CRP Haying Scenario - Right or Wrong?

UGUIDE

Active member
An landowner in South Dakota owns 1500 acres. Half of it is in CRP and the other half is in crop and pasture. He farms crops and cattle and also takes in pheasants hunters in the fall. He's got about 60 hunters booked at his place over 7 weeks. The drought is bad this year and CRP is open for haying. He takes the max hay off the land in August which is 50% of the acres and that reduces his huntable acres by 50%. Essentially reducing hunting acres from 750 down to 375. This also affects over winter cover for wildlife as well.

You are one of the hunters coming to his place this fall.

Right or Wrong?
 
Right, provided the hunters are informed and have a chance to cancel.

Or maybe the landowner obtains other comparable land to hunt. The tail can't wag the dog.
 
Right. Bottom line it's his land and his responsibility to not lose his cattle. I guarantee those hunters will still see more birds on his land than they would from whatever state they came from. I also believe that the landowner should informer the hunters of the drought and how it has affected his land for the upcoming season.
 
If they booked to hunt 750 and it gets cut in half they should be offered the chance to cancel or get a reduced rate. Can't have someone book expecting one thing at the time of booking and turn around and cut their implied upon huntible land in half without offering them the chance to back out like was done to them by cutting half the land. If a person didn't allow them that opportunity I would venture to guess their hunting operation would take a hit the next year after word got out.
 
How many days does each hunter hunt that property? 60 guys hunting for even 3 days each on 750 acres? That is a lot of pressure on one farm. That farmer will probably do what lots of other farmers have figured out...reduce the habitat, farm more land, and if he has to buy roosters at $12 or $14 apiece, he is money ahead. In this case, the guy can leave corn strips up into November, giving some extra hunting. What is the estimate--private landowners, not preserves, put out over 1,000,000 birds? Maybe I have my #'s wrong, but a lot of that goes on every fall.

I used to have access to a full section of CRP, and we killed a lot of birds on that ground. But it was just my groups that hunted it, with a few days of hunting by a trio of guys that came out one or two times a year. But if you put groups of 8-9 guys on that ground 3 days per week for 7 weeks, I would be curious to know what the hunting was like by about week 4. When we hunted that ground starting in 1994, all the way through about 2009, it held a lot of birds, as there was other habitat nearby...that property had the most birds I have ever witnessed. Don't know the answer here, it all depends. Usually in a situation like that, if this guys is a decent dude, he probably has other farmer buddy's he could ask for a favor and get on some different ground...most of my farmer buddy's do that kind of thing to help one another out.

If I was a hunter who booked with him, it is a perfect opportunity to NOT be a pain in the ass, to not complain, but instead, ask him what your group could do between sunup and legal hunting hour, and help him out...doing something. This is the year that he NEEDS the $. what are we talking? a few hundred bucks? this is the year that you differentiate from the other groups...you bring walleye or salmon or king crab legs and put on a feed for him and his family and his friends. Hunting is slow? No big deal, let's start the affair early, like 5 or 6 pm. I have had more damn fun doing this kind of thing over the past 25 years. For about 10 years I brought out 50 lbs of Alaskan King Crab legs and did a crab boil for about 30 locals plus my gang...we each had about 60 bux into the feast...best money we ever spent. They still talk about those feasts. We still do a lot of entertaining, but group sizes are smaller, and there are fewer farmers with habitat..but that is some of my favorite time spent out there. This is a marathon, not a sprint...I am 51, hope to be doing this for 20+ more years. I would look at this year as an opportunity to be a good guy, knowing that may pay dividends in the future...but even if it doesn't, who cares....
 
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Frequently here folks talk about pitching in and helping the farmer out, has anyone actually done that ? I mean, it's a good intention and all, but as a farmer I can't think of anything I would allow someone to walk onto the place and do.

Maybe mow the lawn.
 
I am not mechanically inclined, but I have several hunting buddies that are. One is a former farmer himself. One is a logger, and has lots of equipment. One builds logging equipment..runs the production facility, knows how to fix about darn anything. Another buddy worked on the railroad for over 30 years, and knows how to wrench. With some or all of the guys mentioned, we have helped two farmers work on machinery in a substantial way, and another time we helped a farmer put up fence and a corral...right after a phenomenal hunt. We have moved trucks from point A to point B as well. Big stuff? Probably not. But it helped them, especially the farmer with the combine that wasn't working, and he was trying to get his canola harvested. Most of my hunting buddies aren't mechanically inclined, but having even one who can pitch in, it never hurts to offer. Maybe I am crazy, but even asking about what is going on on the farm, and listening....and asking further questions about what has been said....and listening....etc, etc,...in a sincere fashion...is how relationships are built. It is called caring. Either you do or you don't. I do. Oh, one of my farmer buddies is a trapper. I live in a town that has a furrier, and it is the one this guy historically uses. I often will haul furs back from his place to this furrier. I just brought mink and beaver and some fox furs for him when I left there on july 15th, after a wedding. Saves him 425 miles each way. a lot of the time my farmer buddies are driving 30miles one way to get parts for their equipment...I can do that, for example.

A few of my hunting buddies are doctors...they have since retired. but over the years they have listened to farmers or family members of those farmers and given medical advice...many, many times. I work in finance, and have taken about 6 calls over the years from one particular farmer who wants to know my opinion about interest rates as he acquires more land. Yes, these relationships are built over time, but they have to start somewhere.
 
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Excellent, sounds like you have built a special relationship that goes above and beyond the usual. Well done.

I have on occation had folks offer to share their take with me, but that's the most I've experienced. One group of gentlemen allowed me to accompany them on their hunt which was good. I'm hoping they come back this year but it sounded like it was a one time deal for them.
 
I normally offer up birds to the farmer...cleaned, of course. And on a few occasions, when you can tell there is interest in joining on the hunt--"guiding" us, per se--that has happened, and it has been MUCH fun! We have on many occasions taken young kids...8, 10, 12 year old boys...we normally know the farmer a bit by then. My scenario of offering help was sort of assuming that the hunters are returning, have met the farmer on prior hunts, and have developed some sort of rapport by then. But hey, even at first meeting, you can develop a nice start to what could be a long friendship. My farmer buddies from SD have been back here to Duluth to visit in the summer, even came back for a funeral in 2013 for one of my hunting buddies that they had gotten to know over the prior 15+ years. I have been hunting the same area for the past 25 years, and I make many trips each season, so they are stuck with me, like it or not! If I have 10 close friends on this earth, and I am not sure if I do, but if I do, 5 of them are farmers in SD.
 
An landowner in South Dakota owns 1500 acres. Half of it is in CRP and the other half is in crop and pasture. He farms crops and cattle and also takes in pheasants hunters in the fall. He's got about 60 hunters booked at his place over 7 weeks. The drought is bad this year and CRP is open for haying. He takes the max hay off the land in August which is 50% of the acres and that reduces his huntable acres by 50%. Essentially reducing hunting acres from 750 down to 375. This also affects over winter cover for wildlife as well.

You are one of the hunters coming to his place this fall.

Right or Wrong?

I forgot to mention. These guys hunt 3 days per week, drive 3 days to get here and each pay $1000/person and it is their highlight trip of the year they look forward too all year long...
 
Guess if I paid for one thing and got another. I would be more than a bit disappointed. Especially given the money, travel and highlight of their year expectations.
 
WRONG. There's going to be a whole lot of fee hunters showing up to Chi-Town to find half their CRP is missing.

I guess I don't understand your response.

He did what he had to for his primary source of income. If he doesn't do the right thing and make some sort of concessions to the hunters, then that's not right.

Maybe it's because I can walk out my back door and hunt, but I don't see a pheasant hunt on any type of par with protecting your livelihood. He's got to try and make it right with the hunters however, somehow.
 
I guess I don't understand your response.

He did what he had to for his primary source of income. If he doesn't do the right thing and make some sort of concessions to the hunters, then that's not right.

Maybe it's because I can walk out my back door and hunt, but I don't see a pheasant hunt on any type of par with protecting your livelihood. He's got to try and make it right with the hunters however, somehow.


I agree. And I think most hunters completely understand. And if they don't, they should go to a preserve/game farm.
 
I don't understand it either...what is "Chi-Town?"

The land we hunt was hit with lots of snow last December. The farmer/rancher indicted he was going to call the next group of hunters and advise them not to come, due to the deep snow et al. Had it been me, I would have appreciated the snow alert. Likewise, if half of the huntable acreage has been cut...and no additional land added, a phone call advising future hunters of the altered conditions would be smart.
 
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Proves the failure of CRP.

If the conditions change he should offer a refund. The big point is the failure of CRP. Does He return half the CRP payment? Or as a tax payer, am I just out half the money we spent on the program, and 1/2 the benefits to wildlife. It would have been so much wiser to purchase erodable land directly. No grazing would be needed when moisture is low. Hundreds of millions spent, and your back where you started.
 
Prairie grasses need to be cut or burned periodically, and that is what CRP consists of. Leaving them for the duration of a 15 year contract is not good...it becomes pretty obvious after about year 7-8 if not sooner. So even without a drought to spur the action, my experience with my own CRP/WRP is that you have to have a management plan, and to cut or burn periodically...maybe every 5-7 years ideally...and yes, the landowner still gets the payment. So this is not a bad thing, in my opinion...I don't think it is a "failure" of CRP.
 
CRP as originally conceived is a soil conservation and water quality program. Those benifits are achieved, as are the ones related to nesting habitat when limited haying takes place. The benifits to society is certainly reduced somewhat however.

Heck, the Iowa DNR has ground they take hay off of, land they lease out to producers to graze and land they grow row crops on.

I have always had a considerable (for me) of ground I raise hay on, and I have some CRP. I didn't take any hay off the CRP because I didn't need the forage. I offered it to some South Dakota ranchers but the trucking costs were prohibitive.
 
So as a landowner I book a hunt in December, guys show up with their German Shorthairs and the high for the day is -15 degrees and the wind is blowing 25 mph. They say we can't hunt in this and want some kind of compensation. Am I responsible for the weather? Likewise am I responsible to assure hunters that if a drought comes that they won't be affected? I have spent all the money on seed, chemical, planting plus tied up the land so I have made the investment should I be responsible for the weather and refund there money? Who is going to refund mine?
 
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