Elk act as a keystone species, meaning their absence in an ecosystem would cause significant harm to other species given the elk’s role as prey for some animal species and as a consumer of many plant species. Put simply, the work done by RMEF is work we can, and do, get behind. 

“We knew we had a tool that helped elk hunters, and the staff at RMEF were very excited about helping spread the word about our maps as well,” said onX’s Matt Seidel about the origins of the partnership. “We wanted to support RMEF’s missions of conservation and open access to public lands.”

To that end, we’ve supported RMEF projects throughout the country with the onX Access and Stewardship Grant Program and through grants dating back to before the formalization of the program. And, according to RMEF Land Operations Manager Ryan Chapin, that support matters. “Partner organizations like onX help RMEF leverage resources for greater conservation and hunter access impact. onX grant awards help with project design and purchasing materials for critical hunter access projects like Raymond Mountain and other key access routes in elk country.”

It’s hard to believe that RMEF’s origins can be traced to a doublewide trailer in Troy, MT, in 1984. In fewer than 40 years, RMEF has become a powerhouse in the world of conservation. The organization now boasts 225,000 members, 12,000 volunteers, and more than 500 chapters. The collective impact of these individuals is staggering. To date, RMEF has helped complete more than 14,000 conservation and hunting heritage projects, protected or enhanced more than 8.6 million acres of habitat, and opened or improved access to more than 1.5 million acres.

The scale of that work can be seen in the onX Hunt App’s Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation Layer. Found in the Land & Access Layer Collection, the RMEF Layer displays locations, borders, and access points for RMEF elk habitat restoration projects around the county. The layer also displays the current and the much larger historical elk range. Again from Ryan Chapin, “We are seeing a focused emphasis on conserving grassland habitat types. The grasslands of the Great Plains are one of the historic home ranges of elk, and some of these populations are expanding. Current projects include sage and grassland habitats in Colorado, Wyoming, and South Dakota, among other states.”

The RMEF Layer reveals that, in many ways, the organization operates as much like a land trust as a wildlife conservation organization. In the Hunt App, you’ll find more than 500 Permanently Protected Lands, areas in which RMEF, with funding from partners like onX, acquired land and ensured it would remain elk habitat far into the future. In many cases, access points are also displayed where access is permitted. “Having RMEF’s projects displayed in onX Hunt is great exposure for our projects, and it allows hunters to quickly determine public access points in prime wildlife habitat areas,” said Ryan Chapin.

Also revealed by the RMEF Layer is the extent to which the organization operates throughout the country. While elk are rightly seen as a bold symbol of the Rocky Mountain West, their historic range extended across the Great Plains, as far into the Northeast as Vermont, and as deep into the south as the Gulf Coast states of Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana. RMEF has assisted with numerous elk reintroduction programs outside of the West, including within the Great Smoky Mountain National Park and, most significantly, in Kentucky’s wildly successful program. Kentucky now sports a population of more than 11,000 elk, the largest herd east of the Mississippi River, and a permitted hunt that allows more than 500 hunters the chance to bag an elk.

Throughout our history, we’ve been privileged to work with and support many great conservation organizations. RMEF’s work aligns with our deeply held access and conservation ethos. And while our partnership has assisted in achieving massive gains for wildlife and recreation opportunities, we think we’re only getting started. This work is always ongoing, and we’re committed to working with organizations like RMEF for years to come to ensure the future of elk and many other species that belong on the landscape.

Whether you’re concerned about the state of elk from a high-level ecosystem and wildlife health perspective, as a hunter who sees the need for local efforts, or as someone who dreams about pursuing elk across the country and preserving the resource for your children, RMEF is vital. Their work, though, takes everyone.

Learn more about our access work at onX Initiatives, and head over to RMEF to dive deeper into the latest from Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation.

The post onX Hunt Partner Spotlight: Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation appeared first on onX Hunt.

So What Is This Project, and Why Did You Start It? How Can People Get Involved?

We started Public Land Tees as a way to give back to the organizations that protect, improve, and increase access to public lands. In addition to that, we’ve used the platform to creatively raise money outside of the typical banquet, auction, or sweepstakes models. One of those projects that has been highly successful is Stamp It Forward. 

Stamp It Forward is a project founded on conservation. Starting in 2019, it has been a yearly effort each fall to raise as much money as possible, and all of it goes to funding wetland habitat and access. 

How it works

We ask individuals and companies to make donations and with 100% of the money raised, we buy Federal Duck Stamps. The reason we chose the Duck Stamp is because it is quite possibly the most efficient way to ensure the money goes directly to the ground based on the fact that by law, 98% of the purchase price of a duck stamp has to be spent on purchasing or improving more wetland habitat. This is so effective because it goes far beyond just benefiting migratory birds. 

If anyone would like to get involved and help us reach our goal this year of raising $100,000, they can do so by donating directly through our site.

What do we do with all the stamps? 

The really fun part of this project is what we do with all of the stamps that we buy following the fundraising efforts. After we get a huge stack, we begin to give the stamps away with every item ordered on our website. Since we give back $5 from every item sold to conservation, it’s a way to roll one fundraiser into another putting even more money back into the ground. 

In addition to giving stamps away with orders, we give stamps away to youth, new hunters, and veteran hunter organizations to help get more people into the outdoors and keep bringing people into the fold. This year specifically, if we can raise the $100,000 we’ll be giving 500 stamps to Ducks Unlimited, 500 to Delta Waterfowl, and 500 to those youth, new hunter, and veteran groups.

What Does the Duck Stamp Money Do? What’s the History of the Stamp?

The Federal Migratory Bird Conservation and Stamp Act—better known as the Duck Stamp Act—was passed in 1934. Every waterfowler over the age of 16 is required to purchase a federal Duck Stamp to legally hunt waterfowl. Since the inception of the duck stamp, over $1.1 billion have been raised, and over six million acres of wetlands have been protected making it one of the greatest conservation tools over the last 90 years. 

Originally, the stamp dollars went only to adding to the national refuge system, but over time the funds were spread to include the purchase of “small” parcels that hosted excellent breeding habitat for the birds that use the wetlands. 

The money from duck stamps gets distributed around the country to different easements, refuges, and wetland purchases. A large portion of the money, however, does get spent on the “Duck Factory.” The Prairie Pothole Region is responsible for more than 60% of the breeding population of waterfowl in North America. As more land is protected and improved, it creates more ducks in every flyway across the country. 

One of the greatest things about the duck stamp is how easy it is to get involved. You don’t need to be a member of an organization (although you should join one), you don’t need to have a hunter’s safety card, you don’t need any other license at all to simply purchase a stamp making the barrier to entry about as low as it comes to getting involved in conservation. 

What’s the Duck Ruck?

This year, we felt there needed to be a change to our original model of encouraging people to send money to help buy stamps. As a way to earn people’s donations, the 100 Mile Prairie Pothole Duck Ruck was born: a 100-mile hike over three days through the heart of the Prairie Pothole Region. It’s a way to put a spotlight on the region itself, Waterfowl Production Areas, and National Refuges all funded by duck stamp dollars. 

The goal of the hike was to raise $100,000 and spend 100% of that money to buy duck stamps because ultimately $98,000 of those dollars would have to be spent on creating more habitat and by default, creating more animals whether that be ducks in the flyways, deer, elk, bears, grouse, or any of the other 700 species that rely on wetlands to survive. 

The ruck started at Witsel Waterfowl Production Area southwest of Fargo, North Dakota, for about 50 miles, then the route took us south and west, ultimately finishing across the South Dakota border along Sand Lake National Wildlife Refuge. We rucked 33.33 miles per day and in that short stretch of time we raised just shy of $50,000 for the ducks. Short of the ultimate goal, but the project is not finished, and we’ll keep pushing that total up as we work to get more people to donate to the project. 

Can You Share Stats on Duck Stamps and Funds Contributed Over the Past Few Years? 

In 2019, we took $2,500 in cash and drove around to seven different post offices in order to buy the first 100 Duck Stamps in the inaugural Stamp It Forward project. Then we opened it up to the public to participate and donate, and that first fall we raised just over $25,000: enough to buy 1009 stamps. 

In 2020, we were a little more organized and worked with more brands to bolster donations and ended up buying 1,582 federal duck stamps, raising $39,550. In 2021 we backtracked a little and raised enough to buy 1,187 stamps for $29,675. 

When 2022 rolled around, rather than just leaving it open-ended to raise as much as possible, we put a goal on it to raise $50,000 to buy 2,000 stamps. And in December, we received a donation from Scheels Outdoors of $15,000 that put us over the top!

Currently, with the dollars raised for the 2023 Stamp It Forward project we have raised enough money since 2019 to buy 7,728 duck stamps totaling $193,215. At 98% going into wetland preservation or restoration, that means $189,350.70 of that will have to be spent directly on creating and protecting more habitat. 

Want to Learn More?

Sam wrote this blog for Savage Arms about the history of the duck stamp and crafted this reel about the duck stamp for Vortex.  Read more about Stamp It Forward and the Public Land Tees Project here.

The post Stamp It Forward: Public Land Tees appeared first on onX Hunt.

By offering newly enrolling private landowners an additional up-front payment of $25 per acre, PATH adds to incentives already in place via state agencies to provide a more competitive conservation option for landowners. For hunters, these acres are added to accessible acreage via the state’s walk-in program with 10-year agreements in place to help create sustainable and sustained hunting opportunities. 

“When we think back to the heyday of pheasant and upland hunting decades ago, those days often were correlated with boom times in federal conservation programs like CRP(Conservation Reserve Program) enrollments or the predecessor to the Farm Bill,” said Jake Hanson, development director at Pheasants Forever. “We don’t live in a day and age when CRP payments can out-compete what you can make being a producer on your own land. CRP just isn’t competitive enough.”

Unique Partnerships, Big Impacts

But by leveraging a coalition of private support from companies like onX Hunt and nontraditional state support via Travel South Dakota adding dollars to the pool, the dollars and cents of habitat conservation and hunting access can get a lot more competitive. 

“Landowners receive payment from the state agency and this payment from PATH to give them a push to make it almost as competitive as what they could do [otherwise],” Hanson said. “Combine this with a ‘farm the best, conserve the rest’ type of model, and gosh, think about what you can do with your lands where you’re putting your marginal lands into conservation programs, which is not only going to help your way of life if you’re a producer with water quality and soil health and erosion prevention, but also what you’re doing for wildlife and enrolling in public access. These are the programs that work in 2023.”

These programs also provide considerable economic benefit to rural communities’ economies that benefit from hunters—and their wallets—traveling to areas known for great bird habitat and hunting access. This is the idea behind Pheasants Forever’s mantra of “Creating communities committed to conservation.”  

“What we know for a fact is when you have more quality habitat on the landscape, you have more abundant and healthy populations of wildlife,” Hanson said. “And when you have more abundant and healthy populations of wildlife in your county or area, hunters say ‘I wanna go hunt there. Let’s make a trip to Huron or wherever that might be in South Dakota.’”

onX Hunt’s Biggest Access Investment

It’s that multi-layered impact that inspired onX Hunt to make PATH the largest-ever single project investment for its Access and Stewardship program. Private land access programs are particularly critical in states outside the West and the chance to participate in a partnership with other entities to open a lot of acres in a single state offered a way to maximize impact.

“Pressure on public hunting land is increasing and quality bird habitat is on the decline. We believe the PATH program will create a profound and immediate impact to combat this trend,” said onX Hunt General Manager Cliff Cancelosi. “onX Hunt is committed to funding time and money with its conservation partners to ensure there are public hunting opportunities available for years to come.”

And thanks to the minimum 10-year agreements that are part of the PATH program, these 10,000 acres will remain accessible for a decade to come and set the benchmark for bolstering the program in subsequent years as Pheasants Forever and its partners look to create a recurring funding model to replicate the goal of 10,000 new acres per year in the future.

Critical Walk-In Access

onX found in a recent report that there are over 30 million acres of private land that are opened up each season to hunters across the country via unique “voluntary public access programs” (many are called “walk-in” programs). South Dakota’s walk-in programs account for 28.4% of the state’s huntable acreage, adding over 1.4 million acres of habitat for hunters in the state.

With 17.8 huntable acres per licensed resident hunter and some of the finest pheasant hunting in the country with more than 1.15 million harvested in the 2022-2023 season (and a strong outlook for the upcoming season with above-average moisture creating ideal nesting and brood rearing conditions, per Pheasants Forever’s forecast), South Dakota makes the perfect spot for an innovative program like PATH to build on a strong foundation.

“Not only are these acres doing good for wildlife and environmental conditions, but also impacting rural economies across South Dakota,” Hanson said. “Everybody wins.”

To find out more about enrollment and access opportunities, visit pheasantsforever.org/path.

Celebrate the Season Opener with onX Hunt

Kick off pheasant season with onX Hunt and Pheasants Forever from 5:30-8:30 pm October 12, at Sioux Falls’ Remedy Brewing Company. Join us for happy hour beers, giveaways, a live recording of The Flush Podcast starting at 7 pm, and more information on the PATH program. Giveaways include a Weatherby Orion SxS 20 gauge, Silencer Central Banish suppressor, (5) Free Tax Stamps, (3) barrel threading, Final Rise Summit vest, Ruffland Performance Kennels, Purina Pro Plan food, Lucky Duck intermediate kennel, onX Hunt memberships, and more!

The post onX Hunt and South Dakota Set the PATH in the Right Direction appeared first on onX Hunt.

By Doug Duren, Sharing the Land

Riley, a once thriving rural town in Southwest Wisconsin, is a crossroads where public and private land conservation history meet.

The Military Ridge Trail

The town of Riley is located on the Military Ridge Trail. Stretching 40 miles across Dane and Iowa counties, the trail was first a Native American footpath, then a wagon road established by early Wisconsin settlers and soldiers to connect pioneer forts. In the 1880s a railroad was established along the route and like many small railroad lines, became obsolete as trucks and automobiles became the main modes of transportation. In the early 1980s, the Wisconsin Natural Resources Board approved the purchase of the abandoned railroad line. The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources developed the “rails to trails” public land trail that today is used for bicycling, hiking, snowmobiling, and cross-country skiing.

Aldo Leopold and the Riley Game Cooperative

At the Military Ridge Trail access parking lot near the Riley Tavern, the last remnant of the town Riley, a kiosk pays homage to another story of forward-thinking, conservation access: The Riley Game Cooperative. 

During the years 1928-1933 Aldo Leopold, the Father of Wildlife Ecology and Conservation, was living in Madison, Wisconsin, and was conducting research for his report “Game Survey of the North Central States” which informed his thinking and led to his seminal work on wildlife management “Game Management.” Leopold, who had not yet purchased the run-down farm and shack made famous in his posthumously published book “A Sand County Almanac,” stumbled upon the town of Riley in 1931 while on an expedition searching for a new place to hunt. There he met a local farmer, Reuben Paulson. Leopold later described the event:

“One Sunday in 1931, I was cruising western Dane County, looking for a place to hunt during the approaching season. I stopped at the farmyard for a drink of water. The farmer, Reuben Paulson, was washing milk cans at the well. We talked game. He needed relief from trespassers who each year poached his birds despite his signs; I needed a place to try management as a means of building up something to hunt.  We concluded that a group of farmers, working with a group of town sportsmen, offered the best defense against trespass, also the best chance for building up game. Thus was Riley born.”

Aldo Leopold, 1940, in History of the Riley Game Cooperative, 1931-1939, Journal of Wildlife Management

With the cooperation and contributions of other Riley farmers and Leopold’s friends and students from the Madison area, the Riley Game Cooperative was formed. This partnership between the farmers and townspeople served as a way for Leopold and his hunting friends to work with the farmers and their families and contribute labor and resources to habitat improvements and conservation efforts. Not only did the group share in the work and the hunting, but it was a way to socialize and build a community of like-minded people. The Riley Game Cooperative operated throughout the 1930s and 40s and became an outdoor classroom when Leopold joined the faculty and established the now-named Wildlife Ecology Department at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The cooperative continued after Leopold’s death in 1948 until the early 1960s.

Leopold’s “Game Management” and “Something New Must Be Done”

In 1933 Leopold published “Game Management,” and along with his position at UW Madison, established the discipline of Wildlife Ecology.  Along with the Riley Game Cooperative, it was the beginning of his call for caring for the land and by extension, all the members of the biotic community that inhabit it.  

I became aware of Aldo Leopold when I was in high school and his book, A Sand County Almanac fascinated me then and continues to speak to me 50 years later. As a farm kid, growing up in rural Wisconsin, I lived a youth that included much of what Leopold wrote about in the first part of the book. That little book, especially the last two sections, continues to speak to me today.

In the late 1990s, I became this generation’s steward on our family farm near Cazenovia, Wisconsin. Located 60 miles north of Riley and 30 miles west of Leopold’s farm and shack, the 400-acre property owned by my family 120 years has evolved over time from a source of timber for my forefather’s sawmills, into a quintessential Wisconsin Dairy farm, to now a conservation-based legacy property. Although managing the property could be a full-time job, it’s difficult to squeeze a full-time paycheck from it. Add to that I am the owner of a small business and up until a few years ago, my wife and I lived in Madison, 65 miles away. I, like many modern rural landowners, was an absentee owner and steward, working on projects on weekends and squeezing in hunting when I could.

Over the past 30-40 years, the small working farm has pretty much disappeared from the rural landscape, and land practices and ownership have changed. Populations of whitetail deer and turkey exploded. Landowners plan and implement management strategies to care for their land. Land ownership is a time-consuming participation sport! At the same time, hunting and other access to private land has become more difficult for outdoors people to secure. As a manager of our family and through my land management business, I experienced these issues and opportunities firsthand and pondered ideas.

Leopold, musing about similar issues in the 1930s said, when musing about private land conservation, “Something new must be done”. In the early 2000s, I found out about one of his “new” ideas.  I was bicycling along the Military Ridge Trail with a friend, when we stopped in Riley for refreshments. A new kiosk had been erected which provided information about the trail and the area. I went over to check it out and there I was introduced to the Riley Game Cooperative.

The idea that hunting can be cooperative, an experience shared with family and friends, was familiar to me. My father, who was my first and most influential hunting mentor, had stressed how “hunting with and for the other guy” made the experience more enjoyable and productive. Leopold had taken that idea and added the shared experience of conservation education and action. I had grown up with the ethic of helping neighbors and friends with chores and that community and cooperation extended to our outdoor experiences. Was “Something New” simply revisiting those ideas and applying them to the 21^st century? 

The Duren Farm, Sharing the Land, and Leopold’s Five Tools of Wildlife Management

As I reflected on the current situation in the outdoor world, the work that needed to be done on the farm and discussing Leopold’s experience and lessons with some like-minded friends, we decided to see if we could create something that brought it all forward. Sharing the Land, a conservation cooperators network, connecting landowners with hunters and access seekers has evolved out of all that history and thought. The premise is simple: Access to private land has value; the land needs us to care for it; anyone interacting with the land should be willing to contribute to conservation; relationships, cooperation, and community give us the opportunity to be part of something bigger than just taking from the land.

The Sharing the Land website provides a meeting place for people interested in making those kinds of connections and contributions and bartering for access. Landowners fill out a Cooperating Land Profile where they describe their property, their interests, needs, and available access opportunities. Access Seekers fill out a Conservation Resume where they provide information about themselves and their interests, skills, and willingness to contribute. Sharing the Land staff receives this information and matches landowners and access seekers. Other resources such as agreement forms, insurance offers, and other FAQs are offered to all involved.

Launched in 2022, Sharing the Land has 25 Cooperating Land properties enrolled in seven states and over 300 Conservation Resumes submitted. Landowners and Access Seekers are being matched and although demand outpaces supply, there have been a lot of connections and successes.

In Game Management Leopold taught, “The central thesis of game management is this: Game can be restored by the creative use of the same tools which have destroyed it—axe, plow, cow, fire, and gun.”               

Sharing the Land Cooperating Landowners and Access Seekers are using those tools as they work together on projects and access. Here are some examples:

The Axe (Chainsaw, Handsaw, and Loppers)

 “We teamed up with Kevin and thus far it seems to be working out well. He is a friendly, talkative guy and has come out to the farm on three different occasions. The first trip was just to get to know each other and tour the farm. On the second and third trips, we worked together with him on some brush/tree cutting and building wood piles. Because he wanted to know at the outset what we expected of him in exchange for hunting access, we worked out a plan under which he would help us do various tasks around the farm over the course of the spring/summer/fall. Kevin seems happy with the arrangement, and we are enjoying having some help at the farm.” – Mary, landowner

“Things are going great! Took us a while to get together but we’ve had two great workdays so far and the property is stunning! Looking forward to learning more about the property, helping out, and of course the Fall hunting season!” – Kevin, access cooperator

Plow (and the Tree Planter)

“Dear Ashley, I wanted to follow up with our Sharing the Land Project. You did a great job! Thank you for your work and for working with others so well.  We planted 200 berry-producing trees (of six different varieties) and weeded 2000 others. Good teamwork, we got it all done in one day!  You also have two beautiful dogs. They were very well-behaved, and I enjoyed watching them run and work. You will have many years of joy with them. As we agreed, for the summer and for the entire hunting season of 2023 through January 31, 2024, you have my permission to access and hunt on my farm.” – Gordy, landowner

“Our first meeting was in late April, while the harsh remnants of the winter were melting away, and I saw the plan for his property. This included removing invasive wormwood from a wildlife buffer that had been planted in the last few years. Trees and shrubs were carefully selected for their foraging and protection qualities for resident animals. One month later, seven eager volunteers who also signed up through the program went straight to work on making way for new plantings and give existing trees room to breathe by pulling the wormwood. Working together made it easy to conclude all of Gordy’s plans in just one day.” – Ashley, access cooperator

The Cow (and the Goat)

“We started over 20 years ago with our first wildlife habitat project. In our part of the state, winter thermal cover and brood habitat are key for upland bird survival. Our habitat improvement efforts have focused on mostly thermal cover plantings consisting of shrubs and trees. Over the past few years, we have added pollinator and food plots and started rehabilitating 80-year-old shelterbelts. We are now working on native grass re-establishment, grazing management practices for our pastures and “right-sizing” grazing cells, providing fresh water sources for cattle, and protecting cattail drainage areas from cattle. As you may imagine, all this is a lot of work. From fencing removal, new fencing installations, maintaining fence, installing water pipe, removing old tree rows, prepping for, and planting new tree rows, replacing failed tree plantings, and controlling invasive species – it’s become a full-time job for a couple months in the spring.  The Access Cooperators are enthusiastic, and the work goes quickly and enjoyably. We’re happy to provide access to folks like this who are willing to help us with these projects.” – Kurt, landowner

“I went well, quick work with all the help. Beautiful evening on the prairie. He has some beautiful pieces of property, and the family was very welcoming. My daughter even got in on the work a little, which is good for her to understand that habitat doesn’t just happen.” – Rachel, access seeker

Fire: Prescribed Burn

“I have always wanted to use fire more as a management tool, but because I’m not really experienced with it and need a lot of help to do it safely, I usually opted for the mowing option for managing native areas. With the knowledge of some of my cooperators and having plenty of a turkey hunting group around to assist, we burned three areas safely and effectively. It was a very successful day and there was plenty of time to hunt!” – Doug, landowner

“The beauty of the model lies in engagement. Once an access-seeker invests in the stewardship of a property, they gain a heightened connection to it, and become incentivized to enhance the health and productivity of the encompassed resource. They are given the gift not just of deer or birds to hunt or trout to catch, trails to hike, or birds to watch, but the more holistic gift of a sense of place. The landowner in turn benefits both from the improvements, and from the strength of those relationships built.” – Reid, access cooperator, and landowner

“It was gratifying to lend my experience with prescribed fire to the crew. What a great day. I can’t express how much fun this has been. Thank you so much for letting us be a small part of what you are doing!” – Mark, access cooperator

Gun: Hunting and Foraging

 “As a part of Sharing the Land, I had the opportunity to learn how to hunt in a safe, supportive environment, with the best mentors imaginable. At the same time, I was encouraged to develop a relationship with the land I was harvesting from, something that was extremely important to me. I would have never felt comfortable as a new hunter asking for permission to hunt on someone else’s land, and I would have never felt comfortable going out on public land alone for my first gun hunt. But Sharing the Land is not about gaining permission, it’s about community.” – Megan, access seeker

The Future of Access and Conservation

It’s a common refrain amongst some in the outdoor community “I remember in the good old days, when you could just hunt wherever you wanted or knock on a door and get access”. That may have been true, but everything changes. Let’s ask ourselves “What can I do to be a good land steward and contribute to conservation?” Let’s build our conservation resumes and make this land better than it was. Let’s applaud landowners who meet and grant permission access seekers willing to put in some sweat equity to help the land. These are our good old days. Let’s make sure that the next generations also have them. Let’s remember, “It’s not ours, it’s just our turn.”

The post Leopold and Riley: The Crossroads Where Public/Private Land Conservation and Access Meet appeared first on onX Hunt.

“Upland hunters are dedicated and passionate about the pursuit of wild birds in wild places, but it doesn’t end there. Without access to these wild places, it means no more wild bird dogs. And without habitat, no birds for hunters and the dogs that pursue them to earn their namesake.”  

33,154 of these passionate uplanders descended on Minneapolis, Minnesota, to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Pheasants Forever at the National Pheasant Fest and Quail Classic. The record-breaking attendance was just the tip of the iceberg for this momentous event. The legendary Howard Vincent, President and CEO of Pheasants and Quail Forever, officially passed the torch after 23 years of service to the highly qualified Marilyn Vetter. The event was a celebration of Vincent’s career and the future of the organization under Vetter’s direction.

As a National Sponsor of Pheasants Forever, onX Hunt looks forward to the three-day event every year. Not only do we get the opportunity to meet and talk with fervent uplanders, but we’re always excited to help the Habitat Organization further its mission.

On Friday night, onX Hunt hosted the 40X Event, something we plan to do each year going forward. Calling it 40X refers to Pheasants and Quail Forever’s ability to match every dollar donated towards projects in Minnesota 40 times over thanks to local chapters and partners in conservation. After the 40X event, onX donated $25,000 to Pheasants Forever and Quail Forever to be used specifically for adding 278 acres of permanently protected access in Minnesota’s Lac Qui Parle County through the Build a Wildlife Area Program.

The 40X Event saw more than 1,000 attendees from across the country come together to support onX Hunt and Pheasants Forever’s shared missions of permanently protecting critical habitat for upland wildlife as well as opening more land to public hunting. In addition to drinks, live music by the Minnesota band The Dam Jammers,  and giveaways, attendees were able to pin their favorite upland hunting state on a large U.S. map. Six hundred pins were placed in 40 states, and onX Hunt donated $40 to Pheasants Forever for each pin. We rounded up that $24,000 total to a $25,000 donation.

onX Hunt also teamed up with Elite Partner Final Rise to sell limited-edition hats and raise an additional $25,000. As of the publication of this article, there are still hats available from Final Rise. Together, after the 40X matching, $50,000 became $2,000,000 raised for access projects in Minnesota.

“It never ceases to amaze me how passionate uplanders are about the pursuit of these beloved birds,” said onX Wingshooting Manager Ben Brettingen. “We are incredibly thankful for the Pheasants and Quail Forever team as well as the chapters and members who put in the work creating access and habitat in those wild places. Bird hunters from all over the country came out to support and celebrate these habitat and access opportunities at the 40X Event, and we’re proud to have helped forge relationships among hunters and raise funding for the Habitat Organization.”

The 40X initiative is part of onX Hunt’s commitment to protecting habitat and increasing access to public lands. In the past two years, onX has helped support more than 1,000 acres of public access across Minnesota, South Dakota, and Iowa through Pheasants Forever’s Build a Wildlife Area Program. Across the U.S., onX aims to improve access to more than 150,000 acres of public lands and build or restore 150 miles of trails by the end of 2023. The Minnesota access projects benefiting from this year’s 40X event will soon be identified.

“We’re so blessed to work with partners like onX who truly ‘get it’,” said Pheasants Forever and Quail Forever Vice President of Corporate Partnerships Chris Kalis. “Not only does onX support our non-profit organization’s infrastructure through sponsorship support, but they take it a step further and contribute directly to our habitat and access mission. With grant partnerships we have in place, the 40X event is going to result in matching those contributions by a magnitude of forty times to help us do good things for our conservation mission. Thanks to onX and every uplander who contributed at the 40X event.”

The post Raising $2,000,000 for Habitat appeared first on onX Hunt.

Turkeys for Tomorrow

Turkeys For Tomorrow (TFT) is a new organization supporting and funding research that aims to get those answers. As a group formed only a handful of years ago by 14 veteran turkey hunters who were concerned about the decline of wild turkeys in areas they hunted, they dedicated themselves to improving turkey populations for future generations. 

The single goal of TFT is to help reverse the downward trend in wild turkey populations across the United States. The organization is doing this through sound research and funding professionals willing and able to answer those questions and implement practices that could reverse what’s being seen in wild turkey populations.

The places that TFT is seeking those answers are in Alabama, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Mississippi, with the possibility of adding Iowa and Texas in the near future. In those states, TFT is supporting leading researchers and projects that consider every contributing factor that might be harming wild turkey populations, including predation, habitat loss, habitat degradation, disease, hunting pressure, and even political issues or concerns. 

The first TFT research project launched in Alabama, where researchers have been GPS-tracking turkeys to better understand where they nest, roost, and feed, and to discover what challenges they encounter along the way.

This was also where onX Hunt could lend a hand. “A turkey doesn’t know where a property line is,” says Grubbs, “but we had to be within a certain distance of these tracked turkeys to get their GPS data, which we’d download every few days. It was difficult before we had onX because our researchers were just driving around asking who owned the property the turkeys were traveling across. Now they could look up the landowner and their contact information, sometimes writing them a letter asking for permission to access their property to get close enough to the turkeys to download data. Every landowner except one let them on their land to track the turkeys.” 

Another benefit of using onX Hunt was that TFT could use our maps to read the topography of an area to select the best location for placing microphones to record the turkeys. The higher and more open the spot, the more sounds the researchers could capture. Ninety such microphones were put up in Alabama alone.

Things in Tennessee are also really moving along. In 2023 TFT was able to help extend the research going on there by another year after the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency (TWRA) made changes to the season framework and bag limits this year. One of the goals now is to study and understand if these changes will make as big of an impact as TWRA hopes. Preliminary results are showing low poult survival primarily due to predation.

Work there is being led by Dr. Craig Harper and Dr. David Buehler, both with the University of Tennessee. Highlights of this ongoing study, in which researchers have trapped over 1,000 birds (toms and hens) and radio-tagged 99 hens, include determining hen nest success and poult survival are primary limitations in south-middle Tennessee. Drs. Harper and Buehler have not identified any disease as a limiting factor as of yet. And after measuring reproductive success for four years prior to a two-week season delay and two years after implementing a two-week season delay, in delayed and non-delayed counties, they have found no differences in productivity. 

Of special note, researchers in Tennessee just recaptured a hen in Lawrence County that TFT trapped as an adult in 2017, making her at least eight years old. Dr. Harper, Dr. Buehler, and TFT have now put a third transmitter on her, and they have nesting and brooding data for her from five of the six years of their study so far (2017-2021).

What Dr. Harper is finding thus far is that the goal really is to make more birds. In terms of season start dates, moving the season dates back may limit some number of non-resident hunters from getting an early season push, but resident hunters will still take as many birds in a season regardless of when it starts. 

Can We Make More Birds?

The argument in favor of making more birds was echoed by Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks’ Wild Turkey Program Coordinator Adam Butler in TFT’s new podcast, Wild Turkey Science. Butler explains that with no other game bird species are we asking how can we limit our harvest. When pheasants decline, for example, the conservation efforts start with what can be done to improve habitat and brooding sites. But with turkeys, the first suggestion often made is that hunters should shoot fewer birds in a season. 

Another high-profile research project led by a high-profile scientist is what’s happening in Kentucky through work led by Dr. Mike Chamberlain, a.k.a the “Wild Turkey Doc.” 

“It’s the first turkey research that’s been done in Kentucky in decades,” says Dr. Chamberlain. “It’s in response to pretty dramatic declines in harvest and observations of turkeys, particularly in the central and southwestern parts of the state which have historically been the bread-and-butter of turkey hunting in the state.” 

The Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife invited and funded most of Dr. Chamberlain’s study, but The Hunting Public held a fundraiser to expand the study and TFT also contributed to the expansion. Now Dr. Chamberlain and his team can take the study that was at first only looking at hens and reproduction and start researching toms too. The study can also start including disease testing and genetics work. This growth will make the Kentucky study fully comparable to all of Dr. Chamberlain’s other projects around the country. 

The project is just getting off the ground, with the team of researchers having just begun to trap birds to put GPS trackers on them, but the funding is in place for a three-year study with another year of wrap-up. 

Kentucky is unique among other turkey study sites in the South. “There are a lot of reclaimed mines there,” says Dr. Chamberlain. “Those reclaimed mines are providing habitat for not just turkeys but a host of other species, so understanding how turkeys are doing in those reclaimed mines and landscapes is important.”

“There’s a lot of factors driving these turkey declines,” says Dr. Chamberlain. “And what may be most influential in one part of the landscape may not be as influential in another part of the landscape. But if you boil the major players down we have a loss of habitat and we have a degradation of habitat.

“We have lost acres and acres of turkey habitat in the last 20 years, and we see that what’s left is not as high quality as it was. We are also seeing predator communities that are at an all-time apex. In many ways, our landscapes are better predator habitats than they are turkey habitats. Then you factor in things that we don’t yet understand, like disease issues. Lastly, this is the only game bird in the lower 48 that we harvest during its breeding season. That matters.

“You put all these things together and understand why we need the research to understand what’s at play, what can we manage, what can’t we manage, and what do we do today to make sure we can hunt this bird sustainably 50 years down the road.” 

onX continues to support TFT’s work in 2023 and beyond. To learn more about TFT chapters in your region and the organization’s upcoming projects and events, visit turkeysfortomorrow.org.

Cover photo: Turkeys being trapped in Tennessee before being tagged and released back into the wild. Photo courtesy of Turkeys For Tomorrow.

The post Turkeys For Tomorrow Tackles Population Declines a Day at a Time appeared first on onX Hunt.

Write Letters

Knocking on a landowner’s door may work for some, but for a less intrusive alternative writing a letter to ask permission to hunt is recommended. The private landowner data in the onX Hunt App generally include a mailing address in addition to landowner names and boundaries. This is a great place to start.

Whether you’re driving through a potential hunting area and viewing public and private land boundaries on your phone or e-scouting with the Web Map, pay attention to any details you can reference in your letter to the landowner.

Here’s how to ask permission to hunt in your letter. First, introduce yourself. Include relevant background information, perhaps noting your place of work or familial ties to the area. Next, show that you’ve done your homework about the property and the landowner from whom you are asking for hunting permission. Begin to close the letter by explaining your hunting ethics and what you would like to hunt on their land.

End the letter by asking permission to hunt, what special rules or regulations they might have for their land, and when you can come by to personally introduce yourself. Be sure to include your mailing address, email, and phone number.

Anything you can do in return goes a long way with private land hunting. And once you get access to a property, keep it by doing what you said you were going to do.

Make a Strong First Impression

Whether you’ve written a letter first and gotten a positive response or you’ve knocked on a landowner’s door, making a memorable first impression will help your chance of getting permission to hunt private property. Look presentable at the meeting. Some hunters favor bringing along their kids, especially if they plan on hunting with their kids on private land.

If you do not gain permission to hunt their land at this moment, don’t ask for an explanation but do thank them for their time. You can also ask the landowner if they would recommend someone else who might allow hunting access.

Provide References

Either in a follow-up letter or to have with you when you knock on a landowner’s door, be ready to provide character references. If you have hunted on private property in previous seasons, ask a landowner to be a hunting reference for you. If you have a strong connection to a notable community leader, ask that person to write a letter of reference.

Showing the landowner that you’re aware of their private land boundaries on the onX Hunt App is another way to provide a credible reference. Having the Private Lands Layer turned on during your discussion with the landowner helps you plan exactly where you can and cannot hunt on their property.

At this point in the process, you may be asked (or required) to fill out and sign a private land consent form. Some states, like Connecticut, require filling out a consent form and having it with you when you hunt.

Remember, both landowners and hunters assume some legal risk when hunting. QDMA offers Hunting Land Liability Insurance to protect all parties against unfortunate accidents. As a hunter, you may want to offer to carry a policy for yourself and the landowner.

Show Respect

This advice extends to when you already have permission to hunt as well as when you’re asking permission to hunt. Ways you can show respect to the landowner include listening more than talking, asking relevant questions so you don’t waste their time, and always keeping in mind you are a guest on their private property.

With showing respect, always show gratitude too. If you have a successful hunt on private land, consider gifting some of the prepared game or a relevant gift card to the landowner at the end of the season, and always consider sending a holiday card.

Ask What You Can Do

At all times during the process of asking permission to hunt, ask what you can do for the landowner. The types of landowners who may or may not give permission to hunt will vary, so it’s important to know what needs each might have. For some, you can offer to check fences while you’re on their property, or control predators you run across. For others, it might be helpful to cut wood, plant trees, mark private land boundaries or simply check in on them from time to time for company.

Anything you can do in return goes a long way with private land hunting. And once you get access to a property, keep it by doing what you said you were going to do. Keep in mind, if you think the property has potential, someone else probably does as well. These landowners are likely hammered by people seeking permission for hunting rights. Look to build a relationship of trust with the landowner and you will likely have access to that property for many seasons.

The post How To Ask Permission To Hunt Private Land appeared first on onX Hunt.

Over the last two years, onX has been engaged in a project to identify landlocked public lands at both the federal and state levels across the West. With the help of the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, these efforts identified nearly 16 million acres in 11 Western states.

In addition to inaccessibility, another concern is areas that are simply hard to get to. The piece of land that Eric and Cal hunted on this trip, for example, can only be accessed by a single public right of way—a river. Follow along in the video below as the guys canoe in, establish camp and put themselves and their equipment to the test against some monster bucks.

The post Unlocking Public Access With MeatEater and onX appeared first on onX Hunt.

Montana’s Block Management Program

State agencies have long realized the importance of landowners and landowner relations as a solution for wildlife management and access challenges. Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks (FWP) Block Management program has been doing this important relations work, and more, for over 25 years. The program now boasts nearly six million acres of private land made accessible to hunters, and over 1.1 million acres of public land are made more accessible through Block Management Areas (BMAs).

In Montana, over three million acres of public lands are inaccessible because they are surrounded by private parcels. We call these landlocked lands. At onX, we were curious how many acres of Montana’s landlocked public lands were opened annually to hunters by the Block Management program. Jillian J., the geospatial analyst dedicated to our access initiatives, compared our landlocked data for Montana to the BMA data, and determined there are 618,330 acres of landlocked public lands accessible through the BMA program that would otherwise be off-limits to hunters. That’s a huge success for public access because that is over 20% of the state’s landlocked lands.

An Interview With Montana FWP

We were also curious to learn how this impressive program began. So we asked Jason Kool, the Hunting Access Bureau Chief for Montana FWP, about the history and the “why” behind our home state’s unique BMA Program.

onX Founder Eric Siegfried: Can you explain the history of the Montana FWP BMA program?

Jason Kool: Block Management started in the mid-1980s by landowners working together with FWP field staff to improve hunter and wildlife management on ranches and farms locally. Additionally, landowners saw a philanthropic need to provide their “city cousins” a place and opportunity to get out in nature and recreate. This initial localized effort was then expanded significantly through the 1995 Montana Legislature and thus the 1996 hunting season. The Legislature authorized FWP to provide tangible benefits to private landowners as an incentive, compensating for the impacts of allowing public hunting. There have been lots of changes over time through various legislatures, but in general, the hunter management piece, complimentary hunting licenses for participating landowners, and monetary compensation for hunters’ impacts has remained.

In Montana, the private landowners work with FWP to set their property rules–which is why each of Montana’s nearly 900 BMAs have specific rules regarding species, hunting dates, parking, access routes, and gaining permission.

Siegfried: What inspired the Block Management system?

Kool: Block Management as we mostly know it today was the result of House Bill 195 in the 1995 legislative session. The concept for a statewide program that provided compensation for hunter day impacts, a free license for landowners, and hunter management came from the originating landowners as well as through the work of the Private Land/Public Wildlife Advisory Committee (PL/PW) established in 1993.

The 1994 PL/PW report to Governor Racicot problem statement suggests, “The long-term viability of Montana’s wildlife resource and hunting heritage is threatened. Landowner/outfitter/sportsperson relations have become increasingly strained over the past several years. Landowners feel victimized, helpless to control increasing game populations and they feel their contributions to wildlife habitat are overlooked. Sportspersons are concerned about diminishing access to private and public land for hunting opportunities. They view this as a threat to the long-term viability of wildlife management and Montana’s hunting heritage.”

Hence the creation of a statewide program designed to help landowners manage wildlife and manage hunters and their associated impacts as well as provide a way to foster hunter/landowner relationships. Our 2019 BMA survey suggests 72% of enrolled cooperator/landowners believe relationships with hunters have improved because of BMAs. Additionally, 78% believe hunter behavior has been improved or greatly improved because of the Block Management program.

Siegfried: Where did the idea for walk-ins originate from?

Kool: I’m not sure where the idea for a public-private partnership came from. I know many states have walk-in programs, but Montana is different. BMAs are landowner-centric and landowner-driven and more hunter management/wildlife-driven than typical walk-in programs. Hence the need to get permission to hunt a BMA. This permission comes in the form of hunter-administered permission (Type 1) or someone else administering permission (Type 2). Only a handful of Montana’s 890+ BMAs have “no permission required” to hunt the property. The remaining BMAs have rules, hunter limits (if applicable), and permission requirements as set forth by the landowner and in accordance with FWP program guidelines.

Siegfried: How are the landowners incentivized?

Kool: Landowners receive tangible benefits in the form of hunter management services, a complimentary sportsman license (or non-resident big-game combo license), a free subscription to our department magazine, and monetary compensation in the form of a per-hunter-day impact payment. Hunter management services are provided by over 30 FWP seasonal positions as well as full-time staff in the form of patrolling BMAs, developing and installing signage, and developing maps and rules for each BMA.

Specific to monetary compensation, landowners receive a $250 enrollment payment, up to $13 per hunter-day impact payment, and a 5% weed management contract bonus. The hunter-day payment is figured so that landowners choose when and what hunters may hunt on their enrolled lands. It is important to note this is an impact payment as opposed to a payment for access. In Montana, the BMA program doesn’t pay for access. It pays for the anticipated impacts on the land from allowing that access. In 2019, landowners received $6,113,538 worth of impact payments.

Siegfried: ​What is your favorite story of a successful recruitment of a landowner?

Kool: I’m sure our Regional Access Coordinators have better stories as they steer the ship locally, but for me, one of my favorite stories is when a new landowner purchased some property previously enrolled in BMA called and asked, “How do I remove these signs?” I spoke with them about the benefits of the program and they ended up working with our Regional staff and enrolling thousands of acres that would’ve been otherwise inaccessible to the public.

Siegfried: What does the public get?

Kool: The public not only gets the opportunity to go hunting on these enrolled private lands, but also a lot of access to inaccessible public lands for hunting. Almost six million acres of private land were enrolled in BMA in 2020. The other added benefit is the relationships that have been built over time between hunters and landowners.

Siegfried: How is the program funded? 

Kool: From a combination of fees and licenses: primarily nonresident deer/elk hunting licenses, Native Montana licenses, as well as proceeds from the Super Tag Lottery, private donations and grants, and Wildlife Restoration/Pittman-Robertson funds. Residents contribute $2 of their base hunting license to the hunter access program.

Siegfried: What are formally-enrolled state lands, and how do they differ from other state lands? ​

Kool: Formally enrolled state lands are state lands that have legal public access, but access is limited or governed by BMA rules. This does not occur with any federal land. This is the result of a couple of things. First, the historic nature of BMAs originating in the mid-1980s when landowners could limit public access to their state land lease. These leases were considered part of the total ranch area enrolled in BMA, and there wasn’t a delineation made in peoples’ minds, like there is today, between what was private land and what was the rancher’s leased land. Secondly, there is a formal enrollment process outlined in Montana Administrative Rules. You can read more here. 

Basically, by enrolling the leased state land, the landowner is also granting access to their private lands. This happened most often in southeastern Montana. If there was no formally enrolled state land, private land would be lost also. This is no longer a practice used by FWP today, but historic agreements and the benefits provided to the public dictate some BMAs will have formally enrolled state land. It will be indicated by signage posted on the ground as well as the PDF maps/rules produced by FWP for each BMA.

Siegfried: What resources are required to administer the program?

Kool: For this program to be successful it takes a collective team approach. From an FWP perspective, the program wouldn’t happen without landowners offering the opportunity, FWP staff to implement all the necessary facets of the program, and the hunters who buy the hunting licenses to compensate for the impacts of hunting on the landscape.  

Annually, approximately 150,000 maps, 26,000 BMA access guides, and over 25,000 BMA signs are printed for public distribution. Six Hunting Access Program Coordinators, with assistance from area biologists and wardens, oversee and provide regional guidance and help to negotiate contracts, produce informational materials including maps, supervise seasonal staff, develop materials, and respond to the needs of hunters and landowners. Additionally, approximately 35 seasonal BMA technicians help set up, sign, patrol, monitor hunter compliance, and then dismantle the BMAs across Montana each hunting season.

Program administration includes time spent by myself with assistance from a variety of Helena staff who are responsible for approving contracts, payment coordination, the release of licenses and magazine subscriptions, hiring and equipping seasonal positions, and providing direction and coordination of regional activities.

For enforcement, six full-time warden positions are funded through Hunting Access Program funding sources. Portions of these positions are allocated statewide to game wardens who patrol BMAs for hunter compliance with the rules. FWP biologists and other wildlife staff also play a crucial role in landowner relations and evaluating the game and habitat opportunities available on properties considered for enrollment.

Siegfried: ​What else should the public know about the program?

Kool: This program, as it’s known today, is 25 years old (at the end of 2020). We have about a 95% re-enrollment rate, but that can change annually.

Because it is landowner-driven, it’s very important to get the individual BMA maps/rules PDFs, as each of the nearly 900 BMAs could be different in a variety of ways. Just because a hunter sees a BMA doesn’t mean there is a standard set of rules or travel routes–hence the importance of the FWP-produced BMA map/rule PDFs.

Siegfried: This is great information, Jason, thank you! And many thanks to the entire Block Management team for 25 years of impactful work for hunter access.

If you’re out on one of these BMA’s this upcoming season, please remember to be thankful for the landowners and the BMA officials who make this access possible.

Hero photo: Captured Creative

The post Talking Block Management With Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks appeared first on onX Hunt.

Project Name: Edith Peak
Location: Missoula County, MT
Access Point: 47.0846, -114.2146
Description: Two parcels totaling 1,120 acres of elk habitat high in the mountains of western Montana about 15 miles west of Missoula.

Public land does not always feature large swaths of landscape that are 100% open to public access. Sometimes, privately owned inholdings feature development or the potential for development that can disrupt wildlife migration corridors, wildlife management, and public access.

The Edith Peak parcels were private inholdings owned by a lumber company before being acquired by RMEF in 2018. After the purchase, the property was conveyed to the Lolo National Forest—it is now publicly owned and open for anyone and everyone to use and enjoy.

The surrounding area features spring, summer, and fall range and supports more than 500 elk. It also includes crucial habitat for deer, moose, bears, and other bird and animal life as well as springs that create important riparian habitat. In addition to being a wildlife movement corridor between the Northern Continental Divide Ecosystem and the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness, it includes the Edith Peak Trail that is now uninterrupted as it crosses the property.

The post Edith Peak RMEF Public Access Project appeared first on onX Hunt.