The Yukon Fish and Game Association was under fire Tuesday night for its proposal to increase inexpensive sheep hunting opportunities for Canadians from other jurisdictions.

Tim Mervyn, president of the Yukon Outfitters Association, went so far as to suggest the association was perhaps being motivated by opportunities to profit from illegal hunts.

At the very least, it hasn't given the proposal much thought in terms of what impact more opportunities will have on local sheep populations, he said.

Mervyn said the fish and game association's request has already been denied by the Yukon Fish and Wildlife Management Board in a previous request.

And he suggested the territory's largest non-profit organization has shown disrespect to the management board, and its previous position, by lobbying the four premiers of the western provinces to write Premier Dennis Fentie with their support for its proposal.

The association is asking the board recommend to Environment Minister Elaine Taylor that mountain sheep be included on the list of animals Yukon hunters can receive special guiding permits for.

There are 100 special guiding permits made available each year. They allow Yukon hunters to guide Canadians living outside the Yukon on hunting trips for moose, caribou, bears, wolves ... but not sheep. Canadians living outside the Yukon have to hunt under a special guide licence, or pay the regular big game outfitting fees, which can run well into the thousands - and more for sheep. Yukoners are allowed to pull a special guide licence once every three years.

Of the 254 sheep shot last year, resident Yukon hunters took 90 while the outfitting industry took 164.

As part of its annual routine, the wildlife management board conducts public consultation on proposed changes to regulations and policies affecting wildlife. It reviews the material, and forwards its recommendations to the minister, who can either accept, reject or alter the recommendations. There are 14 proposals being considered this year.

The audience of 25 or so for last night's public meeting was predominately made up of board members, staff with the Department of the Environment, members of the management board, outfitters and their supporters, and members of the fish and game association.

Mervyn said illegal guiding for big game already happens in the Yukon. Adding sheep to the list of animals allowed under special guiding permits would quickly invite further temptation to make a little cash with special guiding opportunities.

It wouldn't be long at all, it was suggested, before sheep hunters outside the territory learned that buddying up to a Yukoner could save them a bundle for a sheep hunt.

"It's common practice for special guides to trade hunts, or to receive cash under the table," Mervyn said. "We all know that."

The big game outfitters, he continued, wonder what the real purpose is behind the fish and game association's request.

Association president Paul Jacobs said the organization just wants to increase sheep hunting opportunities for friends and family living outside the Yukon.

His said his cousin, for instance, is a Yukoner who now lives in Alberta but can no longer go sheep hunting when he visits.

Putting sheep on the list for special guiding licences would allow Jacobs and others like him to take his cousin or friend sheep hunting, he said.

There's nothing unscrupulous, or underhanded, no hidden agenda, and no driving incentive to create an illegal guiding industry in the Yukon; it's just a simple, straightforward request for more opportunities for friends and family, he said.

Illegal hunting? There are reports of people out there who already allow others to harvest on their big game tag, Jacobs said.

Jacobs said the fish and game association anticipates there would not be more than an additional 15 sheep harvested if sheep were put on the special guide list.

John Carney, the association's vice-president, told members of the management board that when the association was formed back in the 1940s, there were six guiding principles.

One of those was to promote fish and hunting opportunities, he pointed out.

Carney said the association's request is simply that, a request to promote further opportunities, just as many other provinces in Canada provide hunting opportunities to Canadians from other jurisdictions.

The debate, he insisted, is not about wildlife management and numbers, with some 20,000 sheep in the Yukon.

"It's a political issue," Carney told members of the board. "It's not a conservation issue .... It's about who can shoot the sheep and where."

He pointed out there are people who would consider coming to the Yukon to hunt sheep with a friend or relative under a special guide licence, but cannot otherwise afford to book a hunt with an outfitter.

Association member Gordon Zealand said the group wrote the four western premiers to seek support for the proposal, because the four western provinces also provide special guide opportunities.

They don't for sheep, the outfitting president was quick to emphasize to the board.

Mountain sheep, he suggested, is in a different category altogether than moose and most other big game animals.

Mervyn countered that Jacobs' cousin can still go sheep hunting. He just can't pull the trigger. He can still look through the scope, and he can still enjoy the experience of being up in the mountains. He just can't pull the trigger.

Non-resident Yukoners have the opportunity now to go sheep hunting by booking a hunt with an outfitter, he told members of the board.

The proposal, it was was pointed out by outfitter David Dickson, comes at a time when the board is being asked to recommend a sheep hunting closure on Pilot Mountain and in the Miners Range immediately northwest of Whitehorse.

Allowing sheep hunters on a special guide licence could take out an accessible and vulnerable sheep population in no time, Dickson said. He said temptation would overcome principles of conservation, especially when the opportunity for a special guided hunt only comes every three years under a special guide permit.

And the special guided hunters and their Yukon hunting buddies would move off somewhere else, to the next population, and on and on, members from the management board heard from other outfitters.

Outfitters, the board heard, have a vested interest in ensuring proper harvest management of the wildlife in their areas, because it is their livelihood.

Dickson pointed out that the Town of Faro recently became so concerned with the eight moose taken on special guide licence in 2006 that it requested the minister restrict the number of guide licences for the area.

Allowing non-resident hunters on special guide licences - hunters with no direct ties to wildlife management in the territory - could eventually lead to lost opportunities for Yukoners in specific areas, because of increasing pressure and declining populations, the board heard.

Outfitter Alan Young said in his 19 years in the business in B.C., he's seen the ravage of illegal guiding.

Putting sheep on the special guide list would impact every outfitter in the territory, and would only add to the existing problem that already exists with illegal guiding for moose, said the Yukon's representative of the Foundation for North American Wild Sheep.

In an interview prior to the meeting, Young said adding sheep to the list just wouldn't kick open the doors to illegal guiding here, it would bust open the windows too.

As soon as the word is out that there are special guiding opportunities in the Yukon for the sheep, the rush will be on, Young predicted.

He said then there'll soon be a friend of a friend, who knows a friend who'll buy all the beer, and then some.

And pretty soon, Young said, "They'll be shooting those sheep right from under your noses."