I wouldn't assume that.

You cannot trap at all on the West side of 101 now because of the coastal marten.

They {USFS} recently stopped the 2025 huge dune fest fall celebration, using the marten as the excuse of the day as well.

You could be right Wayne. But the bill itself only talks about a beaver closure. After it is passed the Game commission will have to draw up the areas affected and any rules associated with it.
I’ll ask Stan next time I talk to him about what he thinks.

If I recall correctly the marten closure didn’t come about through legislative action. It was the Game Commission after threats of litigation from the do-gooders.

That’s about what my rep said too, nobody knows all the info yet I reckon. I would bet the areas closed to beaver trapping will be closed to otter trapping as well. That’s how it has been anyways. If that’s the case, I’ll have to make a lure that can draw otter 201 feet away from the waterline. lol

Well Wayne, Stan thinks you're probably right. They will likely prohibit the types of sets that could catch incidental beaver in the closed areas.

Is there anyplace on the west side of 101 that ever had a marten? The few spots that are on the west side never impressed me as looking very marten like. Never imagined dunes and marten going together.

Dunes and marten go together very well in this particular region.

Plenty of marten are in that habitat and always have been. I see marten fairly regular when I am in that habitat zone.

The one or two guys that trap that area lost a lot of trapping opportunity by honestly reporting a few marten that were caught incidentally to ODFW.

There is a lesson to be learned here.

Well Wayne, Stan thinks you're probably right. They will likely prohibit the types of sets that could catch incidental beaver in the closed areas.
[/quote]

Carl,

Let's not forget the 50-mile buffer East of 101 that is now closed to marten trapping or any sets in trees on the Siuslaw national forest.

Furthermore, look at the new buffer on the trapping of red fox along the Cascade Range after the new pet name " Sierra red fox" was launched into this anti trapping effort.

All of these new listings are just the start of a negative domino effect for the trapping community.

You know and I know that these coastal marten and cascade fox have always been here and will likely always be here. We both know many generations of trappers that have harvested and interacted with these species. We as trappers have never overharvested these species in my time. I personally believe the whole trapping community appreciates these species more than any other demographic. The USFS and ODFW, and of course the democratic earth muffins are just looking for new tools to further regulate our activities out of existence.

Democratic earth muffins

Made me laugh out loud

[/quote]

Are these programs still ongoing in the areas you referenced?

ODFW paid WS to kill them here with a similar protocol as you described and then also had private hound guys registered as volunteers killing them on regional quotas as well. The areas where the volunteers worked had a remarkable increase in deer numbers immediately.
The volunteer programs ended here in 2018 or 2019 I believe, deer numbers plummeted in those areas within a couple years.

Oregon has become a predator pit; there was a reason our predecessors managed predators differently in the past.[/quote]
I am not sure, the one I ran into and talked to most often has retired. I know that they would target a specific area for three or four years and then move to another.area. I quit talking to some of the houndmen I knew involved in it, especially the ones involved in the volunteer program you mentioned, because I didn't agree with what they were doing. I am terrible with time, but I know I was married in 2018 and have ran into and talked to a couple of the ODFW guys with the wife. So it was since then, and last I talked to them they were moving to a different area that next year that I don't hunt. I don't do as much wandering willy-nilly hunting various areas and just staying in the truck since I got married. Now I tend to set up a base camp and hunt from there when I travel (the wife likes something a little more comfortable than the front seat of a Toyota to sleep in) and sort of assumed that it was still ongoing, just not in the areas I was hunting. I know the lion population is rebounding in a couple of the areas they had practically annihilated them in, but not back to the levels it was.

BP, back in the late 90s-early 2000s I had never seen a population of longtails so thick as in the coast range west of Eugene, at that the Cascades didn't have nearly the population. Since then I have seen areas in Eastern Oregon that actually had considerably thicker populations, but I admittedly haven't been over in that Siuslaw and Smith river country in ten years.

Far more marten killed crossing 101 than ever were caught by trappers in the last 50 years. The do-gooders claim that there are only 200-400 marten left. Also never fail to mention that a major limiting factor leading to their decline was trapping. Total BS.

Carl the Humbolt marten was a game commission decision. Same thing with the cascade red fox. As soon as the anti extremists start pushing fish and game rolls over. Oregon needs more folks grabbing oars. As you know ( I assume “ we had about 500 chime in in written testimony. The activists had 1400 or so. That room should have been full…… Or trappers or them that support us. You can’t play a baseball game with 4 people can ya??? Nope so you’ll have to forfeit the game. Well after so long they won’t even call your team cause they know you do t have enough players to come to the game. So eventually we won’t even have a team anymore. Hope that analogy worked for you folks. We can talk about water clarity and how beavers won’t help and salmon and public enemy number 2 etc but that’s not going to change anything here. We needed people there. Next it’s all public land trapping.

Good post Jeremy and well put.

Jeremy, I think you're 100% correct; ALL STATES "needs more folks grabbing oars," and yet we've all read the posts from the many trappers who refuse to join, support, or get involved with any trapping association. If the activists had 1400 or so written testimonies, how many did they really gain by our own fellow "trappers" not supporting or participating in submitting any testimony at all?

Silence is affirmation, and if we don't care enough about issues to get involved, then we get what we deserve.

Let me add this; if Oregon trappers (including myself) put in 25% of the effort that Jeremy and Stan do we would be GOLDEN!

No offense to those two but you wouldn't.

We gave the same problem you guys do Carl, too many Democrats, more specifically younger urban Democrats making decisions.

It's sad what the state of the DNR has become here.

It's turned into a DEI l, preservationist, environmental organization.

I didn’t mean to say we would win all our battles. But Jeremy is right in saying if we don’t stand up to them all is lost. Oregon, so far has won just as many or more battles than we’ve lost. The demographics have always been what they are now pretty much.

I agree

'peeler and Jeremy, does Oregon T.A. have a legislative lobbyist?

Demographics are much worse now than ever before. Look at the liberal game commission, and all the liberal indoctrinated State biologists, and then the blue haired general public in Oregon.

We've been losing ground on this front for years, statistically our hunting, fishing and trapping culture is being phased out of Oregon. Just look at the recruitment numbers Carl.

This is the result of democratic evolution in the West. Offer free food, free housing, free medical, no punishment for crime [ especially drugs}, and they come here to breed more of their kind just like rats. Our only hope is that they keep breeding men to men and women to women and slow down the infestation.