Most politicians, particularly those in the West, learned long ago that you don't rile up sportsmen without consequences.

Now it appears Cabela's, the giant sporting goods company, has learned the same lesson the hard way. At least it says it has.

Few issues are as important to hunters and anglers as access, especially as more and more wealthy individuals keep buying up prime property and closing it to sportsmen. So when Cabela's associated itself with a concerted effort to sell land for big money as "trophy" property, the backlash should have been predictable.

You don't go off into a side business that's going to alienate the very people who make up your core business. Cabela's Trophy Properties Web site touting exclusive access to public lands or properties ripe for subdivision was a red flag.

Last week, half a year after some Montana Wildlife Federation members returned their Cabela's catalogs and called for a boycott, the company's senior vice president, Mike Callahan, came to the state Fish, Wildlife and Parks Commission, check in hand.

Telling commissioners that Cabela's has changed its marketing approach to promote access and to educate buyers about access issues, Callahan said the company will donate $50,000 immediately and an additional $12,000 each year for five years to FWP to be spent for public access programs.

At least one commission member, Shane Colton, worried that accepting the money might make it look as though Cabela's "came in and bought the commission off." But, as commission Chairman Steve Doherty pointed out, FWP routinely accepts donations, and often uses them as matching funds for government grants.

The question is not whether FWP is selling out, it is whether Cabela's (and other sporting goods companies as well) will follow through and stop selling out its Montana customers' access to quality wildlife habitat.

"The jury's still out" on the company's real estate activities, said Web columnist Bill Schneider. He said he thinks Cabela's is "flirting with disaster."

One thing's for sure: Like the NRA in particular, sportsmen in general aren't the type to back off.