Which Nilgai NWR?

[Phorizt]

never hunted LANWR so don't know about that but I've been drawn for 2 archery hunts on different LRGVNWR tracts the past 3 years and shot 3 nilgai. I go 2 days early and scout a ton before the hunt starts which I think is key for me(or maybe I've just been extremely lucky idk). I have no luck hunting whitetails but Nilgai instinctively flock to me like the salmon of Capistrano. . With a rifle there would have been a quite a few shot opportunities although the LRGV tracts are generally extremely thick w cover.

[Yakinthebox]

with the cubed system the average number of points is going to be consistently much higher than before. In the past a few outliers who got lucky could swing the average significantly from year to year on many hunts where they don't have huge numbers of hunters. Now that's much less likely to happen. Instead of the average being closer to the middle of the points range, it's going to be much closer to the high end of the points range.

I'm sure the WMA staff actually love this bc it means they are getting a much more experience group of hunters in each hunt which hypothetically should lead to fewer issues, less babysitting, fewer wounded animals, etc.

In the past, a guy with 20 points was 10x more likely to draw than a guy with 2 points. Sounds like a lot at first but now the guy with 20 years of points has 1000x more chances(8000 points) to draw that same hunt than the guy in his 2nd year(8 points) applying. In the past the average number of points for a hunt may have been 10 or so, but the point of the cubed points is to skew that number as far as possible to the right to reward the guys who have been applying the longest.

To me it seems like it skews it so far it discourages any newcomers from applying (if they actually understand how the system now works) bc your odds of drawing now are hundreds of times less likely than they were 2 years ago when you are just getting started. Personally I've reduced the amount I spend on applying for these hunts by 75% and I'm spending that on an Oklahoma license to go hunt up there.

Excellent thoughts. Agreed!

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