South Dakota Wildlife Federation Executive Director Dana Rogers argues in favor of a proposal before the state Game, Fish and Parks Commission on July 11, 2024, at Good Earth State Park near Sioux Falls. (Joshua Haiar/South Dakota Searchlight)
PIERRE, S.D. (South Dakota Searchlight) – South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks Commission has voted to narrow a controversial nest predator trapping program, but the state intends to pay as much for bounties as it did last year.
Instead of paying anyone who traps animals that prey on game birds, the state will dedicate $200,000 of its $500,000 Nest Predator Bounty Program budget to payments for youth trappers. The remaining funds will pay trappers of all ages for coyotes. It will be the first time the state will use program funds to pay bounties for coyotes.
The nest predator program is funded by hunting, fishing and trapping license fees. It currently pays trappers $10 per tail for raccoons, skunks, badgers, opossums and red foxes collected during the nesting season for birds that are prized by hunters, such as pheasants. The program was designed to boost pheasant numbers by protecting more young birds from predators.
Since its 2019 inception during the Gov. Kristi Noem administration, critics have argued that the program leans on a scientifically unproven approach to raising pheasant numbers and is therefore a poor use of licensing funds. The program’s operational data has done little to quell those initial concerns. In 2024, officials with Game, Fish and Parks told lawmakers that the end of previously annual pheasant counts made it impossible to quantify the bounty program’s impact on pheasant populations.
Other critics have questioned the ethics of government bounties for wildlife trapping.
Game, Fish, and Parks leaders have defended nest predator removal, saying it’s been successful in engaging youth in trapping. They’ve also said reinstating the pheasant count that ended in 2019 wouldn’t be enough to show the program’s direct impact, as too many other environmental factors influence wildlife to draw a direct line from bounty payments to game populations.
State Sen. Tim Reed, R-Brookings, sponsored a bill during the 2026 legislative session that would have barred state-funded bounties on animals taken for nest-predation control, which would have ended the program.
But the Senate Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee defeated Reed’s bill, arguing the issue would be better addressed by the South Dakota Game, Fish, and Parks Commission. Senators suggested refocusing the program on youth, as a means to increase participation in trapping and other outdoor activities, reduce spending and reallocate funds toward wildlife habitat improvements.
In total, the state has paid $3,295,480 for 342,743 nest predators since the program’s inception.
A March 3 letter drafted by staff for the Legislature’s budget committee said its members wanted the program limited to children 17 and younger. They also wanted a cap of 25 tails per child, and to reduce the program budget from about $500,000 to $250,000.
However, the letter was never sent, given that the Game, Fish and Parks Commission acted before the budget committee reviewed its letter on March 12. The commission did not follow the budget committee’s recommendations to the letter and did not move to cut its budget in half.
Game, Fish and Parks Secretary Kevin Robling argued that the department was already heavily prioritizing habitat and public access.
“For every $1 of the bounty program that we spend, we spend $50 on habitat and access,” Robling told budgetary lawmakers.
The commission’s March 5 resolution rescinds its 2023 reapproval of the Nest Predator Bounty Program through 2026. In its place, the commission decided, the state will run a “Youth Trapping Recruitment Program” from March 1 to July 1 for residents 17 and younger. It will pay $10 per tail for raccoons, skunks, badgers, opossums and red foxes, with a cap of $200,000. Adults will no longer be paid for trapping those predators.
The commission also created a Coyote Bounty Program for all residents from April 1 to July 1. It will pay $30 per tail, capped at $300,000. The Department of Game Fish and Parks said the change keeps the overall effort within the former budget for the nest predator program.
Reed called the South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks Commission’s changes “a good start.”
A critic of the nest predator program still has concerns.
George Vandel, vice president of the South Dakota Wildlife Federation and a retired state wildlife biologist, said the commission handled the change with too little transparency. He said the coyote bounty was presented as an informational item — rather than an administrative proposal — and approved as a resolution without meaningful public notice or public comment, despite involving $500,000 in licensing funds.
Game, Fish and Parks’ Director of Wildlife, Tom Kirschenmann, told the commission why that was done. He said the department did not use the traditional rulemaking process because the change was being treated as new programs, rather than a rule change. He said that is in line with how other programs are managed.
Vandel said the commission, not the legislature, was the proper place to address the issue, but the changes don’t assuage his broader concerns. He said bounty programs, whether for youth engagement or for coyotes exclusively, do not reduce predator numbers enough to meaningfully boost wildlife populations.
“Bounty programs can’t work, never will work, and are basically a total waste of money,” Vandel said.
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