Doc

Speaking of getting away from the smoke ..... Has anyone figured out what scientific principle is involved with the fact that campfire smoke always blows in your direction no matter how many times you change position?

Now if you don't have faith in that one particular statistic, doesn't that make you kind of look funny at the rest of the management system statistics, procedures and data? I have to wonder just where they are getting all this age info anyway. Nobody ever asked me on my report how old my deer was. Heck, they come up with all kinds of data that is not part of the reporting system. If they have figured out a way of arriving at all this stuff without hunters reporting it, why the heck are harvest reports mandatory. Just run around a couple of processors, check a few dozen deer at each and then expand those findings to the rest of the state. Forget the hunter reports and just pretend that the trumped up stats are all correct.....lol. Actually that ain't so funny. That's kind of a version of what they are doing right now.

Like it or not, I don't really think that NYS has the resources to handle any large-scale re-testing. The way I hear it there is not exactly an over-abundance of instructors now as it is. It's just possible that you would wind up with excessively long waiting lists just to find available courses. How do you suppose that might affect the already shrinking hunter numbers?

How long before large numbers of hunters are going to throw up their hands in disgust and take up a different line of recreation. Frankly, I am getting a bit weary of being taken advantage of and basicly being made the fool by paying more for less. I'm thinking that if this crazy stuff continues year after year, the drain on sportsmen's numbers will continue to accelerate, and then the DEC will experience money problems like they can't even imagine. I also think it's about time some of these reporters did a bit of research to put names to all the financial problems that the DEC is encountering. I really don't believe that all of the blame, (or even a majority of it) resides inside the DEC. I also think it would be interesting to see if the DEC is taking a fair share of the statewide budgetary hits, including past years when they were already taking hits before it became fashionable.

What the heck is the matter with you people? Do any of you ever read the crap that you're typing on here. It seems like the whole damn site is being taken over by pointless flame wars. And it's all over nothing. I've got to say that the view of the personalities that are coming out here are not exactly very flattering. It appears that flame wars are the only benefits that some of you joined for. What's up with that? If you all are trying to prove just how disagreeable your personality is, then by golly you're doing a real bang-up job of it. One forum at a time, the whole site is being taken over by a few people that simply want to see how clever they can be at insulting each other. As I watch former participants becoming silent, I don't think it takes a whole lot of insight to see where this site is heading.

And yet they can afford to send DEC personel all over the state visiting deer processors and taxidermist, writing down the names of successful hunters and then go back to headquarters and input into the computers all that info and then have the computer see what percentage of those hunters actually reported in order to come up with the "reporting rate" which may or may not actually be acurate. I guess I don't understand how that is more efficient than having the whole job done by some software. Actually, the fines for the non-compliance would most likely pay for what ever expenses that are required. After all the tickets don't have to be hand-issued. The fact is that after hunters learn that there is no way of escaping the fines, the reporting rate will quickly approach 100%. Right now the attitude is that there is no enforcement going on so why bother.

Temperatures are getting to the point where I can start dragging the sand-bags, tripod, rifles and all that newly re-loaded ammo outdoors to the shooting bench on my rifle range out back and wake up all the residents of the valley .... lol. I've got a nice new Remington .223 that just simply needs to burn up some ammo. I also have a pretty significant volume of reloaded .22 Hornet ammo that needs testing. It'll be fun trying to put all the bullets in the same hole. So, soon I'll be splitting my time between shooting the bow and shooting the rifles. Life is sweet!

Slowly but surely, it looks like the weather is moving toward a condition where I will soon be able to move my bow practice from the basement, to my outdoor range. I have been shooting at tiny little 3/4" diameter bullseyes on my 15 yard indoor range all winter, and am ready to get outside and step back a ways. That will all be wonderful until the black flies start....lol. Have any of you guys been keeping up a steady program of winter shooting? Maybe some of you are lucky enough to have a club or commercial indoor shooting range nearby for some tournament action. Great way to stay sharp and have some winter fun. I have been shooting just enough to keep the muscles toned and the form in place. But, I am way beyond ready to step outside and get some real practice in.

It's not so easy today to "preserve a tradition". It seems to be a societal goal to actually stamp out traditions and any items of U.S. culture. To most today, tradition is simply another phrase for living in the past or doing things that an enlightened society has evolved away from. I think you can make efforts to slow the demise of hunting traditions, but as long as society has the attitudes that it it does, it certainly is just a matter of time before the hunter numbers simply become too small to be relevant. I've seen it happen in a big way to another of our traditional activities (trapping), and data now suggests that both hunting and fishing licenses are showing significant downward trends. In fact as was already mentioned somewhere on this forum, this idea of shunning outdoor activities goes well beyond hunting, fishing and trapping. I honestly believe that we are the last of the breed as technology and elite and supposedly enlightened attitudes continue to take over the psyche of society. I know that is a real downer of an observation, but those of us who have been around long enough to get the long-term view of trends I would guess would have a hard time seeing it any other way.

Yup ....... guaranteed to get your deer everytime! ...... LOL.

Ok, here is my theory on why the DEC might be against a "1 tag - 1 report" law. And bear in mind that this is only a theory, not supported by anything that the DEC has said or implied. I think they may be a bit scared by the low reporting rate that currently exists and may be fearful that they could find themselves in a position of fining or otherwise punishing more than half the hunter population, which could then lead to a terrible backlash of desertion in the hunter ranks. One thing that kind of supports that theory is the lack of action taken against those that they find non-compliant as they do their "reporting rate" surveys and calculations. Have any of you ever heard of anyone receiving a ticket in the mail for not reporting their harvest? And yet they apparently find enough of them to come up with a reporting rate number that shows that there is significant non-compliance. It's almost as though they really don't want to enforce that law. So a "1 tag - 1 report" mandate would force their hand and perhaps make them enforce something that they are afraid to enforce. Now that's all just a guess, but I'll be darned if I can think of any other logical reasons. In prior posts on the subject, I have shown how such a law that is basically enforced by computer software would actually save money over the labor intensive methods being used today.

The herd in Ontario County seems to be handling the winter quite well from what I've seen. Their biggest problem here seems to be staying out from in front of vehicles.

We have already discussed an excellent way of getting near 100% reporting that involves mandatory reports for every tag issued (successful or not). Apparently the DEC is not really that interested in forcing an improvement of reporting rate since they have publicly ruled that plan out. In terms of publishing hunter names on the internet, I see that as serving no other purpose than supplying a useful resource for harrassment from your local animal rights wackos. However, given the history of anti-gun people supplying pistol owners names on the internet, I'm sure it is just a matter of time before some nutcase applies the Freedom of Information Act to get listings of hunter names to publish on their websites.....lol.

I understand that all of the published stats that the DEC issues all have a pile of formulas behind them and for every question we might have, they could drag out volumes of statistical analysis that we are supposed to merely accept as gospel. However, when you look at the fact that every input involves some estimate, factor, trend analysis, and other such soft data, it is very hard to work up any kind of credible confidence in what comes spewing out the end of the computers. That coupled with the fact that there is never any physical verification of results, and yet those results are built on and added to every subsequent year, kind of makes you think that there has to be a huge opportunity for statistical "creep". And then we look at the randomness of results such as the deer glut of the 90's followed by the admitted over-harvest a few years later, and it becomes obvious that the real management methods are not the statistical models, but merely the wild manipulation of antlerless permits to frantically compensate for what eventually becomes obvious to everybody. It would appear that all this statistical mask is merely a cover story to a much more basic reactive management scheme. If I am wrong about this assessment, it is only because the DEC does a real crappy job of instilling confidence in their super-secret, hokus-pokus, black art, unverified, statistical methods, and do not adequately explain to the public all the apparent mis-steps and tangible evidence that all is not well in the deer management methods.

I'm not completely sure that I really give a damn whether it is a fake or not. I don't know the guy and it wasn't taken anywhere near where I hunt. I guess it's one of those things that I'll let others worry about and figure out ..... lol.

I still have a question about whether an arrow doesn't stuff feathers and crap in a nice little trail through the breast meat. Years ago, I was talking to a guy that quit bowhunting turkeys because of that problem. I guess I can easily imagine that being a problem. Anybody else ever notice that kind of meat damage?

My favorite is what ever is on sale and looks like the kind of garment that will keep me comfortable. As far as what gives me the best concealment, there is no question that my ghillie suit does that. Unfortunately, I have not figured out a way of shooting my bow while I wear it, but what a great thing for turkey hunting with a gun.

You know, I have to wonder. When they visit processors, taxidermists, etc. to come up with this ratio of those that report vs. those that don't, what do they do with the list of hunters that they find that did'nt report. Do they send out tickets? I have never heard of anybody getting a "failure to report" ticket in the mail. Doc

Wind direction predictions are a fundamental requirement for my stand selection or still-hunt plan each time before I go out. In that same forecast, is the sunrise and sunset times. It really doesn't take any "looking up". It's not all that big a deal.

I guess I am just a bit more picky about game laws, and really don't see them as simply suggestions or some kind of judgement calls. I also understand the ECO scarcity situation and understand that we all have to be a bit more responsible in policing ourselves. I get pretty out of sorts whenever I hear of somebody poaching or bending and breaking other hunting laws and have very little sympathy with all the excuses manufactured to rationalize breaking any of the laws that govern hunting. I have no problems with people putting extra additional restrictions on shooting times or conditions, but I find it no problem at all to note the sunrise and sunset times when I check the weather forcasts and wind direction predictions before I go out hunting, and then abide by them as a minimum effort to comply with that law. What exactly is so difficult about that? As far as not being able to take the time to glance at your wrist to check the time, I hope nobody is in that much of a hurry to take a shot. It's not really an issue where you have to make any judgement calls ...... thankfully. The law is clear. Every year I hear some of those shots in the dark where people are supposedly using their "judgement". I guess that's why some of those laws were written. Look, I understand temptation and understand that always complying with game laws is not an easy thing to do. But as hunters we need to be picky about such things. It really is up to us to be self-policing because the law enforcement branch of the DEC is never again going to be adequate to handle that job.

I'll bet that if you changed it all to "1/2 hour before sunrise to 1/2 hour after sunset", the same guys who are not complying now would continue to push the limits beyond that legal requirement. As far as the scenario of the breaking the law simply because of the quality of the buck, I guess it still boils down to your belief in a system of laws. You either do or you don't. The law doesn't make exceptions for large animals, and there really would be nothing about a large buck that would cause me to feel good about breaking game laws. I am amazed that people are starting to consider game laws a "suggestion". Perhaps they are realizing just how few COs there are out there and how small the odds are that you would actually get caught. I have to admit that I have come to expect to hear some of those first shots during gun season well before any kind of light. Every year there are some shots that make me wonder how in the heck those guys even know it's a deer. So maybe I should not really be all that amazed.....lol.

Yeah, that's kind of the point I was making earlier. It doesn't even have to be really pointed at hunting. Shooting a bow is just plain fun. Hunting with it is simply frosting on the cake. It's pretty darn easy to get hooked and is a lot more fascinating than other weapons that are not quite so directly hooked up with the shooter's personal abilities. Don't get me wrong, I do a whole lot of target practice with rifles, but that time on the range with the bow still has a special attraction for me. And some of the novelty shooting (like those plastic milk jugs) just adds to the fun. It's kind of like the "stump shooting" that SOB always talks about. It's just plain ol' fun that really has appeal to primarily a bowhunter.

A DEC 5-year plan ....... Now there is something that would be fun to read. Given the current financial climate and that of the forseeable future, I have to wonder just how they are able to plan anything? Well, I guess you can plan all you want ..... It's incorporating that plan that might be a bit tough to do ... lol.

One thing I am noticing is that the snow doesn't seem to last very long anymore. That sun is super warm this time of year. However, I have seen some wicked storms in March so I'm not writing ol' man winter off yet. I did see a few deer in the yard the other day and they are starting to show some real signs of wear and tear. Even though they had that winter "fluffed up" look, the hip bones are getting very prominent especially in the younger ones. They need a permanent break in this weather pretty soon.

So, the DEC is made to be ineffective because of the political aspects of their operation. I know that that will never change. So is there some way of effectively dealing with the political interferences in such a way that the DEC gets the support that they need to do a better job of game management? Usually when you can identify a problem, you are more than half-way towards solving it. However, in this case, I don't see any solution. Their financial condition will always be tied to politics, and our legislators seem determined to starve that agency right out of any sort of usefulness. Any thoughts?