Survey: Most Idaho sportsmen OK with auctioning game tags

HUNTING — Most Idaho hunters would support the state offering more big-game tags for auction to raise money for wildlife management, according to an Idaho Fish and Game Department survey.

The voluntary mail survey pertaining to controlled hunts and big game auction tags was conducted late in 2015.

• Asked if it was acceptable for Fish and Game to auction tags to generate funds for wildlife management programs, 55 percent of hunters in the mail survey agreed, 37 percent disagreed and 8 percent were neutral.
• Asked if Fish and Game should release up to 12 more big game auction tags to help fund wildlife management and hunter access programs, 51 percent of mail responders agreed, 38 percent disagreed and 11 percent were neutral.

Hunters who buy raffle chances and auction tags contribute directly to funding big-game management. Most notable is the funds raised for research on diseases setting back Idaho’s bighorn sheep.

Sportsmen who have bid on auction tags or bought a chance at a bighorn sheep lottery tag have raised $2.9 million since 1998 for bighorn sheep restoration including disease research, transplants and habitat conservation, Idaho Fish and Game officials say.

Auctions for the ultimate bighorn sheep hunt in Idaho and other states and provinces will occur Jan. 21-23 at the Wild Sheep Foundation Banquet and Auction in Reno, NV.

Online bids will be accepted.

• See a new video about wildlife biologists’ research on diseases and efforts to helping wild sheep repopulate the western landscape.