Maverick 1

Yep. And just like with hunting, even if the lake is chock full of fish, some won't catch any while some will catch plenty.

Sure, but we aren't talking about a lake chock full of fish. We are talking about a lake with one fish.

Maverick 1

Mav,I wouldn't fish in a lake that had one fish and I wouldn't hunt in an area that had no game.I don't know why people continue to hunt where they claim there's no game.

It's because there are no areas around here that have game. It's either you hunt where there is little game or you don't hunt at all.

bawanajim

What area of the state is this game free zone located? I don't want to get sucked into that black hole.[]

DougE

Mav,I don't know here you're speaking of so it's hard for me to have an opinion.I do know that I live and hunt in the WMU that has the lowest dd's and the lowest success rate per aquare mile in the state.i know many areas in this WMU that have very few deer.I also look at those areas and completely understand why.In most cases,there's really no reason for deer to be there,yet guys still hunt there and thancomplain that there's no deer.I hunt where there's food and cover and I find deer consistantly.Food sources can be spotty and they change constantlyu so Ihave to remain flexible throughout the seson.A hotspot one week can turn into a dud the next week.

Screamin Steel

And all of that is fine. No doubt with enough time, someone can locateand kill a deer. I won't pretend to know anything about anyone else's schedules but I know we've come along way from the days when folks had alot of leisure time. Those of us with enough time and effort will always find a deer or two. Those with busy jobs, family lives, etc are the one's getting screwed the most. The weekend or opening day crowd always are the blunt of everyone's joke about not getting their deer, but truth is they often just lack the time or in some cases the abilty to walk very far (older hunters.) Many of them would gladly take any buck includiing a spike. Whyare THEY getting screwed while the minority who blindly support HR and are fortunate to still be killing multiple deer a year are grinning? Opinions on this may vary, but successful deer hunting while often challenging, is still viewed as recreation by most. They work hard all year, and don't really feel they should have to scale rocky cliffs, ford rivers, and spend a hundred hours scouting just to see a couple of deer. Of course that's a blow to the pride of the self proclaimed deer hunting experts who think that anything short of a blood sacrifice to earn your buck is unworthy. Just go on HPA and claim you didn't get a buck and saw next to no deer and see what reaction you get. Glad to see a few sites out there still allow feedom of speech.

BTBowhunter

Interesting how we have Doug, with limited hunting time due to a very busy occupationfinding excellent hunting on public ground in 2G which isdescribed by most as the worst area in the state.

Then we have Corny in one of the best WMU'swhen measuredin kills per square mile claiming the hunting is lousy for everyone where he lives.

I guess it all boils down to the fact thatsome hunters will consistently find the deer wherever they hunt andothers consistently won't find the deer no matter where they hunt.

DougE

Steel,I understand what you're saying but Ihave much less time to hunt than most people.This year,I blew off 3 evenings to hunt during archery season.The vast majority of my hunting is done on saturdaysand most of them,I don't get a full day to hunt.I've been in the woods once since the snow has melted.I work 60+ hours a week running a business and I have two kids that are involvedin way more activities than they should be.My 10 year old daughter is involved with gymnastics,cheerleading and she shows horses.Almost every saturday in te fall,she has a cheerleading competition which leaves me at home,at least part of the time with my 4 year old.We have horses that take up a ton of my time not only taking care of them but training them as well.I work a horse almost every evening,even during the winter.On the first day of spring gobbler season I'll be in Ohio with my daughter at a two day barrel racing clinic.I literally never stop but I do find a few hours here and there to scout and check out new places,alot of that is done on horseback.call it multi-tasking if you will.I'm fortunate inthat I live where I hunt and that does allow me to steal a few hours away from time to time.Still,I get much less time to hunt than the guys that actually have vacation time.this year,i couldn't hunt at all in bear season and I took no days off during archery season to hunt.the only day I took off to hunt was the first day of buck.

I don't consider myself to be any type of great hunter.i do however understand where deer should be and why.Also,since I know this part of the state fairly well,it's easier for me to narrow down the placesto start looking.I don't always pick the right spots but I do enough to fill my freezer every year.

i actuallythink hunting is easy in this part of the state because tehre's literally huge expanses of wasteland that I don't have to waste my time hunting because the habitat is so poor.I key in on the areas where I know should hold deer at various times of the season and I usually connect on a fairly regular basis.Two of the places where I killed deer this year on public land were never scouted this prior to showing up that day.

blkpowder

Just a question here. Back in the late eighties and early nineties when deer numbers where hitting their peaks. You had hunters complaining about not seeing or harvesting deer! With that, how do you justify even today,if the complaint is legit? Is it the hunters effort,choice of spots,no food to hold deer or is it over harvested?[/align]

bluebird2

Those would be valid points to consider if the harvests didn't equal or exceed recruitment. But, since the PGC says the harvests are keeping the herd stable, that means hunters are harvesting all the deer available to be harvested without reducing the herd even more.

Cornelius08

"Then we have Corny in one of the best WMU'swhen measuredin kills per square mile claiming the hunting is lousy for everyone where he lives. "

Used to be one of the best. Kills per mile is irrelavant and thats the reason our herd is going down the toilet in the first place. Easy access due to friendly terrain, no big woods... And one of the highest antlerless allocations in the state. Give us the allocations of 2g or other wmu and see if we still lead in harvests! Our harvests werent sustainable. And as you know my main complaint isnt that hunting here in particular is TERRIBLE. ITs simply worse than previous. And my biggest problem is pgc LYING yet again and where we are clearly headed. Claimed stabilization, yet our herd and buck harvest has dropped like a ton of chit. The buck harvest was only 8th or 9th in the state, in some of the best habitat in the state....The absolute worst wmus in the state had higher buck harvests than we did! 2A is halfway down the toilet. In another 8 to 10 years if nothing changes, we'll be in the same rotten boat as the bottom of the barrel areas thanks to pgc. Continue to kill more than the recruitment and its INEVITABLE. Also remember our previous goal when the sham began was THIRTEEN DEER PER SQUARE MILE here! WTF!!?!??! What a joke LMAO!! So now they have no spoken goal, yet is there really any reason to believe, even if they cant ever get to that point, that they arent STILL shooting for it? This situation here is far from "dire", but why in the hell shouldnt we expect the best management possible when there is no excuse not to? All would be necessary is tweaking of the allocation which should have happened about 4 years ago....And gone DOWN slightly at the time INSTEAD OF UP!! To stabilize the herd! LOL. Now a reasonable decrease to the allocation for a few year to see the effect is exactly what is needed... Think that will occur? I think the odds are better of my joining the audubon society.

"I guess it all boils down to the fact thatsome hunters will consistently find the deer wherever they hunt andothers consistently won't find the deer no matter where they hunt."

And I'll find them in either, fill my buck tag archery season as Ive always done and refrain from shooting does.....That doesnt mean I have to pat pgc on the back for having reasonable success IN SPITE of them....Used to enjoy shooting a skinhead during flinter. Thanks to pgcs asnine plan, Our crew no longer does so. Buck numbers are down... small and large, and as stated, despite your spin on my position, the plan is a miserable failure, and has nothing to do with the fact I can more easily find deer year in and year out than you, and dont even needon your lil' lease in the best wmu in the state.