It began as one of those halcyon visits to yesteryear, a return to the grain fields around the town of Holyoke where 38 years earlier I bagged my first pheasant, one of those benchmark memories an outdoorsman takes to his grave.
There had been other agreeable visits over the years, but a wandering pursuit of the long- tailed bird had taken me elsewhere in recent seasons. I’d lost touch with the region, always longing to go back.
So when an acquaintance invited me to join his group for a December outing, I jumped at the chance. The man had hunted often in the area, had obtained permission on several farms.
With another Denver resident, I joined the procession just after sunrise and began the customary march through a succession of properties.
In keeping with the tenor of a generally frustrating season, we found a few birds, but not nearly enough, taking our pleasure in the fellowship of new companions and the invigoration of clean, crisp air. Then, as we switched location, something went terribly wrong.
“You guys hunt here while I go over to talk to a farmer about another spot,” our volunteer guide said, indicating a place where a weedy roadside ditch blended into a field of freshly harvested corn.
When my Denver friend and I made our way off the road into cover, we almost immediately were confronted by an angry landowner. Refusing our explanation of being misdirected, he phoned a Colorado Division of Wildlife officer and insisted we be charged with trespass.
That’s when an apparently naive outdoor writer who never in almost 60 years of hunting had so much as an official finger wagged at him got a quick education in the inner workings of a key part of Colorado’s wildlife law.
Simple trespass, the warden informed, carried a levy of 20 points against my license, enough to revoke my hunting privileges. He offered the caveat that, given my clean slate, the unintentional aspect of the violation and cooperation in the matter, the hearing officer customarily doesn’t revoke a license on first offense.
When I asked why this penalty was so severe, the warden replied, “It’s a law the Colorado Farm Bureau got passed in the legislature.”
By comparison, someone who willfully shoots an elk in illegal fashion faces only a 15-point penalty, with similar lesser levies for what might be considered fairly heinous offenses.
Which got me thinking all over again about this legislative imbalance that exists regarding landowners and wildlife. Let me say straight off the top that I bear no ill will toward those who make a living from the land. I grew up on a farm and rode a scraggly little herd of cows through college. I wish every farmer health and prosperity.
But it’s high time that the agricultural community stopped dictating wildlife law, whatever form it takes. Certain convoluted conditions exist relative to game and fish matters in the Colorado General Assembly.
The worst dates back more than three decades, when a powerful livestock lobby eliminated the independent committee for wildlife and parks, making it subsidiary to a larger Agriculture, Livestock and Natural Resources Committee. It’s no coincidence that agriculture comes first in the title; the chairmen in both houses routinely are either farmers or ranchers.
The consequence for wildlife and sportsmen often has been severe. Legislation benefiting wildlife often gets squelched in committee. Other measures, such as the one that extended landowner preference vouchers to public lands, find clear sailing.
The time has come for the legislature to correct these abuses. For starters, it should re-establish a separate committee for wildlife and parks, leaving agriculture to its own dealings. Next, restore DOW to its original more independent status as a Type 1 agency following a downgrade during the domineering Bill Owens administration.
In short, it’s time to get agriculture off the back of wildlife. Let each run its separate affairs, with the entire legislature as arbiter, and best wishes to both.
Now for the rest of the story. A call came later in December from another farmer near Holyoke who had learned of the incident through the cornstalk network. He offered a second-hand apology for what he termed a “lack of hospitality,” adding, “I don’t want people to think everyone out here is like that.”
He further extended an invitation to hunt his property, a gesture that restored warm memories of so many pleasant associations with farmers through all those years.
Now I’ll again look forward to that next trip to the Holyoke country. My new benefactor tells me I might even find a pheasant or two.
