Western MA Hunter

HA! That would be a sight to see.
MA Jay, you are right.. there is alot to it that we take for granted after growing up with family & friends that hunt. Wow.
Good advice though!

jay-bar

I would suggest buying a compound bow, attend a hunter safety course (archery or not) and buy an archery and a primitive firearm stamp for your hunting license. That will allow you to hunt for 11 weeks (I believe) this year. In addition, you can learn to shoot your bow in your basement, back yard or some other safe place, which you can't do with a shotgun w/o going to a range. You do not need the bow hunting safety course to hunt in Mass. (which course by the way is a huge waste of time and which I only did so I can hunt in NH or NY), but as a first time license buyer you need some type of hunting course. My gun club has periodic hunter safety courses that are open to members and non-members. In my experience, it is easier to find a gun safety course than a hunting course and if you read page one of the abstracts you will see that an FID allows you to buy a hunting license, so if all you can find is a gun safety course then take it and get an FID and go and buy a hunting license.

I agree that you will need a car and or a hunting buddy with a car to hunt effectively. If you use the number of doe permits that are allocated to the northeastern part of the state (which is where you and I live) as a proxy for deer density, you can deduce that the north-east (or Zone 10) has the highest or second highest deer density in the state.

I hunt in Zone 10, 50% on public land 50% on land owned by a conservation group that allows a limited number of hunters per year. Hunting pressure in Zone 10 during archery season is non-existent. I have seen one other hunter in the woods over the past two years and that was two years ago on the last day of shotgun when we had a terrific rainstorm and that guy was lost and wandering in circles (as I later found out when he stumbled up to my house). Fortunately, I walk to my deer stands and have had great luck the past two years as I have become more adept at scouting and staying quiet and scent free.

To have consistent success requires a lot of time spent in the woods learning how to read sign and knowing where/when the deer are moving. If you are serious, you should read whatever you can about scouting, practice your archery so you are always on target at 20 yards and begin walking the woods. Also, even though there can be a lot of crap on this board that is not helpful, I read it all the time because you never know when you will find a nugget that helps, such as a new set up, what to look for in sign or terrain, deer/buck behavior at certain times of the fall, etc. Good luck.

neck4752

My family didnt hunt at all and I had to learn it all on my own, and still have alot to learn. Getting the license and education is one thing, but wait till you get in the field, there is alot more to learn there. Any way I am from MA and I hunt archery, shotgun and muzzleloader. You do not need a archery course, just a hunter education course. Im in the process of going for my LTC, but man on the liberal east of MA I have a feeling its going to be difficult.

Jim