Wi. Badger season

Anyone hear anything about the experimental badger season that was voted on at last springs conservation hearing ? I was just wondering if any attempt was made to establish a season.

Probably will get shot down like the wolf season will be. I've never trapped anywhere that had any badgers, but I'd love to catch one.

You may be surprised. They show up in a lot of places. I caught one in Oneida County 3 years ago where they supposedly don't exist. Be careful what you wish for, they are a bugger to release. The one I caught had an attitude problem.

The department was forwarding it to be on the spring questionnaire for the WCC again this spring. If it passes again, I am guessing there will be some folks that try to find a legislator author to introduce a bill.

Sorry, but who cares about catching one WI badger a year? Spring rat season or higher otter limit makes more management sense, but I guess folks like there "trophies".

LOL

That's like saying, "why would anyone want $1 if they can't have $5?"

I didn't know they could only change one trapping rule each year and we had to pick and choose which efforts to focus on.

Seen them around Sparta before.

Maybe if you had them on your property and had to deal with taking them out of your coyote sets you would have a different mind set. But they are also worth alot to a taxidermist when the trappers bring in their TROPHY .

Will anyone from the dept. show up?

I'd love the opportunity.

Department also said they were requesting to bring back the the question on muskrats with zones and an extension. Otter is two per person and the quota was raised to 2500 this year. Will be interesting to see how we do against that higher quota.

I've caught 6 so far ( over the years on my property ) and every one had a attitude problem .

Corky , I saw a pair of them in your neck of the woods. Up by wolf lake last summer.

True, you guys, I am not affected by them, and if this is what folks want, I want it, too.

Had one come to a turkey decoy when calling it walked up eyeballed it then took off I was rolling on the ground laughing.

Caught and released 5 badgers this season. WI badgers suck when It comes to fur quality.
I think It's a mistake to even think about trapping Bucky Badger. If you think The dove hunting thing was a big issue just wait till a badger season comes up for a vote.

X2. Bobcats could also use some adjustments.

I usually release a couple a year. Releasing is easy, its the bomb crater that is hard to deal with in certain spots.

Trappers trap for a variety of reasons. Something new is always intriguing.

I caught one in Dunn County back in the early 80's

Badger blow outs are great coyote sets.

If they destroy the the mound no problem if they take a snare down the hole then the work begins.

Pulled this one out of the hole and restaked it took over a hour to open the hole to get a peek at him.

Lots of badgers In Oconto county.

We have badgers around here. Releasing one is not fun.

If we have no open season on Bucky I won't care.

It would raise good funds via a permitting system

Exactly. Why would you want to stir the pot and start a season on the state animal. It’s not like we’re being over run with them. Trophy trapping is what it amounts to.

Do other states not harvest their state animal? Of course they do.

We should never have a problem defending the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation. Everything with a season has fared far better over the long haul. And it was the carrot that kept investment coming back into those species.

nimzy, we have opened up bobcat quite a bit in the last few years. Probably take a pretty big coordinated effort to continue to drive it up as we did loose a pretty influential person within the department. Funny thing is I saw more sign in Winnebago County than in years past. Just looking closer or something else driving it?

The state fish is the musky, should we have a ban on musky fishing?

Coyote is our State animal, why do feelings over facts the badger has no clue it’s the State animal.

Why not a robin season just in case we limit out on morning doves?

Robin soup sweet!

If they start a badger season and we have to pay for a tag or do the lotto thing, I am going to apply and try to learn the White17 paper bag dispatch method. Not to steal anything from the hamburger thread, but can a mcdonalds bag be used? WI badgers arent very pretty, how bout letting trappers pay for extra otter tags if this is a revenue thing. Or a spring muskrat license.

Or a spring beaver hunting season, or the ability to harvest and hold more than three snapping turtles and being able to market them, anything we have a true abundance of..

State beverage is milk. Should we ban dairy farming? How about we stop hunting the state wildlife animal? That'd be the whitetail deer.

Talk about trophies but then raise the level of what they are not interested in harvesting, classic anti thinking right there. LOL

Probably shouldn't have a wolf season then either, I mean not if we can only get one and they're a trophy.

It will be tough to pass this year without all the deer questions on the spring hearing drawing record attendence. Skat, there is likely a question about expanding beaver season on there as well.

We don't have to worry about that one as the department ignored state statue and refused on it this year and the lawsuit will prevent it next year.

Sorry , didn't realize this simple question was going to turn into a anti trapping agenda .

dude a wolf is a "trophy" species. But we should be able to harvest them. Same as a badger. Im just internet spitballing WI game management, thats all.

I don’t do it thereof neither should you, a very narcissistic view for sure.

They seem pretty abundant in the Driftless Area. They really do a lot of damage when they start digging pocket gophers in farm fields.

If you get a chance at any new season jump on its better to gain a season then to lose one. IMO

Amen

This is true, Law Dog, I wasnt saying lets not do it, youve kinda twisted my view point to make it seem like I dont want it, I was just saying, on an internet forum, that I didnt think it was an essential change. Lets get that Badger season, folks.

where is the wis trappers association on this?

They are looking for Bucky!

No different than any other managed animal.

You non WI residents and some of you WI residents don't realize how big the anti trapping population Is. It's been quite for some time no reason to get them all stirred up. And with this online voting It's like poking a hornets nest. So far we aren't losing anything but It could boil over and come back to bite us. Leave a sleeping dog lie.

So why is it our state animal?

But do you know the history behind the name? Many people think that it comes from an abundance of the black-and-white animal, but in reality Wisconsin has no more badgers than its neighboring states.

The nickname actually dates back to the 1820s, when mining became a huge business, leading thousands of men to the ample iron ore mines in the Midwest.

Wisconsin workers made temporary homes by digging caves into the rock of the mines, similar to tunnels that badgers dig for shelter. The miners came to be known as “badger boys” or “badgers,” and the name eventually came to represent the state itself.
Source: Travel Wisconsin

Not enough
Poor ice conditions in December inspired me to trap some mink. Why? Because i like catching them and greatly enjoy their environs. Anyway that style of trapping, that time of year is eye opening on the current status of our trophies. Looking close, nah.... just being there. I can remember when a coyote track was a rare find.

Careful Beav, sensible talk like that might get you labeled as an anti by some out of stater that has no skin in the game.

They shut down one season and it is in state statue. But you want to say don't kick the hornet nest? So should we just move to eliminate all fur trapping to appease those folks? Or do we take our case to the public about the benefits of trapping. The reason nuisance trapping polls so high is because the animal takes it to the public for us.

Show me the benefit In trapping badgers. If the badger Is dong damage you can get a permit to eliminate that problem. Or I should say the land owner can.

You need to pick your fights to come out a winner. You weren't even born when we busted our butts so you still have that right to trap.

Hook up with the GFP here we can upgrade your badger bloodlines with some quality specimens and see how quick things change. LOL Make sure you request a pair if civets with every badger to relocate in WI that would be a dream come true for me on the civets.

So your saying non- residents should be quiet on how other States manage their wildlife and seasons thats some sound advice folks.

Show me an animal that hasn't benefited from a regulated season? Of the hundreds, you think badger is going to be the outlier?

As far as picking your fights, I agree. While I wasn't at the Capitol during the last clash, I am not afraid to learn from my history. What lead up to that point? Appeasement and the voluntary sacrifice of our tools of the trade so we wouldn't have to fight that battle, yet it came. Why? Because trappers sat in their corner afraid to talk to the general public about the benefits of regulated fur trapping and yet you encourage the same behavior today?

The history should be clear, the public will come to our side when we stand behind the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation, but we can't wait for them to kick the hornet nest and bring the fight to us. I will never pass up an opportunity to be out in the public square sharing the value of the model and the role regulated trapping plays in todays modern world.

?[quote=The Beav]Show me the benefit In trapping badgers. If the badger Is dong damage you can get a permit to eliminate that problem. Or I should say the land owner can.




So Beav, are you also going to say the same about the wolves when the antis are going nuts about a harvest season on them ?

No problem voicing your opinions but when It comes down to the vote you don't have any say In the outcome. And you have nothing to lose.

Go out and knock on 100 doors In Mad town and explain to those 100 households why It would benefit the badger to have a season on It. And then get back to me.

I am not going door to door in that cesspool, but if you want help, I will gladly give some pointers and try to help you out.

Looking at the WCC results, I see you had about 8000 folks vote on the badger season question in Dane County last year. Another 1500 participated in survey in Dane County, but had no opinion on a badger season. Nearly 20% didn't have an opinion and I am guessing quite a few of the ones that didn't support a season never really heard our side. Keep refusing to sell the benefits of the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation to the public and you will end up back at the Capitol sooner than you think. The antis wont stop just because you are hiding in the corner. https://dnr.wi.gov/About/WCC/Documents/spring_hearing/2020/Results/2020_CountyResults.pdf

But you asked for the benefit of a season. One of the biggest benefit of a season is the data it provides. Doesn't matter if it is lake sturgeon, fisher, deer, or any other game animal for that matter. Harvest data is extremely valuable in keeping track of a population. Wasn't too long ago, researchers were not sure what they would find, yet sportsmen paid the tab. Here is an interesting article about some of the research. http://archive.jsonline.com/news/wisconsin/90434294.html

Latch notes that Michigan is known as the Wolverine State and yet no wolverines, aside from one that died in February, have been seen there in decades. "I didn't want the badger to fall into the situation where you've got Bucky Badger but no badgers," said Latch.

Couldn't agree more. Time to re-open a season. Sportsmen will ensure they are around for years to come.

Dang badger that’s $60 in my pocket man. Seriously I’d import some stock release on public ground then you would have a bigger dog in the fight then because reality, common sense, facts and figures are out the window today the world will run on feelings and nothing else now. Sounds crazy I’m sure but if you don’t ante up then your not in the game.

So your going to transport 100s of Western badgers to WI to improve the our worthless badgers, good luck with that.

Maybe doing nothing will gain some ground good luck.

A valid point of a badger season is data collection on the harvest. However, the fact remains that we’re not over run with badgers and I don’t think that is a result of lack of harvest. Possibly habitat, I don’t know. I do know that an opportunity every once in a great while at harvesting a sparsely populated species isn’t worth the battle/publicity in my opinion.

Now someone else brought up wolves...a season is warranted on them for the mere fact that the population has exploded in the absence of management. Here again, I believe the above average recruitment in wolves is related to habitat. Wisconsin’s habitat can more than support a harvestable population of wolves. That’s clear with the ever growing population in the absence of a management plan. I think we all agree on that.

And the wolf plan calls for 350 wolves. We couldn't even get 40% of count for permits so that will leave us with less than 140 wolves harvested on an ongoing basis. At 10% percent success rate, that means about 1400 folks will get to try to trap a wolf each year. At that rate, we might as well hire the feds to handle and then we can get the harvest where it will have the greatest impact for relief.

I don’t understand the plan for 350. If we have 1100 why would they only allow a harvest of 140?

Lots of folks are pushing for that 350 number that is outlined in the previous wolf management plan, and frankly the longer we wait for a season, the faster we will get to it IMO. Sure you will get a few years of a higher harvest, but 1100 is irrelevant unless you are advocating we should keep the population that high ongoing. And while we have to wait, the feds will be out there knocking them back.

During the last season in 2014, we harvested about 150 wolves with 1500 folks. Population was double the population goal of 350. Folks need to understand just how much this administration and the actual DNR agency is against harvesting wolves. Unless both are changed out, we will get a token season. Switch them out, we end up at 350 instantly.

wolf harvest

Thanks for all your feedback on this thread WIMarshRAT. You 'get it.'
And I can tell you've done your research.