bobcat wrote: ↑June 3rd, 2020, 7:58 am
O.K. I don't need to contact them. Western Pacific Timber has a posted
Rules and Recreation Policy, which even allows camping! It's pretty clear, from the source itself.
Whew. That's good to hear.
Regarding the KWA managers email: it's weird to me when land managers have rules that are more lax for higher impact activities. To me, at least, a hiker would be less likely to leave the road, less likely to start a fire, less likely to get injured, and less likely to "leave trace," or in this case, remove resources, than a hunter. So why would hunters be welcome and hikers not?
That said, I wasn't super surprised at the advice in her email, even though it does seem weird, and that's because I think of the cultural differences driving this kind of management difference. Hikers are foreigners from the big city, while hunters could be locals who know the loggers and the land managers better, and/or might be assumed to have better wilderness sense. I'm not sure any of that is true, but I can see that as an operating assumption.
One
legitimate difference, though, might be the worry that inviting "hikers" would open the door to Instagram masses, while, because hunting numbers are supposedly down, and rural communities are often shrinking, the land managers might assume that hunting pressure wouldn't be that great, or at least wouldn't be suddenly larger, after a spectacular photo appears online. Some wild public areas
are really suddenly more busy, thanks to insta-hikers.
Anyway, that's apparently not the case, because the recreation and policy page doesn't prohibit hiking, but I do wonder if the assumptions built into the KWA manager's email are based on these cultural and demographic factors.
Believe it or not, I barely ever ride a mountain bike.