Doc

I don't know whether you are comfortable with that kind of logic, but I personally would simply rather see something included in that setback law that talks about what's behind the target. You must have a lot more trust in strangers than I do.....lol. Let's face it if everyone out there was doing what is safe and sane when deer get in front of them, we wouldn't really need a lot of these laws to call their attention to unsafe practices would we? I have seen people shoot in the direction of our house. With the introduction of rifles since then, the results may have turned out to be quite a bit different. But the point is that they do it. And if they do it with guns, they damned sure will do it with a bow if there isn't some language prohibiting it. If they are out at 500' shooting their bow at the house, I probably wouldn't worry a whole lot about it unless they were trying to hit the house. But at 50 yards, the arrow trajectory easily makes to the house without any particular exaggerated elevation in aiming. Also, while it is getting a bit repetitive, I have to remind you that the concerns are not just with hunting situations. Backyard target situations also have to be considered. There are a lot of suburban situations where the 50 yards can easily be accommodated, but the backdrop (houses, yards, etc.) is not so easily controlled.

But last time I checked their website, everything seemed to be out of stock and not available. Not just for NYS, but seemingly unavailable to anyone.

Amazing .... I am wondering what part of this quote from my reply indicates that I think is easy....."First of all, hunting bears with dogs is not something that I will ever be involved with. I think I have left that level of exertion behind me quite a few years ago ... lol."

This thread isn't about "why crossbows are not archery equipment" either. But as a note of interest, there was another You-tube video of another crossbow manufacturer making a 200 yard shot. Pretty darned impressive. Of course there were all kinds of warnings not to take that sort of shot while hunting. And also the guy doing the shooting was a military sniper, so he kind o knew how to execute.

Seems to have worked? Depends on who you ask. The relatives of that little 4 year old girl that was shot and killed in their livingroom might not agree with you. And then there was the other occurrence where a rifle bullet came through the wall of a house and ripped through a mattress of a crib that had moments before been occupied by a baby. Also, I have seen a few newspaper pictures of the old mom and pop characters pointing to bullet holes in their walls. And then I am sure there are many instances where the homeowner never knew his house had been hit because the bullet didn't enter a living area. But I will agree with the first part of your sentence. The 500' rule without any regard as to what is in the background is not very safe. There certainly is some more verbiage required on that one, not that we will ever see it.

Don't forget who is passing laws and interpreting the meanings of these sorts of things. The odds are very good that they don't hunt. As far as wishful thinking about the direction of shooting being specified, I have to point out that current setback laws say absolutely nothing and never did say anything about what or who is in the direction of the shot. It only talks about proximity to certain structures.

Some guys will try anything to get a deer!

I'm not sure what you mean by most versatile caliber for deer hunting. Versatile from what standpoint? There are a pile of calibers that will kill a deer very nicely. And dead is dead so I don't see any versatility in that. I recently went through the exercise of picking out a caliber for deer hunting. I wanted excellent accuracy out to a maximum of something like 300 yards (that distance chosen because of it's darned near impossible to get a longer shot where I hunt). I wanted a gun that didn't beat me up when spending time on the bench, target shooting. I wanted a caliber that didn't break the bank to reload. And I needed sufficient power to put the critter down quickly and humanely. For all that, I chose a .270. From the title of your post, I thought you were looking for something that you can hunt everything from squirrels to bear. There's only one gun that will do that, and that would be a shotgun. Now there is some true versatility.

Was that slick, or what? I'm not so sure about using structural supports on your house though. I'm thinking a tree might be a little bit safer .... lol.

You got the amount of attention that your comments deserved.

Anyone who is interested in any sort of gun ownership rights should be able to understand a little bit of history, and recognize a distinct pattern that shows that the anti-gun forces are interested in nothing other than total elimination of legal private gun ownership. If you don't understand that fact, I would suggest that you pull your head out of that dark unsanitary place and take note of a little history that has gone on in front of where your eyes should have been. In '68 we started compromising on handguns (big-time), because that promised to be the end to all violent gun crime. Anti-gun forces have been nibbling away at gun ownership until now today here we are with a freshly passed law that has made a whole class of hunting rifles illegal for sale and a proposed registration system for grandfathered owners of those guns of that "made-up" category dubbed the assault rifle. Not only that, but the whole key to using any gun, the ammo, has now had a law added to add harassment and cost to every bullet you buy. And make no mistake, that is the sole purpose of the ammo background checks. It has no impact on crime at all, but is simply designed to throw roadblocks in front of people exercising their gun rights. That fact alone should be a clue to any thinking person exactly the mindset of those that we are told to compromise with. So anyone who insists that systematic compromise is not a path to eventual gun confiscation simply is either unaware of the real motives of the anti-gun crowd, or are in the process of actively becoming part of that movement themselves. Yes you all believe that each little compromise will be the last, and apparently don't care that you really know that it won't be.

And don't forget that determining which setback (500' or 150') is the less restrictive setback is still subject to interpretation. The size of the number does not always determine just what is more restrictive. In this case, a smaller setback could be more restrictive or less restrictive depending on who's viewpoint you are considering. If you are a homeowner, the 150' setback may very well be the more restrictive to your privacy and safety rights. It all relates to just who's ox is being gored.

It used to be said that fishing lure design was more for catching fishermen than fish. I'm thinking that philosophy of design is not just for fish and fishermen.

We've never had very many bears around until recently, and I've got to say that I am totally ignorant about bear hunting in general. But there are a few things that I have picked up on the subject over the years. First of all, hunting bears with dogs is not something that I will ever be involved with. I think I have left that level of exertion behind me quite a few years ago ... lol. I guess as long as I am not letting myself open to having some traveling circus of bear and dogs ramming across my property while I am trying to deer hunt, I probably wouldn't have much of a problem with others getting into it. Bait .... I am generally an opponent of such practices for reasons stated before, but I have been led to believe that hunting bears in ways similar to deer is probably not all that practical (trail watching and still hunting). Not saying its impossible because I know it isn't. But if the DEC seriously wants to increase the harvest of these critters, I think baiting is the only practical way that that will ever happen. Again, it is probably not anything that I will ever get involved in, but it seems like with effective bear harvesting, it has an important place. Trapping ..... Another activity that I am very well versed in, but not when it comes to bears. I do know that bear traps are a pretty intimidating piece of equipment, and I doubt that I would ever want to find myself tangled up in one, but again, I have no idea what he pros and cons of bear trapping might be. I would need an awful lot explained to me before I could ever form an opinion. As far as the sporting aspects of any of these activities, the population control needs may transcend those concerns. In the case of bears, I believe it does.

Ha-ha .... You are certainly entitled to your opinion and also have a perfect right to be wrong.

And lose the deer.

Well, I am not sure how the hierarchy of governments work that sort of thing out now, but they must have figured something out because changes in setbacks are accomplished already (Just in the other direction). For example, some how they worked it out that setbacks could be expanded locally, so there must be some form of compromise and interaction already established.

Lol ..... less or more "restrictive is a matter of interpretation ..... eh? If you are a landowner you might consider the 500' setback to be less restrictive in that it impinges less on your rights to privacy and safety. But the hunter may see the 500' setback as the more restrictive because he can't cozy up to your house.

And my point, which apparently I'm not explaining too well, is that if you set the default archery setback to 50 yards statewide, every township across the state without a deer problem, suburban or rural will be forced go through the effort to change it back to where it is now or live with it. It sure seems to make far more sense to me to leave it where it is as default but change the law to allow the few areas with problems to pass local laws to shrink the setback. In other words put this invasive and perhaps unsafe setback only in areas where it is in dire need and force the communities deciding to do so to take full responsibility for any negative results. Apparently this is becoming a hard concept for me to explain, so please take a bit of extra time to slow down and understand the nuances of what I am trying to say.

Mike- The link to the draft is in the original post on this thread. Check it out. It is pretty interesting reading. As far as the trapping mentioned, I see it listed as the third means of harvest right along with hounds and bait. These are things that they are researching and studying, not actual proposals. I'm pretty sure that they are talking about a general trapping season. Also, I have been informed that Maine has a bear trapping season, so it is not unheard of here in the northeast.

Ok, All better now. The scum-bag didn't mean it ..... ha-ha-ha. He just didn't mean to say it out loud.

I absolutely agree. If we cannot somehow become totally united, it will happen. From what I have been reading on this forum, I am beginning to think that such unity is not all that likely. I believe that the culprits will likely all get re-elected and things such as the safe act will continue to be successful here in NY. The safe act was a test. It likely will turn out that they will be emboldened by the success of their test. The culture in NY may have simply leaned so far left that it has fallen over with no real way of straightening it back up again.

My understanding of the plan is that under current seasons and regulations, there is pretty much a lack of interest in hunting bears. And yet there is a growing population of bears that somehow have to be controlled. I understand the lack of interest aspect. There is no way that I would purposely go out with the sole purpose of killing a bear. The odds against success are ridiculous. So what they are trying to do is to create a "bear-hunting culture" change where people actually enthusiastically try to harvest a bear. The baiting, hounds, and trapping thoughts are simply methods to make the pursuit practical and entice participation. While none of these methods would interest me, I was just curious how others view these possibilities, and how many would actually use any of these methods. In other words, would the allowance of these methods really create this "bear-hunting culture" that they are trying to create?

No, actually the problem is the attitudes prevalent, in NYS in particular, that the government should become the parent of the constituents. There is now an expectation that the government knows best and should be looked to as a replacement for individual initiative and responsibility. We cheered the fall of Russian communism, never recognizing that their style of government has been slowly replacing ours.

Wooly- The original topic burned out about 20 pages ago and has morphed into something that is probably a whole lot more relevant to even those people interested in crossbows. I think by now we all understand that the "Governor has announced support for crossbows in NY". We spent a few pages talking about the relevance of that. And then the thread moved into more interesting directions. We probably could have, and should have, created a bunch of new topics, but that didn't happen. So, it has turned into a free-form general discussion that is still evolving. I for one find it all kind of interesting even though it is a bit unconventional.