Doc

All my posted signs are on a plywood board, which is nailed to a tree. The nails are not driven all the way down to allow for tree growth. I went to separate boards because of the tree growth which would pull the nails right through the aluminum sign, leaving the sign on the ground, perhaps under the leaves and pretty much useless and even in some cases lost. I also have a self-imposed rule that when standing at a sign, I am able to see at least one sign before and at least one sign after. They are well within the required minimum distance and no one can claim that they didn't see the signs. That kind of care eliminates any and all arguments about mistaken trespassing. When someone enters my property they are willfully and undeniably aware that they are breaking the law and trespassing.

I hope they have something as good or better to replace it with. Frankly, I think the DECALS system is the best thing that has ever happened to hunting license issuing. It sure beats any systems that preceded it. I remember all the hand printing and waiting and the BS involved with obtaining a permit. What a pain that was.

Just a point of curiosity, but do they really regulate how many hunters that can hunt in a designated unit? Is there some kind of lottery system that required for hunters to be able to hunt in certain WMUs? I'm not familiar with the regulations of those states, so I really don't understand how they accomplish hunter number regulation.

NYS habitat is in decline as old farmland brush-lots mature into full-growth over-story. Some places worse than other places. Yes, there is still some excellent habitat, but we are losing it at an alarming rate, and there are increasingly more places that used to be prime deer hunting area that are either being eaten up by development, posted out of accessible reach, leased and under-hunted, or simply maturing beyond usefulness for deer habitat.

Nope, I'll be missing out on this Thanksgiving day hunt. That slime that dropped out of the sky the other night and covered up my driveway has to be plowed out this morning. There's only about 4" of that stuff, but it has the consistency of pudding. It has to be removed so the gang of friends and relatives can drive up my driveway and hope to have any chance of getting back out.....lol. That's ok, we have enough venison in the freezer for the two of us.

Interesting graphic.

Thank you for posting this update. We need more activity on this issue and other aspects of keeping the passion against this infringement in the forefront of the minds of gun owners. In concert with these various legal actions, we have to keep our eyes on the goal of punishing those legislators who supported and voted for the Safe Act. A message has to be issued by the gun owners that we will not allow our rights to be tampered with, and that those who do will be dealt with at the polls. We have to act as a single-minded, single issue, voting block in order to have the impact that will keep these people from daring to thumb their noses at our rights. It will be through the efforts of this organization (NYSRPA) and other similar NYS organizations and the ire of all gun owners in the state that this will be accomplished. And it must be accomplished in order to put the fear of God into these self-serving politicians, and to put an end to these kinds of harassments of honest law abiding citizens.

This thread certainly points out the variations across the state. Not really a lot of surprises here.

Probably the smartest thing ever done by the DEC is when they broke the state up into WMUs. Now the smart thing to do is to use that WMU system, and stop coming up with these one-size-fits-all kinds of solutions. I cringe every time I hear these statements about how NYS needs a statewide AR system, or how the state needs an Earn-A-Buck requirement, or how the state needs a one-buck limit. We have a WMU system so that hopefully, management activities and regulations can be tailored to the local habitat and populations. Now, we can argue about whether that is effectively being done or not, but the concept is sound. None of these schemes applies to all of NYS and there is no point in talking like there is some magic single bullet that will solve every situation across the state.

I still haven't decided. I already have two in the freezer, but I still have a buck tag left. I have this guy that I am still trying to find.

I see nothing wrong with stating the contents of a law that you may feel has been broken when reading a post. I would hate to think that any of us would allow another hunter to remain unaware that he had violated a law. Why would anybody want him to remain ignorant of the infraction and perhaps continue it over and over? That doesn't mean that such a reply has to lead to some kind of battle. As long as the correction is not stated in a way that is judgmental or accusatory, no offense should be taken and there should really not be any controversy. I personally got the impression that the original poster did not fully understand that the sunrise and sunset requirements do have a precise value that must be looked up each day. I thought it was instructional for someone to point that out.

These bullet hoarding s.o.b.s are still having an effect on component availability. I just came from Beikirch's without spending a cent. Just about no powder, and no 150 grain Hornady SST bullets. The story is that the components are all going to the bullet manufacturers instead of the small distributers. Manufacturers are apparently cranking out factory ammo to satisfy the hoarders. Not only that but I heard that Obama is trying to shut down lead manufacturing in the U.S. That's going to have a huge effect on bullet costs. Not sure where the guy got that tid-bit or how reliable it is. Oh by the way, the Safe Act supposedly has no impact on components. So if we can get past all this hoarding crap, those of us who re-load should theoretically be able to shop mail order for components again.

Huge amounts of deer in my chunk of 8N. The cameras, and the snow doesn't lie. It still requires being in the right spot at the right time ..... not always that easy. One thing I have noticed is that it is once again that time of the season where deer have bunched up. So if you don't happen to be in the area where the bunch goes by, you may get the impression that there is not a deer in the woods. If the bunch goes by you, you will probably be telling everyone about the gobs of deer in the woods. The best way to check it all out is to walk around with this snow on the ground. Deer cannot move without leaving their story behind

Well, we got through the first weekend. So what do you think of the herd size so far. I'm reading some disturbing stats in the latest issue of New York Outdoor News. that claims the numbers so far are down. I didn't read the article yet, just the headline. So what is your estimate of what you have been seeing, hearing, etc. in your part of your WMU?

Milk weed seeds will show you what the wind is doing after it leaves your immediate area. Most wind direction checking powers are only good for 6 feet or so. Send one of those milkweed seeds out there and watch all the twists and turns your scent really is taking. Sometimes, there are some interesting surprises that go on that the powders will never tell you.

That's the first thing that popped into my mind. That's only about an hour north of me. She probably has a whole stash of them corded up somewhere .... lol. Ah, but unfortunately, there probably is no shortage of these anti-gun freaks down our way too. I'm real happy to see that the theft is being highlighted in the local media, complete with her picture and name. I hope the public humiliation factor will serve as a deterrent to other sign-thieves. At least it will show that they can be caught and prosecuted.

Here's the secret. As you go through the woods, keep an eye out scanning the tree-tops. This part of the season, deer resort to climbing trees. Yup .... that's where they are all hiding right now.

And yet I repeatedly see comments on this forum that swear that the statistical models used by the DEC are sound and have been audited for credibility by some kind of accredited authority, and all is well with the DEC statistical calculations. Personally, I am not an expert in that area, but have a natural skepticism about any system that relies on scant samplings and interpolations based on estimates based on another series of other unverified estimates, and calculated factors and constants, and no system of actual verification to guard against statistical creep. On the other hand, I have very little to offer in terms of better ways to handle the management numbers game. I will say that in the past, I have noted massive overpopulation conditions and severe under-population conditions and the knee-jerk over-reactions to each. It kind of makes me wonder where the actual "predictive management" comes into play as opposed to "reactive management". Yes, at the risk of being called a behind-the-times non-believer in the religion of statistics by those who have their livelihoods coupled to that science, I have been known to express skepticism. But even with that risk in mind, I have to admit to having a very difficult time with swallowing a system that has shown historical flawed results as often as the NYS game management applications have. I may not have alternative solutions to offer, but I still don't have to pretend that all is well in the world of game management.

I was trying to figure out just what the escape philosophy was supposed to be there. She was running around in circles out in the field with buildings (safety) just in the background. It looked like pure panic without any reasonable flight. I suspect that she was a in a whole lot more danger than any of them realized. And unfortunately, nobody seemed to be interested in lending a hand in fact the one with the camera thought it was so funny they nearly choked to death. I know that a buck in heavy rut can be a pretty aggressive and brutal creature. Not really something to be messing with.

Checked the dictionary ...... the plural of doe is doe or does. both can be used.

Who the heck needs that nonsense. This guy knows that the horn-blowing and gun shooting, and dumb hunter interference is going to happen. He said that he is between two developments. He never said the place was crawling with deer. So why would he put himself in that position. I have hunted PA. We got permission to hunt a huge farm, and as we walked away we could hear the farmer muttering, "I hope they get them all". There was no possibility of harassment there, and I know the state is covered with a lot of farms where the farmers are more than happy to have you hunt there. Why anybody would try to hunt in between two housing developments is beyond me. Yes, I understand that he has a perfectly legal right to hunt there, but why would you do that?

The only place where I can track deer and have a chance of catching up with them is state land. That's the only place where there is enough contiguous land with legal access to actually pull it off. In my younger years that was a popular way for me to hunt. The problem now as I continue to get old and decrepit is that I have to keep in mind that anything I get has to be dragged all the way back. I used to get so far away that that would be impractical anymore. A two mile drag up and downhill is pretty much out of the question anymore.

Ever dress with so much clothing that you have trouble pulling your scope close enough to your eye? There are times when I have to struggle to get the butt of my gun close enough to my shoulder to get the proper eye relief because of the bulk of the clothing I have piled on.

Many years ago, I remember arguing with a co-worker that there would come a day when hunting would become a paid activity. I believe we are well on our way in that direction and moving fast. Two years ago I had 300 acres of prime deer hunting country that was all of a sudden posted up tighter than a drum with the only access for hunting granted only after payment of fairly expensive "membership fees". That's just one example and there are at least two other examples that I can think of. Leases are becoming commonplace with hunters bidding against each other for prime hunting land. Its a shame, but the European model for hunting access is quickly over-taking the U.S. Sport of the wealthy?.... yeah, that's where we are heading as state land continues to become so overcrowded that that may not even be an alternative before long without impractical travel.

Yes, "stuff like that will happen in life", but we don't have to lay awake at night dreaming up new ways to increase the odds that those things will happen. We have to stop trying to use the law to beat hunters over the head with. That seems to be the first thought in everyone's head, to just keep tightening the screws and see how many hunters we drive out of our ranks. Well, it seems to me that if the object is to take more does, aggravating more hunters out of the woods is not a real slick way of doing that. It's a disturbing trend in thinking these days that seems to be taking ahold. Got a problem? .... Dream up something to screw with the hunters. I wonder where that mentality is going to stop?