Moving the Firearm Season

[Shoot2Kill]

Quote:

(one of the diry little secrets about QDM is that they want you to shoot a lot of does)

Since when is shooting a doe a "dirty little secret" You see, it can often be your average hunter like me, that shoots does, but still would like to see more mature bucks, that doesn't care for comments like that. If shooting does is a dirty little secret, who's for horn porn now???? If does are so prevalent, why shoot the little bucks, what good will that do? Unless you are all about the horns, but then, why on earth wouldn't you want bigger ones? I bust my tail bow hunting to see the mature bucks because that is the ONLY time I see them.

Hey, your post looks like I said that....let it be known that was our anti horn porn buddy BlackJack the psychic who made that comment.

[96trigger]

Sorry, you got your post in there before me.

[sticknstring]

Quote:

you may end up hunting in cold weather like now if the season is moved back

The season won't be pushed back into the 2nd week of Dec! Everyone keeps comparing pushing the season back with hunting in current conditions. WI season starts 2 weeks after MN and has been over with for 2 weeks. Even if it was, it was 38 degrees on Saturday. Pretty darn nice. A 2 week difference isn't really a huge deal. The weather will always be a burden to some, make the best of it. We live in MN, we can handle pretty much anything. Most guys I know have been complaining about the warm openers of the past few years and lack of tracking snow. It's not hard to cut a fresh track in snow and get within gun range. It's beneficial to be hunting later in my opinion.

[Musky Buck]

I agree sticknstring, I'll certainly hope for heavy snow, cold, etc. It will only help me out. My 3 areas I hunt, 2 are tamarac swamp/balsam fir etc and the other is thick creek bottom willows and grass.All 3 hold wintering deer. If all you have is a woods thanks for helping raise the deer that will head my way once the weather gets a little ugly, it would just triple the deer on my land, let's go with a later season and hope for nasty !

[BeezeHound]

Thats exactly what I don't need. My grandparents farm holds a lot of deer until the first heavy snow, then its bye bye to the neighbors to hunker down in the 40 acres of pines. I really hope the season doesn't get moved or I'll be sitting on stand all week just waiting for that one dumb straggler to wonder through the woods with no rhyme or reason to where it's going.

[BeezeHound]

I don't see the reason for moving the season back one bit. The current firearms season can be one of the best times to be on stand. There are many deer moving through the woods which makes it enjoyable to sit in the stand all day. I had my younger sister in the stand with me on opening weekend and she got to witness 5 small bucks come running in to the can call, she had a great time. All those bucks are still running around the woods, at least when they left my stand they were. Even though we didn't get to see any big boys, she shot a doe sunday morning and said this weekend was the best ever watching those bucks come running in looking for a doe. She's hooked for life now. I hope to some day be able to share experiences like that with my own children.

[Musky Buck]

I hear ya boozehound, I was just waking up a few people, it would be a huge plus to me having wintering grounds. I have 3 good wintering grounds and know dozens of parcels that had almost no deer on them come musket season because of snow and cold, there land has nothing, If you own just woods or if they don't like your land once food becomes A #1 you can go sit there until March and not see a single goat. But I'll have roughly 200 animals on my land, sounds good, later rifle season and pray for winterlike weather before it opens and I'm gold.

[Musky Buck]

If I tag a mature buck right away I'll lease my land for 200 bucks a gun and even make money off of it, yes please call your legislators so I can make money on deer and tag my own, vote for as late a gun season as possible.

[Musky Buck]

Hey boozehound where you at in OT. county, maybe those deer you hunt are wintering on my grounds in OT. county ? I know, I doubt it, but I'm guessing deer from about a dozen different property owners end up in my swamp on that parcel, the other 2 I'd guess about the same. My best guess according to last Saturday's track is I have about 40 deer on each and that's a rough guess so about 120 deer calling my grounds home for the winter. In 1984 the total was about 320.

[Bear55]

A two week difference in the gun season isn't going to send the deer running to their winter hideouts, you would catch the end of the rut and some post rut feeding patterns. Once again everyone likes to talk in extremes. People don't see as many deer later in the current rifle seaons because they have been highly pressured for so long they go nocturnal, if you didn't have that pressure the deer movement would be much more natural, not the feast or famine some are describing.

[BLACKJACK]

It literally dumbfounds me with some of you on this site that seem to actually be opposed to having larger deer in MN. Seriously, what is your problem? Do you really like shooting dinks year after year after year?

[BeezeHound]

Bear55, I believe that muzzy season started two weeks after firearms season this year. Everyone in my group saw multiple deer everyday with the rifles. Not even a fraction of what was seen was put on the ground, we don't do deer drives and we don't walk around the woods. Explain to me where all the deer we were watching during the firearms season went because between two of us muzzy hunting only saw 1 deer and only a couple sets of tracks just passing through the woods, and hunted 10 days. Same thing happens every year so you can't tell me that a couple weeks doesnt make a difference.

[Big Dave2]

Not me. I wouldn't be willing to watch from the sidelines during the best time of the year. Archery harvest constitutes what... 10-12% of total harvest? A good portion of the bowhunters I know pass on young bucks anyhow. And rightfully so, we have over 3 months to get the job done. Taking away archery in November wouldn't accomplish anything but give a defense to the gun toters who cry foul.

I would have to argue that the 10-12% number would significantly rise if there was no gun hunting during the rut. There are not very many archers in the woods at this time of year presently because they either don't want to be out there with the guns or they grab a gun themselves and become a gun hunter for a week or two.

There would also be many more people taking up the sport of archery if thats all that was allowed during the rut. Bow sales would go through the roof.

I just thought that if the bowhunters think that we should move the gun season so that it does not fall during the rut, "for the good of the deer herd", then I figured that the bowhunters would for sure be on board to do what is supposedly right.

[Musky Buck]

Bottomline, it's 2008, I am very doubtful we'll ever get back the glory years no matter what we do with bow,rifle,muzzy. Personally I am very happy with the amount of mature bucks in all three of my areas. No one I know around where I hunt shoot the little bucks so we have several really good ones around every year. It would be in my best interests to have that more statewide so I could get some people off my fencelines, they know I have had better than average success with mature bucks so they have surrounded me to the best of their abilities, maybe if there were a few more better bucks around they would go on others land because of carrying capacity and not all run deep in my swamps. Technology has really changed hunting and fishing, for better or worse and we'll never get back to the glory days. They didn't even last very long in a way, 1971 no deer season and I think dad said 1974 1 day season. 1983 was a 2 day season actually pick 3 days bucks only or apply for a doe permit for the 2 day second weekend. I loved it, but I think the multi-zone buck tag and then the all-season buck tag hurt our buck numbers and age structure. I didn't abuse that tag, but I think many did. I think those tags allowed for quite a few guys to take multiple bucks, having 1st weekend hunters tagging what bucks a group got and "saving" those multi-zone or all-season tags so guys would have their buck tag to use the next weekend or for muzzleloading. I think those tag options hurt the state, kept more guys out that already had shot a buck, now they could shoot buck #2 and maybe more depending on tags, and then even go muzzleloading with an open buck tag. Those tags kept a lot of extra hunters afield and a lot more bucks fell because of it.

[Shoot2Kill]

Originally Posted By: Shoot2Kill

It literally dumbfounds me with some of you on this site that seem to actually be opposed to having larger deer in MN. Seriously, what is your problem? Do you really like shooting dinks year after year after year?

Shoot the messenger if you want but with comments like that who's the psychic?

[96trigger]

Quote:

There would also be many more people taking up the sport of archery if thats all that was allowed during the rut. Bow sales would go through the roof.

If thats all it takes, why doesn't everybody do it. The week before the firearm season is the prerut, that can actually be better than the rut, so why isn't everybody picking them up now?

The reason not everybody picks up a bow is that not everyone has the time and resources to do it. I think sales would go up, but not necessarily through the rough.

It's not that hard, I don't know why some of you can't understand that some of us are not horn porn guys, its not even so much that I want to see bigger bucks, we are hunters, just like you. I am really starting to come to the conclusion that those young bucks are just so stupid, that we should give them a chance. As a bonus for out sportsmanship, in a year or two, we would all start seeing older bucks. I am not a horn porn guy, I'm not like other guys I know that see a nice deer, and all they can say, is "AWWW I woulda passed on that, he's only gonna score around 140". Thats not many of us, I think most of us just want to see the forks and baskets get a little bit of a reprieve. If it means, I have to shoot more does, well then darn, I guess I'll have to. If it means going from a 5 deer area to a 2 deer area so the population doesn't get hammered, I'd do it gladly.

[Musky Buck]

Poaching would go through the roof as well.

[Bear55]

Bear55, I believe that muzzy season started two weeks after firearms season this year. Everyone in my group saw multiple deer everyday with the rifles. Not even a fraction of what was seen was put on the ground, we don't do deer drives and we don't walk around the woods. Explain to me where all the deer we were watching during the firearms season went because between two of us muzzy hunting only saw 1 deer and only a couple sets of tracks just passing through the woods, and hunted 10 days. Same thing happens every year so you can't tell me that a couple weeks doesnt make a difference.

Its called pressure, every rifle season the deer get pounded and only the ones smart enough to hide are going to live. Plus a lot of the deer you saw during the rifle season are now in people freezers. If you are hunting non pressured deer a bit later in November the numbers will still be there, probably not what you would see during the rut but that is the whole point of moving the season back. You really can't compare the muzzy season to a later rifle season when the deer haven't been pressured.

[Musky Buck]

Non pressured deer later in November pending cold temps and snow, that will quadruple the number of deer on my 3 lands leaving others with squat, I say yes definitely to a later rifle hunt!

[inspec_brad]

Non pressured deer later in November pending cold temps and snow, that will quadruple the number of deer on my 3 lands leaving others with squat, I say yes definitely to a later rifle hunt!

ARE YOU DONE YET? HOW MANY TIMES DO WE NEED YOU TO TELL US THAT YOU HAVE 3 PARCELS OF LAND WHERE DEER HERD UP WHEN THE SNOW COMES? FIND SOMETHING DIFFERENT TO TELL US(JUST NOT OVER AND OVER)!!!!

[Shoot2Kill]

Non pressured deer later in November pending cold temps and snow, that will quadruple the number of deer on my 3 lands leaving others with squat, I say yes definitely to a later rifle hunt!

You crack me up man...you need help with all those deer?

[Shoot2Kill]

Poaching would go through the roof as well.

When?

[BeezeHound]

Bear55 I've been hunting for many years and yes, I realize that pressure affects deer and many have already been taken with firearms before the muzzy season, but I was bow hunting after firearms season and was still seeing plenty of deer up until the first snow that stuck around. Then, like every year, they disappear into the neighbors pines for wintering like I had mentioned before. It happens to all of the properties adjacent to these pines, and the pines are loaded up after the first snow. I've been lucky enough to be invited over there for a couple muzzy hunts and it's unbelievable. So you cannot convince me that hunting later would not be any different.

[Shoot2Kill]

Bear55 I've been hunting for many years and yes, I realize that pressure affects deer and many have already been taken with firearms before the muzzy season, but I was bow hunting after firearms season and was still seeing plenty of deer up until the first snow that stuck around. Then, like every year, they disappear into the neighbors pines for wintering like I had mentioned before. It happens to all of the properties adjacent to these pines, and the pines are loaded up after the first snow. I've been lucky enough to be invited over there for a couple muzzy hunts and it's unbelievable. So you cannot convince me that hunting later would not be any different.

Where abouts are these pines? Sounds like a good place to shed hunt.

[sticknstring]

Wait until you get 500,000 hunters in the woods. Holed up in the pines or not, the deer will be moving. Sometimes adjustments need to be made. A woodlot I hunt has been dead all season, I made the choice to drive 35 minutes to start hunting Sherburne. I'm seeing all kinds of deer now. Change isn't always easy, but sometimes, the grass IS greener on the other side.

[jltimm]

If some of the "rifle" hunters actually tried bowhunting they'd realize alot of things.

You don't have to shoot every deer you see.(have to be within bow range)

You will become a better hunter by watching alot of deer and noting their behavior. (instead of blazing away with the almighty gun!)

Basket rack bucks are an easy target even for bowhunters! (so let them live)

Does are good eating, and alot of times hard to take with a bow.

You feel like you really earned your deer when you get them with a bow.

[96trigger]

Quote:

If some of the "rifle" hunters actually tried bowhunting they'd realize alot of things.

You don't have to shoot every deer you see.(have to be within bow range)

You will become a better hunter by watching alot of deer and noting their behavior. (instead of blazing away with the almighty gun!)

Basket rack bucks are an easy target even for bowhunters! (so let them live)

Does are good eating, and alot of times hard to take with a bow.

You feel like you really earned your deer when you get them with a bow

Can I get an AMEN, Brother...

I have nothing against gun hunting, I do it, but there is no comparison. Those that say its just as easy are either ignorant, or lying.

[BeezeHound]

Wait until you get 500,000 hunters in the woods. Holed up in the pines or not, the deer will be moving. Sometimes adjustments need to be made. A woodlot I hunt has been dead all season, I made the choice to drive 35 minutes to start hunting Sherburne. I'm seeing all kinds of deer now. Change isn't always easy, but sometimes, the grass IS greener on the other side.

I don't disagree with you that the deer would be on the move when the hunters hit the woods. However, why would I want to drive to another location when my family owns 200 acres of land that deer call home from late April through the first substantial snow fall? I would prefer to hunt the deer that I have been patterning all summer and fall than to drive to some place that I have no knowledge of. I would also like to be able to hunt the deer that I know are in my woods rather than having to wait for them to get scared over from a neighboring property first. We've tried everything on our property from planting food plots for all seasons to creating sanctuaries throughout the acreage to try and keep them around during the winter months, but they just don't stick around. There's nothing special about the neighbors property other than the great cover the pines provide them during the tough months of the year. I would much rather see antler restrictions, heck even earn a buck as much as I don't want to say that, before I would want to move the season back. Thats just my 2 cents but what do I know, I only hunt deer from bow opener through the end of the year and according to some I have no idea what the deer do in my neck of the woods, lol.

[Musky Buck]

BullMN what I really was saying is colder potentially later rifle hunting would put a lot of hunters sol. November is when the change takes place, a nasty november and many people won't have a single deer on their property.

[BLACKJACK]

You feel like you really earned your deer when you get them with a bow.

I agree with that 110%!!! If it wasn't for the fact that I gun hunt with relatives and its kind of a tradition, I'd give up gun hunting completely.