Also consider the budgets of our various DNRs. We all know how short there are of funds. The hunters fund hunting and fisher folk the fishing but who funds non game and covers any shortfall

this is all funded through the Pittman Robinson act! a tax on all firearms and hunting related items that is sent out to states for things like wild life and hunter ed etc.


The boss sent out an email to me saying that we are probably going to be the only 2 employees left if we cant get it figured. Its very sad that small business has to deal with this.


HD the counties in which we operate spend a total of $186,000 on WS through the co-op as an annual guaranteed fee. Plus every time they take the chopper up or there is a something that wasn't covered under normal Use (for lack of a better term) charge. One county spent $113,000 and change on ONE Project! These where the numbers supplied by the county clerk. The grand total over the 12 month budget was well over a Quarter million dollars(closer to a half million) with the largest user being Large multi million dollar food processing and agricultural operation.

the boss figures that 35% of our total revenue is from Predator control, mostly hunting clubs, etc ( I wont tell you how much we bill as im not sure my self but we pay our guys well and they have perks)

We obviously offer a Better product as we are able to saturate a property and are only paid when we catch (there is a millage fee and some other trivial stuff) and we can go one on one or even 3 on 1 etc. where they only have in general 1 guy per county.

just a quick example We will call this COUNTY A (CA) Spends a total of $58,000 annual fee Plus $118,000 for incidentals. According to the county clerk of CA 4 users made up about 94% of that budget. so that is a total of $176,000. 94 % of $176,000 is $165,440. / 4 =$41,360 per job. I think you can make money at that. On top of all that this doesn't cover anything that USDA funds for the project. That is just one county.


When WS is not involved, I.E. Pigeons, barn rats, gophers, moles, voles etc we get all of it.


HD as far as the USPS I have some calls out now about this, the consensus is that no private shipper has stepped up or wants anything to do with this in fact most all refer to them selves a parcel shippers. I cant seem to explain this like it was just explained to me. The general Idea is they are not one in the same (comparing apples and oranges) when you compare USPS and APHIS.

pinching toes, do your homework. While pittman-robertson does fund a large bulk of our DNRs there are huge unfunded mandates on the agencies and while some is offset by other user fees like camping/state park/user fees and some input from court imposed fines and forfeiture there is still a huge shortfall in other areas. Just go to your state websites and find the budget data, it's there.
There is many other streams of revenue ranging from grant monies for graduate studies to input from farm bureaus to private entities. I'm not knocking any of this save the reservation on those funds either originating from or with the blessing of USDA/USFW/APHIS/WS. Surely there is either strings (matching funds) or quid pro quo.

BTW, not just our DNRS and WS. Our state governments are riddled with this sort of corruption (can we say Dept of Education) where the federal has the local stepping and fetching.

And the (This word is unacceptable on Trapperman) of it is, they are beating us with the money they took out of our own pockets!

doesn't sound like anyone has ever beaten or reached an equitable compromise in this situation.

I've been looking for some instants where ADC companies took on WS or County CO-OPs and one in court. If any one knows of any can you send them to me?

You want to talk to Cody Bakuiska, Don Lafountain and Mark Dotson among others. They've had run in with WS. Oh and if you are a paid in full member of NWCOA they will hear you out, they won't do anything but they'll hear you as long as you're paid up.

You would have better luck if you were a member of NPMA they actually do have an agreement with WS for their members.

The National pest management assoc has an agreement with USDA?

Yes, a memorandum of understanding but it relates specifically to bird work and some insect work.
NWCOA doesn't even have that. They supposedly sat down with USDA for a long heart to heart and came away with nothing except getting (This word is unacceptable on Trapperman) off at there own members and some of us in the industry for being vocal in our desire to get WS to back off. NWCOA booted one of their regional directors over it. Oh wait a minute they did get something out of it. They got a regular speaker to come to their horse and pony show to tell us how much WS is not screwing us

Heck, WS has been caught red handed in criminal fraud and bid fixing here in Georgia and NWCOA'S response was "well he's not a member".

I would like to take this opportunity to thank Justin and David for this incredibly interesting topic discussion. I would also like

to thank God that we don't have any government competition in our work area. ( Okay, once in a while one of the cops will shoot a

skunk that's sick but after they get done filling out all the paperwork for discharging their weapon, they never do it again )

Paul I lose work to them up here on a regular
Basis!

Yeah Kasey, you're not the first guy in the northeastern part of the state that I've heard that from. Usually it's beaver work on

trout streams. Is that what they're taking from you or is it something else? I've been told that we have them down here too but

except for maybe the airport, I can't imagine what they would be doing.

Gear your service to the well to do home owner.

Coondog we don't have well to do homeowners
Around here lol! Commercial work is a key thing
Up here!

Doesn't sound like anyone has ever had any success with this.