What will happen eventually is that anyone wanting to hunt Kansas, be it resident or non resident, will have to go to an outfitter.
Or hunt public land that cannot be leased.
Times change. The
cat buck is out of the bag and there's no going back. IMO, the current system will continue and most likely expand.
I do think we should be honest about the whole deal. The wild game really doesn't belong to the State. The State attempts to manage it, well or poorly as may be the case. That's true.
However, landowners control the access to the wild game. They control access to their land, as they should. It IS their land to do with as they will (although the Feds continue to exercise more and more oversight and control).
Since they control the access, they control the game. That amounts to de factor ownership. If the famous terty-point-buck of song and story resides on a particular landowner's 10,000 acres, that landowner essentially owns that terty-point-buck and can sell him via a lease/Outfitter arrangement. That's just the honest truth of it.
A problem that I saw and believe will become even more common is poaching. Back when this Kansas Giant Deer mania got going, places where I pheasant hunted got leased up for deer. These were places that the regular small town folks that lived in the area used to hunt for deer until the leasing got rampant. What I saw was people going out at night to get that terty-point-buck that they used to be able to fair chase.
Illegal as heck. I know it was going on though. Before you start, I've always hunted deer on public land. Best KS deer I harvested was 207# field dressed. This was on Corps land around a reservoir. Played cat and mouse stalking that deer in snow for about 90 minutes along a creek. He finally decided to make a break for it across a cut corn field. Did not work out as he planned, I'm sure. Great memory.
The other thing I find interesting is the discrimination. Corbet talks about someone owning 80 acres being able to sell his landowner tag. Why 80 acres? Why not 160? What about the guy that has 79 acres? What about the guy that has a 40 acre woodlot just packed with deer bedding down?
Why can't I get a tag and sell it to whoever wants to hunt public land?