Guest policy on leases ... whats up?

[Smart]

I grew up on family land that we still have. We also lease out portions of our land and have had issues with more folks hunting than paid to hunt.
So, please answer this question. Why should a landowner allow non-paying hunters of any age or relation? It is my experience that if you give an inch, a mile is taken.

I can see where your views come from. You are fortunate enough to have never had to pay a lease fee to hunt. If I had never had to pay lease fees or paid extra for family members to hunt, I probably wouldn't understand what the big deal is either.

You are also on the money receiving side, so I can understand you wanting to get every single dollar you possibly can even at the expense of not introducing kids to the future of hunting. And there is nothing wrong with that as it is your choosing. I personally don't have the same view.

To answer your question. Simply to help introduce kids to hunting...having a hand in that has more gains than anything monetary could give. Not to mention it will ensure there will be hunters to lease your family land in the future.

Personally if I was a landowner I would view the lease fee as a # of animals allotment per paid member....much like a family lease does. I wouldn't view it as a per person. Say the allotment is 2 bucks 2 does..... If the 4 animals die at the hands of the paid member....great....if 2 die at the hands of the paid member and 2 die at the hands of his first time hunting 8 year old son...... even better!!!.....I mean can you imagine introducing a kid to this great past time we call hunting, having a hand in the beginning of a new lifelong passion and the joy that it brought to him. The feeling knowing I allowed it to happen for the betterment of our sport and that kid will remember that time forever, when I could have made rules to exclude him for the almighty dollar, would be like none other.

[TexasCanesFan]

Here is how I would handle guests/kids, if the deer lease gods put me in charge.
1) Child can hunt until they are 17. Deer taken come off paid hunters tags. (If you allow guests, well the 17 rule would not apply, the child would just be considered a guest.)
2) Paid hunter must accompany child/guest in the blind/stand with kid/guest at all times during the hunt. Paid hunter takes responsibility for all child/guest kills.
3) Paid hunters only hunt their own blind/stand/area.

If you want your child or guest to be able to go off by themselves as if they were a member of the lease, make them a member of the lease.

Problem solved!

EXACTLY!!!! Thanks for adding that Kdog.

I completely agree. This solves all problems related to guests right there. These are the exact same rules I put in place when I used to be a Lease Manager.

Assuming the paid member follows the rules that is.

Paid Members following the rules is also solved by proper screening of potential lease members prior to them ever paying their money and becoming a member of the lease. Take a potential lease member to the ranch and show him around. Meet him face to face and shake his hand. Then spend some time talking to him and learning about him. If you listen good enough, they will usually talk themselves out of a spot on the ranch all by themselves. Then decide if he is right for the ranch or not.

It is some extra work on the front end, but saves many headaches and problems on the back end.

[TexasCanesFan]

i grew up on family land that we still have. We also lease out portions of our land and have had issues with more folks hunting than paid to hunt.
So, please answer this question. Why should a landowner allow non-paying hunters of any age or relation? It is my experience that if you give an inch, a mile is taken.

wow!!!

[westguy76]

I can see where your views come from. You are fortunate enough to have never had to pay a lease fee to hunt. If I had never had to pay lease fees or paid extra for family members to hunt, I probably wouldn't understand what the big deal is either.

You are also on the money receiving side, so I can understand you wanting to get every single dollar you possibly can even at the expense of not introducing kids to the future of hunting. And there is nothing wrong with that as it is your choosing. I personally don't have the same view.

To answer your question. Simply to help introduce kids to hunting...having a hand in that has more gains than anything monetary could give. Not to mention it will ensure there will be hunters to lease your family land in the future.

Personally if I was a landowner I would view the lease fee as a # of animals allotment per paid member....much like a family lease does. I wouldn't view it as a per person. Say the allotment is 2 bucks 2 does..... If the 4 animals die at the hands of the paid member....great....if 2 die at the hands of the paid member and 2 die at the hands of his first time hunting 8 year old son...... even better!!!.....I mean can you imagine introducing a kid to this great past time we call hunting, having a hand in the beginning of a new lifelong passion and the joy that it brought to him. The feeling knowing I allowed it to happen for the betterment of our sport and that kid will remember that time forever, when I could have made rules to exclude him for the almighty dollar, would be like none other.

well said

[Tbar]

It is called capitalism. There is a market for no guest leases and they sell. Some serious trophy deer hunters that want limited competition and disturbance on the leases they purchase.

There are plenty of leases that allow guests and they sell too.

Also remember the liability exposure to the land owner is less with 5 hunters vs 5 hunters with 2 guests each.


Tbar

[Kingfisher]

Smart, that is very generous and high and mighty of you. But then again, it is very easy for someone to say what they would do with something that they do not have. Our family ranch pays for itself and not much more. Yes, it does require that the land generate every dollar it can. You ask ranchers to give away a commodity, but what do you ask a farmer to give away? Or as a rancher, should I give my beef away? It is not a toy that is played with household money. It is a business. What business are you in? How much do you give away so that someone can introduce their kids to your product?
I want to introduce my daughter to the joy and excitement of the world of Ferrari. But when I walk into a Ferrari dealership and try to, I am expected to pay. There are no free Ferrari rides.
Again, experience shows that you give an inch, a mile is taken.
You also have no idea how many guests, with children) we have on the portion of the ranch that is not leased out. So save your sermon for Sunday.

[TexaswBOWhunter]

Our rules don't allow guests at all, not even in the off season to fill feeders... However, it is a family lease (immediate only) and they must hunt your stand (s) unless given permission by another hunter to hunt their stand, we don't have any "community stands".... No 4-wheelers allowed on our lease so that's not an issue...

Your family shoots off your allotment of animals, once your child turns 18 they are no longer allowed to hunt without buying a spot (more or less)...

All that said, we have all discussed it and don't have a problem with guests being on the lease as long as they are in your stand with you and tyhe animal cames off your allotment, however our rules were set by the landowner and at this point we haven't discussed it with them yet!!!!

[TexasCanesFan]

Smart, that is very generous and high and mighty of you. But then again, it is very easy for someone to say what they would do with something that they do not have. Our family ranch pays for itself and not much more. Yes, it does require that the land generate every dollar it can. You ask ranchers to give away a commodity, but what do you ask a farmer to give away? Or as a rancher, should I give my beef away? It is not a toy that is played with household money. It is a business. What business are you in? How much do you give away so that someone can introduce their kids to your product?
I want to introduce my daughter to the joy and excitement of the world of Ferrari. But when I walk into a Ferrari dealership and try to, I am expected to pay. There are no free Ferrari rides.
Again, experience shows that you give an inch, a mile is taken.
You also have no idea how many guests, with children) we have on the portion of the ranch that is not leased out. So save your sermon for Sunday.

Again I will say WOW!!!!!!!

Sure glad I have a class-act for a landowner to deal with. I have dealt with landowners with your attitude before, but not for long!!!

[Smart]

Smart, that is very generous and high and mighty of you. But then again, it is very easy for someone to say what they would do with something that they do not have. Our family ranch pays for itself and not much more. Yes, it does require that the land generate every dollar it can. You ask ranchers to give away a commodity,

I am not asking a landowner to give away a commodity....the paid member has paid for his allotment of 4 animals in my example above. Plus it makes good business sense to make sure one has future hunters to lease from them. If the allotment system is so easy for a non-owner only, why do so many owners across this state do it?

What business are you in? How much do you give away so that someone can introduce their kids to your product?

If a kid could use financial or accounting consulting on what to do with their piggybank or how to account to the IRS for it, I'd make some exceptions. That being said, I gave away untold hours (my time which is my commodity) for years to raise money for Delta Waterfowl for the production of ducks, acquisition of prairie pothole breeding lands, and the introduction of kids to waterfowling. Our chapter also puts on an Annual Kids Day where we allow FAMILIES (PARENTS AND KIDS) who comes across the flyer to come out FOR FREE and take part in introductory duck calling seminars, decoy placement seminars, duck identification seminars, skeet shooting, blind making, raffles, petting zoos, food and drink....mostly funded by us, the committee members out of pocket and some donations. And get this....the landowner is a rancher who wants to introduce youngsters to waterfowling so he can promote the future of the sport and he does it for free as well....he doesn't view it as a way to generate revenue...he views it as a way to generate interest.

I want to introduce my daughter to the joy and excitement of the world of Ferrari. But when I walk into a Ferrari dealership and try to, I am expected to pay. There are no free Ferrari rides.

Buy or lease a Ferrari and let your kid ride in it. Much like the hunter I mentioned above would buy or lease a spot and let his kid take part....

You also have no idea how many guests, with children) we have on the portion of the ranch that is not leased out. So save your sermon for Sunday.

Do you charge those guests and kids for the use of the commodity? I mean you are giving up a commodity right?

Like I said....I can understand your need to squeeze out every nickel, I just don't agree with it when it comes to kids if the paid members animal allotment doesn't get surpassed.

[Skinny]

Back when we used to be on a lease, the guest had to pay to harvest an animal. They had to be hunting under the supervision of a full time hunter though, which makes sense to me...the full time hunter was responsible for their guest and for them harvesting an acceptable animal. The guest could only shoot 1 doe and 1 buck under 130"...I think they had to pay $100...this was back in the early 1990's. Every land owner is gunna have their own rules about guests...and they have the final say.

[TexaswBOWhunter]

So, please answer this question. Why should a landowner allow non-paying hunters of any age or relation? It is my experience that if you give an inch, a mile is taken.

Here's the first thought that came to my mind as a leasee, I paid to use that land for hunting and if I choose to take my family I paid for the use of that land to take them hunting on!!!! Now, knowing that this is my opinion on this there would be some places that I could not hunt and that's why I choose my hunting land accordingly....


Today it is all about the deer, the size, the amount, etc.... Nothing wrong with that at all, we manage our place and that is by our choice, not the owners, they don't have any restricions as long as we don't shoot more deer than the law allows!!!! I know for a fact a place can be managed and allow the hunter to bring his or her family and be successful!!!!

To answer your question why would the land owner care if there are two people in a stand (me and my daughter) versus one person (me by myself) as long as there is still only one animal getting shot????? Our lease allows family to hunt with us off our allotment of animals, I am teaching my family about management as they only hunt with me and shoot what I say and I explain/teach them why we don't shoot the younger bucks and why we need to take out x- amount of does....

[CaptainDave]

I hunt a fairly small place with 2 other people and we agreed to not allow any guest. Only exception is one guy brings out his grandchild sometimes, which none of us have any problem with.

I wouldn't mind a paying lease member bringing out a minor child, etc. That's no problem, especially if they hunt off the member's tags.

However, bringing guest of age and letting them hunt to me can be a different story sometimes. Perhaps they should have paid for a spot too? As much as a lease costs these days, I don't want to see freeloaders either.

[SaltwaterSlick]

Wow this has been an interesting thread to say the least. I guess we have been very lucky for the past 26 years. We have been hunting the same piece of ground and my buddy and I have managed it all this time. We have tried everything in the book with respect to guests, shooting the right deer, taking enough deer, and promoting the family/child environment. We have 10,000 acres, 32 memberships, and a very good management program that has produced some very nice deer over the years. Our problems have been few these past several years, but in the beginning we fought the guest thing and the shooting the wrong deer thing. What we evolved to was a guest pass and a fee for shooting the wrong deer... Our members can bring one guest anytime, and that guest hunts off the allottment of the membership. Members can borrow guest cards from other members, but each member's stand(s) are theirs and theirs alone. No other person may hunt a members stands without express permission. A guest is anyone that is hunting that is not a member. Anyone who enters the ranch other than a non-hunting spouse must have a guest card. We manage our herd by taking mature bucks, 5 1/2 years old or older. We have a generous cull/management rule, and we usually have to encourage people to take more does every year. For the most part, our members bring guests at their desire and there are plenty of deer for the guests to take. If anyone, member or guest shoots an immature buck that does not qualify for a cull/management deer, we have a "seedbuck" fee that is graduated... the bigger/younger it is, the steeper it is... This system has worked very well for us for many years. My kids both grew up hunting with me, and now my daughter in law and son in law are learning to hunt. We do quite fine under these guidelines. My son has been hunting alone on the ranch since he was 12 years old, and he's 25 now, has taken no telling how many deer and has never killed a "seedbuck", because he just grew up learning how to age and judge them on the hoof. It is just the way we do things on our place, and everyone pretty much likes it. Over the past several years we have averaged 1 to 3 "seedbucks" per year. We don't have a requirement that a member be sitting with a guest when he shoots a deer, but the member is 100% responsible for anything the guest shoots and is responsible for paying the "seedbuck" fees immediately. This system allows anyone to bring guests without restriction, and the guest can shoot anything that the member will allow the guest to shoot. This system has worked well for us for the past 10 years that we have evlolved to it... One other thing, is the guest rule only applies during any open deer season. We are first and foremost a deer lease and deer hunting takes priority over all other activities. Nothing else anyone wants to do can negatively affect any member or guest that is deer hunting... We have great duck hunting along the river, and during September we take a bunch of folks with us to dove hunt and fill feeders, work on blinds, etc... no guest restrictions other than you are limited to the number that you can supervise directly. No guests are allowed out on the ranch unescorted by a member... My son is now a member as is several other sons of members who grew up hunting there... we hope to pass the torch and let them manage the property after we are done...

[Atfulldraw]

...

That, my friend, was a great post!

Makes sense, and has the advantage of a proven track record.

Do you mind sharing how much your seedbuck amounts are for a couple of different deer?

[innergel]

Ours is "no guests on any opening weekend, and they hunt off your tag allotment when they hunt, and must be accompanied by the paid hunter at all times"

This is ours as well. Pigs, varmints and dove are fair game to everyone.