Hope this trend is not North America wide, but am afraid it is.

[muledriver]

We all know that baby boomers have had a huge impact during their live times on society as a whole.

It appears they also have been a disproportionate participants in hunting, and that means that wildlife management, and hunters, may have to get used to future realities, that may not include hunters in the mix.

This short video via Twitter explains it dramatically in about 3 seconds.

https://twitter.com/twitter/statuses/996812203167834112

[Bock Fever]

The number of hunting licenses sold increases each year (in Alberta and I'm sure elsewhere) and those aren't 60 year olds who are just getting into hunting for the first time. I think the hunting population here at least is pretty young and healthy.

[slough shark]

Originally Posted by Bock Fever

The number of hunting licenses sold increases each year (in Alberta and I'm sure elsewhere) and those aren't 60 year olds who are just getting into hunting for the first time. I think the hunting population here at least is pretty young and healthy.

Alberta is a bit of an outlier as generally we have a growing population from migration within Canada many of whom come from rural areas who are more likely to hunt. The bell curve probably is still the same it’s just Alberta’s population has a lot of people in that demographic. Probably the only thing that may keep hunter numbers stable in North America is women joining the sport.

[muledriver]

Originally Posted by Bock Fever

The number of hunting licenses sold increases each year (in Alberta and I'm sure elsewhere) and those aren't 60 year olds who are just getting into hunting for the first time. I think the hunting population here at least is pretty young and healthy.

The number has slowly increased, but the percentage of people hunting has not. It's been going down for decades. In Alberta, unfortunately.

[HowSwedeItIs]

Originally Posted by muledriver

The number has slowly increased, but the percentage of people hunting has not. It's been going down for decades. In Alberta, unfortunately.

Where would a person be able to look up statistics? My Wild Alberta records the number of resident hunters in 2005 as being 85,923. It increases by a few thousand every year until it peaks at 128,077 in 2015, and it has dropped by about 5000 since then. Would be interesting to see numbers in previous years

https://mywildalberta.ca/buy-licence...tatistics.aspx

https://mywildalberta.ca/buy-licence...ts-Apr2018.pdf

[muledriver]

Originally Posted by HowSwedeItIs

Where would a person be able to look up statistics? My Wild Alberta records the number of resident hunters in 2005 as being 85,923. It increases by a few thousand every year until it peaks at 128,077 in 2015, and it has dropped by about 5000 since then. Would be interesting to see numbers in previous years

https://mywildalberta.ca/buy-licence...tatistics.aspx

https://mywildalberta.ca/buy-licence...ts-Apr2018.pdf

Here is a report of what happened up to 2000. It's not good.

http://cfs.nrcan.gc.ca/pubwarehouse/pdfs/25904.pdf

If you look at the first chart in that, you will see that Alberta sold around 100,000 hunting licenses, with about 1.6 million less people. Our percentage is not good.. we used to be around 5% of population, and now are close to 2.5%.

Scary.

[HowSwedeItIs]

Boy, that's troubling. And wait times for draws seem longer than ever, go figure

[Gifted Intuitive]

The chart leveling out at 2% reveals that existing owners of long guns believe that someday confiscation will occur for hunting firearms. To justify owning a long gun you must purchase a hunting licence and this is verified by the number of licences purchased by rifle owners that do not hunt. The age distribution moving from 3% to 2% shifts from the 30-40 age group to the 50-60 age group substantiates the belief that owning firearms is owning valued property.

[Kurt505]

I don't know why but it's so hard getting recent (under 10 years) data regarding our license stats.

[Bushrat]

It's a sign of the times. As the trend of urbanization of people moving to cities continues the vast majority of which are getting farther removed from hunting fishing, guns and the outdoors. Our type of outdoor recreation is more and more frowned upon by a society who is growing up being conditioned by pretty much most types of media and halls of education to think emotionally rather than scientifically about environment and wildlife management. Their default thought pattern is becoming more anti theme when it comes to consumptive use of natural resources especially when it concerns wildlife and the environment. As time goes by, more and more people are being conditioned to automatically respond in a negative way whenever they are exposed to hunting, fishing, guns, shooting, eating meat, keeping animals in zoos, animal research, rodeos, etc, etc. They react emotionally and that is the only point of view they have, they are steadfast in their opinion that they are right. It has come to the point where these beliefs have morphed into a quasi religion. It may change in time (don't hold your breath) but it's going to get worse before it gets better.

[Big Grey Wolf]

Bushrat, very good summary of changes. It fits into the "Tribe" mentality so prevalent in our modern society. If we eat veggies like cows then everybody should only eat greens and leave bambi alone.

[West O'5]

Originally Posted by HowSwedeItIs

Where would a person be able to look up statistics? My Wild Alberta records the number of resident hunters in 2005 as being 85,923. It increases by a few thousand every year until it peaks at 128,077 in 2015, and it has dropped by about 5000 since then. Would be interesting to see numbers in previous years

https://mywildalberta.ca/buy-licence...tatistics.aspx

https://mywildalberta.ca/buy-licence...ts-Apr2018.pdf

Not surprising that it's dropped by 5000 since 2015 given that a lot of CDN transient workers were abandoning their new F-350s at Edmonton airport and bailing out of Alberta.Personally speaking,Ive managed to tough it out since 2015,but more then once I've thought if I'm gonna be broke and struggling I might as well be back east having a good time with my broke and struggling bud's,lol,...I always managed to have fun and somehow enjoy life in NB with a lot less $$ in my jeans,and I didn't "need" rifles and flyrods that cost more then most of my old trucks to do it,haha.

[Red Bullets]

Even back in the day, 100 years ago, the Alberta government felt that hunting would eventually die out.

[6.5 shooter]

From my take on the graph the demographic of 30-40 year olds actually increased over time....?

[Outdoorfanatic]

Seems counter intuitive to think that numbers are slowly decreasing yet wait times for tags is increasing but in many WMUs non hunters have just as much say or more than those who hunt on how tag allocations and seasons and land access should go. Its not as simple as biologists do an aerial survey minus predation, poaching, winter kill etc and the rest go to hunting. In recent years many WMUs have had aerial survey money transferred to other government departments and in much of AB non hunters are invited to consult biologists on what is the appropriate length of season and the appropriate kill ratio and even on land access for those who do hunt. Some of the highest moose density is within a hour of Edmonton but those areas are the hardest to gain permission too. Even green area that as recently as 2 years ago and still public land is now no longer accessible to hunting. Up north in areas that have 3 elk seasons, non hunters have limited the length of the season based on their perception of ethics. Ironically in part our volunteer hunter harvest reports feed not only information too fellow hunters and biologist but also non hunters who think that a 15% success on a priority 1 is too high. So what are they to think when they see a WMU with a 50% success. Of course number of average days to success or average dollar cost to success or total number of animals to square section are never taken into account . Now the AFGA has voted in over whelming support for manitory hunter harvest reports. And this doesn't consider the new proposed caribou management and how our reports will be used to skew the hunting stats in those WMUs. Bottom line is recreational hunting is politically expendable in the eyes of government. We are last to be considered.

[220 Swift]

I have seen the stats do the same in Sk.

What i have been told there is less people hunting but more applicants.

I dont have the exact number but here is the coles notes.
Sk pooulation has grown by 20 percent ik the last 12 years or so but hunting tag draw applicants have went up by 100%. My numbers are off but you get the drift.

So what is said is that all the animal rights guys are putting in for the draws, which costs 6$ some are getting drawn but dont actually purchase the the tag for the remainder $50. Bambi and Bullwinkle then live another year.

[Gifted Intuitive]

You rationalizations are not factoring in the impact of First-Nation harvests.

I have seen First-Nation hunt camps with refrigeration trucks. The Oil and Forestry industries in Alberta provide hunting access to most of the province. Once the ground freezes there is unlimited access. I visited a friend who was a mechanic at a drill-site south of Fox Creek and he said one hunter harvested 22 cow and calf elk in January.

Saskatchewan does not have such extensive access to remote areas and the wildlife numbers in many areas are high. I have sledded in the Worsely area and encountered hunt camps from Saskatchewan. There was a First nation hunt camp from Saskatchewan in the Ministic Bird Sanctuary about 7or 8 years back.

Go to the Blackfoot Grazing Area (WMU 936) 2-3 weeks before archery season. There are wagon loads of wildlife being hauled out of there.

[220 Swift]

Yes you are correct. This doesnt take into account of the FN refrigeration vans (alot of MB bands are here too ) or Metis- Im not sure where this group is now with laws.

These numbers i have said are from the Sk Environment website of those applying for big game draws.