# Increase in deer baiting changing MN deer hunting culture



## h2ofwlr (Feb 6, 2004)

*Increase in deer baiting changing Minnesota deer hunting culture *
As deer-baiting violations triple, DNR officers hunt craftier poachers. 
BY CHRIS NISKANEN and MARYJO WEBSTER, Pioneer Press 
Article Last Updated: 11/08/2007 05:09:41 PM CST

Last summer, a deer hunter was quizzing conservation officer Paul Kuske about baiting deer. Kuske explained how and why using bait, such as corn, to lure deer for hunting is illegal. He recalls the hunter's response: "That's terrible that people do that."

But last Saturday, Kuske and other Minnesota Department of Natural Resources officers raided the same hunter's 160-acre property near Pierz, Minn., and found 24 illegal corn piles near deer stands and trails.

Two of the hunter's sons were busted, including a juvenile. The adult son was fined $300. The father wasn't fined because he wasn't hunting at the time.

"It's one of the most blatant deer-baiting cases I've ever seen,'' Kuske said last week. "They knew it was wrong. The landowner's sons had been helping him (bait)."

DNR officials say the incident illustrates how a growing culture of illegal baiting is changing the sport of deer hunting in Minnesota.

Since 1991, Minnesota has prohibited food from being used to lure deer for hunting, but DNR officials say illegal baiting has grown more popular and widespread in recent years.

They say a new breed of baiters don't fear being caught and DNR bait investigators are being pulled away from other deer-enforcement duties.

The trend is confirmed by a Pioneer Press computer analysis of deer-baiting tickets written by DNR officers since 2002.

That analysis, paired with extensive officer interviews, shows that:

-- The number of hunters getting deer-baiting tickets has more than tripled in five years, a period when baiting complaints have risen dramatically and the DNR has increased baiting enforcement. 
-- Baiting violations occur across a broad swath of Minnesota's forested region, but less so in the state's southern agricultural region, where deer populations are lower and where corn and other crops are common.

-- There are baiting "hotspots,'' such as around Park Rapids and the North Shore. Officers in those areas write more tickets because they get more complaints and make baiting enforcement a priority.

-- Baiting enforcement is taking away from officers' other deer-season duties, such as checking gun-safety violations and trespassing complaints. Last weekend, some officers spent nearly all their work hours investigating baiters.

No one knows how many of Minnesota's 500,000 deer hunters use illegal bait, but conservation officer estimates range from 1 percent to 50 percent, depending on the region.

DNR officers have written 369 tickets for deer baiting since 2002. Five years ago, baiting barely registered as a top-10 violation. Now it's No. 4.

Moreover, those 369 tickets are "only the tip of the iceberg,'' said Capt. Jim Konrad, DNR enforcement administrative manager. "Judging by the complaints we get and our aerial surveillance, there's a lot more out there.''

Ken Soring oversees 56 DNR conservation officers in Minnesota's northeast region. "Eighty percent of them were involved in baiting enforcement (last weekend)," he said. "It's pretty widespread."

THE RISE OF BAITING

Until Minnesota banned it, deer baiting wasn't viewed as a problem. It is legal in Wisconsin and Michigan.

But when Minnesota's deer herd began increasing a decade ago, complaints about baiting also rose. Most complaints have come from law-abiding hunters whose neighbors bait deer and attract them across property lines.

Minnesota's deer herd of 1.2 million is near record levels. With liberal hunting rules, hunters have recently set statewide kill records. Last year, 37 percent of firearms hunters registered a deer, a success rate near the 10-year average.

So why is illegal baiting becoming more prevalent?

DNR conservation officer Kipp Duncan has written 16 baiting tickets since 2002, more than any other officer in that time. Until last year, he worked along the North Shore near Two Harbors, but now he is based in Duluth, where he spent most of last weekend investigating illegal baiters.

Duncan said baiters simply want to increase their odds of killing a big deer.

"There are so many big-buck contests out there, so it's about bragging rights," he said.

He said some hunters justify baiting because their neighbors bait.

"The main complaint we get is a neighbor is baiting, so it's sucking deer away from someone else,'' Duncan said. "They may feel justified to do so if someone else is doing it."

They also want guarantees.

"People spend less time in the woods, but still expect results," Kuske said. "They use (baiting) to have an upper hand. I think for some guys, it hurts their ego if they don't get a deer. Getting that deer is so important to some people."

Mark Johnson, executive director of the 19,000-member Minnesota Deer Hunters Association, said hunters today are influenced by what they see on television.

"If you watch TV, they're hunting over feeders and near feed operations. It's totally getting away from fair chase," he said.

Duncan said he makes baiting investigations a priority because the practice "cheats" ethical hunters by drawing deer away from them.

"People who are hunting honestly and ethically," he said, "rather than shooting deer over a corn pile, should have the same opportunity as the cheaters."

Conservation officer Mike Lawrence, 54, of Park Rapids is also driven to enforce the baiting law by hunting ethics. He wrote six baiting tickets in 2006 and 13 since 2002. He has been a conservation officer for 25 years.

"I think hunters don't want to work as hard as they used to,'' Lawrence said. "Putting bait out for deer is not hunting. Most ethical deer hunters don't like it and they eventually call me (to report bait)."

LEGAL LOOPHOLES

Last year, the Legislature changed the baiting law. The new rule doesn't penalize a hunter on private land if the deer he or she shoots is being draw to a bait pile on a neighbor's land.

In writing the law, lawmakers acknowledged that baiting has become a problem among neighbors, but DNR officials believe the law change only encouraged baiters to find legal loopholes.

"We need to clarify some of the confusion created by last year's law,'' Soring said.

The DNR also made deer feeding and baiting illegal in a portion of northwest Minnesota last year, where bovine tuberculosis was discovered in cattle in 2005 and later in wild deer.

Biologists say recreational deer feeding, which is legal, and illegal baiting encourage the transmission of bovine TB and other diseases.

The DNR also increased the minimum fine for illegal baiting from $100 to $300.

So, how did those law changes affect the incidence of deer baiting this year?

DNR pilots still found 16 areas with deer bait in the TB zone where it's prohibited, despite widespread publicity about the bait ban. "It ranged from a bucket of corn to truckloads of corn and sugar beets," said Capt. Mike Trenholm, the DNR's chief pilot.

Whether the increased fine is deterring baiting is debatable. Kuske said he's made it known around Pierz that he's investigating baiters. "I think some people are cleaning up their act," he said.

But some baiters, Duncan said, continue to play a cat-and-mouse game with officers - using more sophisticated techniques and machinery to camouflage bait and distribute it.

CHANGING THE LAW

The MDHA's Johnson said the outbreak of TB and other deer diseases like chronic wasting disease have his group's membership worried. They'll vote in February on a resolution to ban the feeding of deer from Sept. 1 to Dec. 31.

"We've found tuberculosis in wild deer in Minnesota, so deer feeding is something our membership is worried about,'' he said. "As a side effect, the proposal would also take care of the deer baiting issue."

Any changes in deer feeding or baiting would have to be proposed by the Legislature, Konrad said.

He added, though, that the DNR is reluctant to take up the issue with lawmakers.

Lawmakers could say, "Let's just legalize it,'' Konrad said. "There are those in that camp. It's something we're really worried about."

Konrad said baiting enforcement takes away from other deer-hunting enforcement, but some officers feel strongly it is worth fighting. "They take it personally,'' he said. "It's cheating. They think it's important to catch them."

Kuske said he's determined to catch more.

"I've hiked 20 miles in the past few days, looking for bait,'' he said. "The word is out - we're looking for bait and looking hard."

Chris Niskanen can be reached at [email protected] or 651-228-5524.

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*Deer baiting in Minnesota by the numbers *
Pioneer Press 
Article Last Updated: 11/08/2007 05:07:22 PM CST

A Pioneer Press computer analysis of 369 deer-baiting summons and warnings between 2002 and 2006 showed:

-- Last year's 147 baiting tickets was more than a threefold increase over 2002.

-- Illegal baiting is widespread. Northern Minnesota conservation officers Kipp Duncan, who worked in Two Harbors until last year, and Mike Lawrence of Park Rapids have written the most baiting tickets, 16 and 13 respectively, since 2002. But Kevin Peterson in Hastings has written 12 and a dozen officers across the state have written between 8 and 11 tickets in the same time period.

-- Tickets with fines outnumbered warning tickets, 314 to 55.


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## Dak (Feb 28, 2005)

good article...not surprising


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## Buxster (Oct 13, 2007)

That $300 ticket turns into around $900 when it is all said and done too. Not cheap in the least bit.


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