said he has already been hearing from some of those people.
But there’s no question that ground predators destroy pheasant nests. They can have a noticeable impact in given areas, especially those with reduced habitat. And Noem, a former hunting-preserve operator, clearly believes in the value of predator control. Her belief and direction to the GF&P staff will likely be a strong factor when the GF&P Commission takes up the bounty issue Thursday.
Jensen declined to say how he is leaning, or whether he is leaning.
“I just need to hear what happens on Thursday,” he said. “And I think we’ll all go from there.”
