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Table 32. Range of potential change in the number of hunters, hunter days, and opportunity for deer, elk, 

 and moose between 2003 and 2015 based on the historic range of variation (+/- 1 standard 

 deviation from the long term average 1990-2001). 



" Hunter opportunity for deer is reported as total antlerless harvest because hunters can harvest antlerless 

 deer several different ways: the general deer license, a deer B license, and an over the counter permit. 



The number of big game, deer, and deer B licenses available to nonresidents from 1990 to 2000 in shown 

 in Table 33. The slight changes are primarily due to a policy decision to use market prices to achieve a 

 given target number of licenses sold in some license categories. Most of the changes through time occur 

 in the outfitter- sponsored category. Depending on year-to-year changes in the interaction between price 

 and hunter response, nonresident prices are set at levels so that the target number of licenses will be sold 

 on average over a five year period. In some years, the target will be exceeded, but sales will fall short in 

 other years if the price is set too high. 



Outfitting Industry. Nonresident hunter expenditures and opportunity to hunt big game are not expected 

 to change under this alternative because nonresident licensing opportunities are established by policy 

 and/or pricing. This implies that there will be no impacts to the outfitting industry on a statewide basis 

 because the primary clientele seeking those services are nonresident hunters (Chapter 2). However, 

 individual big game outfitters could be negatively impacted if a specific ungulate herd segment within 

 their allowable hunting area were displaced due to wolf presence or the local herd was disproportionately 

 reduced by wolf predation or a combination of wolf predation and other environmental factors. Hunter 

 success rates are an important marketing tool and some outfitters may experience declines in nonresident 

 bookings. Data to analyze the potential impacts to specific outfitters are currently lacking. The extent or 

 likelihood of such an area-specific impact is unknown. 



Recreational Values 



Hunting Values . Wolves have the potential to affect several kinds of recreation in Montana including 

 hunting and tourism. The economic values that an individual places on these recreational experiences, 

 beyond any amount they actually spend, have been esfimated on a per trip or per day basis in a number of 

 studies (Chapter 2). 



The estimated net economic value for elk hunting is $109 per day (in 2002 dollars), $74 for deer hunting, 

 and $242 for moose hunting (King and Brooks 2001, Duffield and Neher 1990, and Brooks 1996, 

 respectively). Given the variation in the number of hunter days for elk, deer, and moose hunting observed 

 from 1990-2001 , total net economic value of big game hunting would also vary year to year. Total net 

 economic values of hunting would be expected to mirror how hunting participation changes in light of the 

 wolf management program described by this alternative and the other factors infiucncing hunter behavior. 



In recent years, some evidence indicates that net economic values per trip for hunting have increased in 

 real terms (King and Brooks 2001 ). However, there is not enough evidence to reliably predict this trend 

 out to 2015. Therefore, the net economic values per day (or per trip) presented in Chapter 2 are assumed 

 to be constant in real terms (corrected for inflation) over the foreseeable future. 



117 



