Do tell

must be a story behind that statement

There certainly is. It’s a good one. I’ll let t-Rex tell it..

And mine will be just what you told me. From the landowners perspective.

With your spin on it...again.

Nope. I just checked my dictionary. Under bribery, the 2nd example is “such as when one buys steak dinners and golf games for the ranch manager (or lease boss) who then hides higher lease offers from the rancher”. Black and white. No gray.

Not all owners are micromanagers or even care about the hunters. They hire a ranch manager to make the best decision without bringing every issue to them. Taking a higher offer from a random that located the property on the internet and tried to undercut the current hunters in a shady way doesn’t seem like a good bet compared to a group that has been good stewards of the land and resources and pays on time for over 30 years.

My guess is this has more to do with the decision than a round of golf and a steak. Plus, when the ranch manager gets a percentage of profit, would think a round of golf and a steak would pale in comparison.

But what do I know...you have the dictionary

The reality is this: it's not YOUR decision or the ranch manager/lease bosses decision. It's the landowner's decision. Paying someone to prevent the information reaching the decision maker who has the most invested.... is bribery. Plain and simple. Look it up. All definitions describe it exactly that way.

I know it doesn't feel good. But it's the shoe YOU chose to wear. Suck it up buttercup.

Our landowner could get quite a bit more than we pay. He was offered double years ago and turned it down. He rather deal with us who don't ask him for a thing and don't expect anything. Probably talked to him 3 or 4 times in 8 years. We aren't on a trophy lease so that helps.

It wasn’t my decision and I had nothing to do with the decision. Reality is that it is between the ranch manager and the owner. Couple of steaks and a round of golf didn’t sway his decision and weren’t meant too no matter how you spin it.

Feels fine to me

Truth is this folks: there are so many different hunting and lease scenarios that all are different. Each of us has their own perspective based on what we have witnessed, endured, and seen. There are very well run leases and horribly run leases. There are are good lease members and horrible lease members. There are awesome land owners and horrible land owners. There are good lease bosses and really sorry lease bosses. Same as everything else in life now days.

IMO a bad lease manager is there to benefit themselves and profit off of others. They make rules for others but think they do not have to follow the same rules. If you have experienced that then no wonder you are sour on lease managers.

A good lease manager does it because they want to be a part of a team that works to improve the property and deer. If you have experienced that then you are a lucky hunter.

So the debate between the two can go on forever but the truth is this topic is no different from every other debate in todays world. There are thing done well and things done not so well

Right. But it’s his decision to make. Not a lease boss or manager. The money in trophy game is typically the driver in most ranching operations. And even in the rare cases that money isn’t an issue, the owner still is interested in current value.

If it felt fine you’d own it.

Our landowner could get quite a bit more than we pay. He was offered double years ago and turned it down. He rather deal with us who don't ask him for a thing and don't expect anything. Probably talked to him 3 or 4 times in 8 years. We aren't on a trophy lease so that helps.

rancher do you not get the concept that not every owner wants to be involved in or even cares about the day-to-day operation of running a ranch?

They don’t know chit about running a ranch, what’s best for the ranch, every decision that’s made, etc. Many of them don’t want to be bothered with it because they have bigger fish to fry - namely, doing the things that made them the money that allowed them to buy the ranch in the first place. That’s why they hire ranch managers and trust them to make those decisions with all factors in mind. And not every decision needs to be made with the $$ that come in this month or this year as the bottom line. Short term profits can turn into long-term losses if things aren’t run with the long term health of a ranch in mind.

Jeff Bezos probably owns as much Texas ranchland as anyone. But I can assure you he doesn’t spend much time worrying about running them. He spends his time running Amazon.

You just assume everyone should do things the way you do them. That’s your Achilles’ heel on just about every subject.

It is not a lease bosses job to manage maximize profit for a landowner. Maybe for a ranch manager if that is in his job description. But he has a people factor too that plays one of the biggest parts in making everyone happy. LO should handle the money part of his operation and anyone wanted to one up the current leasers can just call the LO themselves. Easy to get phone numbers and email or mail a letter.

Wow what a can of worms this turned out to be?..

Our land owner isn’t involved at all. We deal with the ranch foreman/manager. Most the hunters have never met or even seen the owner.