Idaho Off Road Vehicle Restrictions

[bluetick78]

The law is almost a complete joke. Hardly enforced, I can’t think of anyone that has gotten a ticket. It’s completely ineffective without enforcement. Just makes Fish & Game feel better that they have the law on the books, that seems to be about as far as it goes from my observations.


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Spot on. Fish and Game pushed hard to get buy in from Federal land managers on the restrictions when they were working on making it law. After it passed and became law a lot of people thought the problem would be fixed, but it's been quite the opposite. F&G doesn't try to enforce the restrictions any harder than the Biden administration tries to enforce immigration laws.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not writing this post to sell a sob story about my hunt being ruined by some fat, beer swilling redneck. I'm very aware of the areas that are crowded with the lazy Polaris hunters, and I avoid those areas....and still have good success. I'm mostly curious to hear about hunters experiences statewide and then take that info to some folks in F&G who are interested in making more difficult to travel illegally during big game seasons.

 

[cuerro viejo]

I've always just thought motor cycles where weird. Setting there calling closing distance, and you come to trail. You are on one side of the trail bull on the other, then you a hear a distant rumble, with in seconds Yamaha 450 just rolled right past you at 50pmh.

 

[CM]

The law is a complete joke. It screws over the law-abiding, honest guys. I hunted one of the motorized restricted zones this year and I would walk the 3ish miles and 1200 feet on a 50" or less 4-wheeler trail every morning, and without fail someone would putter up on their 4-wheeler or side by side at 1st light. I still had a good hunt and killed a good bull, but the motorized rule is a huge joke.

They should just open the trails up to everyone, or better yet shut down the trails completely on September 1 or October 1.

 

[ODB]

There is also the matter of, on nat forest, having to defer to those established road maps to know what’s useable and what is not.

i have stood at the intersection of two roads in challis NF, and the proverbial one less travelled was legal, the one more travelled was not. Nothing intuitively would have told me it was that way, I would only have known that by getting their map and understanding the legend.

evidence of the condition of the road shows that few people worry as much…

 

[Mtnboy]

The law is a complete joke. It screws over the law-abiding, honest guys. I hunted one of the motorized restricted zones this year and I would walk the 3ish miles and 1200 feet on a 50" or less 4-wheeler trail every morning, and without fail someone would putter up on their 4-wheeler or side by side at 1st light. I still had a good hunt and killed a good bull, but the motorized rule is a huge joke.

They should just open the trails up to everyone, or better yet shut down the trails completely on September 1 or October 1.

Yeah....lets just completely shut down all the trails during one of the best times of the year to recreate on them. Screw that whole 'multiple use' thing right?

I hate illegal OHV use as much as the next guy but to want to completely shut out a user group due to some people being idiots/breaking the law seems a bit too far to me....that'd be like someone saying we should stop all hunting because people poach.

 

[JeffRaines]

Spot on. Fish and Game pushed hard to get buy in from Federal land managers on the restrictions when they were working on making it law. After it passed and became law a lot of people thought the problem would be fixed, but it's been quite the opposite. F&G doesn't try to enforce the restrictions any harder than the Biden administration tries to enforce immigration laws.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not writing this post to sell a sob story about my hunt being ruined by some fat, beer swilling redneck. I'm very aware of the areas that are crowded with the lazy Polaris hunters, and I avoid those areas....and still have good success. I'm mostly curious to hear about hunters experiences statewide and then take that info to some folks in F&G who are interested in making more difficult to travel illegally during big game seasons.

I'd be willing to bet them posting up at(or near) more popular areas - even if they had to hire on temporary help - would be financially beneficial for them. Have a strict policy in place - if you're caught motoring behind the gates its a mandatory fat fine(think $500-$1000) for every rider in the vehicle and forfeiture of hunting licenses/tags for the year.. again for everyone in the vehicle. You're not allowed to buy tags again until the fines are paid.

Problem would solve itself within 2 years.

 

[TheTone]

I'd be willing to bet them posting up at(or near) more popular areas - even if they had to hire on temporary help - would be financially beneficial for them. Have a strict policy in place - if you're caught motoring behind the gates its a mandatory fat fine(think $500-$1000) for every rider in the vehicle and forfeiture of hunting licenses/tags for the year.. again for everyone in the vehicle. You're not allowed to buy tags again until the fines are paid.

Problem would solve itself within 2 years.

Except fish and game doesn’t financially benefit from citations (unless the crime has a civil penalty or reimbursement) and also doesn’t set punishment including revocations.

the sad truth is most jurisdictions here don’t see wildlife crime as a big deal and atv abuse as even less of a problem or priority

 

[Bowhunting WI]

We've archery hunted ID the last 6 years and from our experiences, the OHV restrictions in ID are a complete joke. Every year the same closed trails are driven up and down on a daily basis, typically all day long, usually by the same guys. "Closed Road" signage is simply run over and they continue on their way. On one ridge, a completely new trail has been created by the ATVers....where there once was no trail, now there is a brand new one. Multiple times this year we hiked out of that valley, huffing and puffing (ready to die) only to walk up on a couple guys sitting in their SxS, more than a 1/2 mile from any trail or road, glassing the area we just came out of. (One group was kind enough to offer us a cold beer, which was nice! )

With the reduction/cap in NR tags in the unit we hunt, this year we ran into only one other NR hunter. All the rest of the guys we talked to were ID residents. We have a buddy from Idaho Falls who hunts with us each September and we have a running joke that most ID resident hunters only hunt from the trail as they spend their days driving around in their SxSs. We've used their strategy to our advantage as we put miles on the boots to get to the places they push the elk. That strategy has been very successful for us over the years. So while it's infuriating to watch guys so blatantly abuse the rules, we've adjusted our strategy to use their laziness to our advantage.

-BHWI

 

[Customweld]

Yeah....lets just completely shut down all the trails during one of the best times of the year to recreate on them. Screw that whole 'multiple use' thing right?

I hate illegal OHV use as much as the next guy but to want to completely shut out a user group due to some people being idiots/breaking the law seems a bit too far to me....that'd be like someone saying we should stop all hunting because people poach.

I certainly agree with that. I have a lot of friends who ride motor scooters on single FS trails this time of year, who don't hunt at all. But if it weren't for these guys cutting trails out in the spring and summer, a good portion of these trails would be so choked off with brush and downfall that they would be unusable.

 

[bluetick78]

I'd be willing to bet them posting up at(or near) more popular areas - even if they had to hire on temporary help - would be financially beneficial for them. Have a strict policy in place - if you're caught motoring behind the gates its a mandatory fat fine(think $500-$1000) for every rider in the vehicle and forfeiture of hunting licenses/tags for the year.. again for everyone in the vehicle. You're not allowed to buy tags again until the fines are paid.

Problem would solve itself within 2 years.

I've offered to go post signs at 50" designated trails free of charge. I was told that the F&G doesn't typically post trails, they didn't have any signs to post, and that I couldn't go do it myself for liability reasons. I told them that if they gave me a template for a sign with their exact verbiage, size requirements, etc, that I would have as many made as I could afford and sign a liability release document. The answer was still a resounding NO.

 

[Customweld]

I've offered to go post signs at 50" designated trails free of charge. I was told that the F&G doesn't typically post trails, they didn't have any signs to post, and that I couldn't go do it myself for liability reasons. I told them that if they gave me a template for a sign with their exact verbiage, size requirements, etc, that I would have as many made as I could afford and sign a liability release document. The answer was still a resounding NO.

The 50" rule applies to federal and state land management agencies, not necessarily IFG. IFG has a completely different measurement for their motorized rules.

 

[TheTone]

And IME getting my local ranger district to do anything is all but impossible. I think they have more recreation people than resource people, thus people out on the landscape is a great thing even if they are causing havoc

 

[bluetick78]

The 50" rule applies to federal and state land management agencies, not necessarily IFG. IFG has a completely different measurement for their motorized rules.

I get that. IDF&G uses the "full size vehicle" quantifier, but that also makes any 50" trail in a vehicle restricted unit a no-go for big game hunters from Aug 30th-Dec 31st. I figured the 50" trails would be a wonderfully simple place to start.

 

[KID]

I can't speak for motorized restricted use units most of which are in southern Idaho, where I've never been able to draw a tag for. But I can say there's TOO MUCH MONEY involved to shut down atv use As long as commercial land owners like Potlatch Deltic and other similar entities, sell land and trail use PERMITS and get paid boat loads of money from fish and game for access. In north central Idaho there has been very little Fish and Game officers in the field they're too concerned about the salmon and stealhead runs. Seems they're more concerned about a guy catching an unclipped fish rather than the ongoing shannanagans out in deer and elk county.