Doc

I have some huge chunks of cardboard that I have been accumulating for future archery target construction. Anyway, at 20 yards, it's pretty hard to completely miss one of those if you even have the gun pointed in that direction. Having it bore-sighted first would be ideal, but as I once said in a previous thread, when I get done sighting a rifle in, I have plenty of fire formed brass to reload .... lol. I haven't sighted in a shotgun from scratch since 1969, but I will say that I would definitely go out and find someone to bore-sight the old shotguns before I put my shoulder through the meat-grinder. I'm not a real big fan of shotgun shooting. That's why each year, I try to check out my scope with just 3 to 5 slugs just to make sure the scope hasn't moved. It's funny how when you're shooting at a deer you never do feel any recoil, but every 12 ga. slug fired off the bench seems to mangle that shoulder. Doc

No.....live ammo is not the sort of thing you want to have laying around on the ground. That might have been a good thing to bring to the attention of someone of influence at the range. Perhaps they might want to reinforce the rules in some fashion or put up a sign or two that list rules and regs. You wouldn't think that people would have to be made aware of some of these things, but .......oh well. Some times you do have to state the obvious to people. Doc

One comment that I remember hearing on that program is that the wild varieties of pigs have longer legs and that may be of some assistance in getting that speed. But by golly, they are awful fast. That's one of the things that adds a bit of danger in a wild boar hunt is the way their speed can turn you from the hunter to the hunted. One of the things that I have repeatedly heard as a major reason for the rapid spread of their range is that often, hunters will illegally trap and transport these things into new areas for new hunting opportunities. The other thing is the proliferation of game farms and pay-to-hunt operations that raise these critters and then have them escape. All pigs are pretty darn hard to contain. I remember that from the old family farm where over the years we lost a few domestic hogs that figured out ways of getting under fences. So, it's not hard to go from an area that has no pigs to an area that has a growing herd (herd ..... is that the right term?) of them over-night. Doc

It is not the place of the Moderator (or at least not this Moderator) to dictate or censor topics or opinions unless they stray from the bounds of legality or proper language. I use a pretty liberal standard. I am not here to decide what sides of issues that can be allowed on this forum. I do enter into discussions and of course have my own positions and opinions. I may even express opinions on the quality of a topic. But what I won't do is use the Moderator position to force topic selection or opinion censorship......even with silly ol' Sits ....... lol. I figure that when people have had enough of him, they will simply stop responding. If they don't, then his opinions are as good as anyone else's. Doc

Did you ever wonder when you hear those 5 rapid shots, just what the guy doing the shooting is seeing as far as a whats going on beyond the deer? Add to that a guy who is trying to take multiple fast shots and has a scope. Imagine how easy on any of his follow-up shots to all of a sudden see an orange suit just as the shot goes off. Scary stuff ...... eh? And you know what, there is nothing about a rifle that keeps a hunter of that mentality from doing that exact same thing, as someone with a shotgun in their hands. No difference at all. In fact there are no safety rules and attitudes that are one bit different with a rifle or a shotgun. There is one thing though. For the most part, the guy with the rifle can extend the consequences of his poor choices a bit farther. Doc

But as long as it has detail about the process, I sure would be interested in hearing it, even if it's some kind of canned response. It would just be interesting to see how that all happens.

I think I could buy into all that statistical stuff if there wasn't clear evidence that occasionally things go terribly wrong. I am remembering back in the late 80's and early 90's when the herd was basically out of control. I personally witnessed the massive yard at the end of Honeoye Lake, and the hundreds of deer standing in the field basically waiting to die. I assume that the staistical model was incapable of predicting and preventing that. Once it got to the point where it was publicly obvious, the only fix they had then was to flood the season with all kinds of excessive numbers of permits until the herd came back down. And then they over-shot the mark and had to slash permits dramatically because of all the (apparently legitimate) uproar about deer shortages. Now to me, that kind of see-sawing results is an indicator of a system that isn't working. They seem to simply be reacting (and over-reacting) to situations and not even using their statistics as any kind of preventive, predictive system. You can see it over and over in the cycles of reaction and over-reaction. I know that statistics can work wonders in many situations when used on things that lend themselves to it, but the results that I've seen in person and also viewing their own numbers shows a system that's not completely under control. However, getting back to the harvest reporting, I have never seen a system, statistical or otherwise, that could beat an actual count. Also, I am convinced that DEC personel have better things to do than visiting meat processors and typing data into a computer. I would think that since they are under a resource constraint, they might be more enthusiastic about something that would cut costs and improve accuracy.

I'm not sure just what the tresspassing laws are these days. I thseem to remember that NYS has two posting systems. One is per the regular penal law and the other is per the conservation law, and they are both different. What I have done is to make sure that I can always see at least 3 signs at any one time. That's not per any legal requirement, but I am sure that standard exceeds whatever the official distances might turn out to be. Also, it is a pretty practical way of guaranteeing that if anyone claims they didn't see the signs, they're lying. I'll be honest, I really haven't had a serious tresspassing problem. In fact when the snow is on, you can see a lot of bootprints that come up to the posted signs and then turn around and go back. Once in a while, I will see where someone will walk along the line. Seldom do they cross. Doc

Yup .... that's it. Hogweed. Real bad stuff. By the way, when I was a kid, I used to walk through poison ivy with shorts and never got it. I figured I was immune. A few years back while clearing brush, I got covered with it. Big surprise.

Yeah, the standard deer hunter uniform was those wool black and red checkered jackets (and sometimes pants) ..... lol. Blaze orange has been a huge improvement over those. Doc

I kind of wonder if that 200 yard claim isn't when machine shot. Frankly, I wouldn't expect that just any hunter could make it perform that well. Even though that's what they are trying to imply. What the gun is capable of and what the average guy can make it do probably are two entirely different things. Doc

I can't imagine that many wild pigs. I would think that if you ever let people shoot them for profit, those guys would be putting domestic pork producers out of business. Imagine a helicopter slaughter crew and a ground crew to pick up, butcher and sell them. That would be one heck of a business opportunity and would go a long ways toward solving the feral hog problems of the south. By the way, that guy doing the shooting was pretty darn good. I'm sure that's a lot harder than it looks. Do you suppose he was using buckshot? Doc

One thing we can probably say for sure is that bad or unsafe shooting habits are determined by the mentality of individual hunters ......... not the weapon they are using. I have never seen a normally careful hunter all of a sudden turn into a wild-eyed, drooling, maniac just because somebody put a shotgun in his hands. Most likely it doesn't happen the other way around either. ;D Doc

Steve- Go back an re-read the original proposal. It's about as close to a free change as anything you will ever find in the DEC. Nearly everything is in place. Very likely, it may even be a cost reduction because it would eliminate all the scurrying around by DEC biologists and other personel, from deer processor to deer processor, taking notes that later have to be manually inputted into the computer to come up with the "reporting rate". Now whether they want to be bothered with any changes, that's something else. I can't really guess about that. I would say that the lack of replies that I've gotten from them on the two occasions that I sent in the suggestion would indicate that maybe they don't really want to rock the boat.

Anybody got a decent recipe for those stumps???

Yes, I have heard the term applied to foxes, coyotes, bobcats, rats, woodchucks, skunks, possums, coons and all other kinds of critters. One dictionary defines "varmint" as an animal considered a pest. So that definition could apply to almost anything including deer and bear. I don't want to speak for Bernie P. but I think he was really meaning a forum on "NY predator" hunting (excluding bears).

Back in the day when I used treestands, and also smoked, I would notice things about cigarette smoke. I noticed that on quiet damp days, the smoke would tend to sink downward quicker. I would notice that when the wind was almost still, the smoke cloud would hang together in a more thick cloud than on days of high wind. I would wonder on days of heavy wind how far out my scent would go before it was dissipated. I would notice that as it hit trees, it would deflect and sometimes move into areas where I didn't think the wind should have been blowing it. I used to watch it start off moving in the direction of prevailing wind and then sometimes reverse or take sharp turns to the right or left, sometimes turning and moving down a trail that I was expecting to see the deer coming from. I always wanted to know just what kinds of features made the smoke react that way. I used to watch the smoke see-saw back and forth on occasion, and yes I would occasionally see it touch down on the trail that I was watching even though the prevailing wind wasn't in that direction at all. All those observations just made me wonder even more about how much damage was being done during that one brief moment that the wind shifted and deposited scent molecules on the trail and the brush surrounding the trail. I realized that the smoke was merely making visible what my own human scent was doing invisibly. So that is what my interest is in the science of scent properties and movements. I am surprised that finding information on that subject is so darn difficult. With so many people creating scent based industries, you would think that ther would be no shortage of research on scent. That's why I keep asking the question about any possible studies that anyone might be aware of. I think the subject is huge, and should be of interest to all hunters. We can only go so far in scent-proofing ourselves, and it sure would be useful to understand just where we can expect our scent to wind up and why and in what concentrations. It would also be useful to understand what consequences an occasional gust of wind in the wrong direction might cost us and for how long. It would be interesting to know just how far scent can penetrate into a thicket. It's funny how much I actually learned on this subject simply because I smoked ...... lol. But it was and is pretty obvious that whatever I learned only brought on a whole lot more questions and really highlighted just how little we know on the subject. Someday I hope to find out more info about scent if I ever locate a source.

Chances are that any homeowner will probably shoot first and then find out the legal impacts later. I know there was one Bristol farmer who did exactly that. I don't know whether he had a small game license or not, but I'm sure that wasn't the most important thing on his mind when he took out one of the boars that was harrassing his livestock a few years back.

Ah, a prophet. My crystal ball is broke, so I won't be making those predictions until several years have gone by and I have actual numbers and experience to look at. You never know, maybe the sky will fall ..... lol. I'll be honest, all we need is an incident like up in Swan Lake where the 4 year old girl was fatally shot in her grandparents livingroom by a deer hunter's rifle bullet, and you will hear Ross Perot's giant sucking sound as the politicians can't repeal that law fast enough. Logical reaction? ....... Probably not, but we know how the emotion of such an event would take over in an area where a rifle law was brand new. Especially in an area where anti hunters are just waiting for us to stub our toe. Right now I love jamming our safety record in the face of the anti hunters and the anti-gunners. I don't want anything to reverse that record. So I'll just wait until time proves the case before I start making too many predictions.

That's a pretty good event and I try not to miss it each year. The only thing is that it does tend to be repetitive. Back when I was a member of Avon Bowmen, we used to run a small archery range that provided bows and arrows and gave some kids their first experiences with archery. I guess they don't do that anymore. I kind of get a kick out of the buckskinners that set up camp each year. They really get into it and have some pretty authentic gear and activities. But really, it would be great if they could figure out a way of introducing something new each year for those of us who make it an annual event.

I spend a lot of time over there walking and fishing. It's like a whole different world from any of the other finger lakes. Fishing can be great, but I understand from some of the locals that the hunting isn't all that great. I can't say that I have ever seen a whole lot of sign over there when hiking around. But, I have no first hand experience with actually hunting there. A large portion along Canadice Lake's east side is solid mature pine plantation and is a very sterile kind of woods ....... not real good for hunting. The rest of it is good mixed hardwoods surrounded by old fields and farmland. As far as fishing is concerned, I would give it mixed reviews. On any given day it can be as good as anywhere, but there are a lot of days when it really is good only for sight-seeing. Keep an eye out for poison ivy. They seem to have more than their share over there. Also, there's another poisonous plant that I have seen over there that I can't remember the name of. But it is supposedly bad stuff that can have some rather nasty long-lasting effects. It's tall and has a super-huge queen anne's lace kind of blossom. Don't mess with it!!! I saw it on the Lake side of Lake Road along Canadice Lake.

Yeah, I did a bit of internet searching and pretty much getthe same impression. There are some chemical cures that last about 2 years, but they all seem to be requiring injections into the cambial layer of each individual tree. That's not exactly practical for turning back an invasion of these critters. Also I guess most of these limited remedies are fairly expensive. So the firewodd thing is the only defense and it is not a foolproof defense. It doesn't look good, and all the triagular shaped boxes are not going to stop what looks like the inevitable. By the way, it turns out that the EAB is another accidentally introduced invader. It's not even native to this hemisphere. I guess we don't ever learn.

Do they really have any procedures for slowing the advance? I haven't heard of any other than campaigns against transporting firewood from one place to another. I guess what I'm getting at is that this activity looks like a pretty expensive operation. I just hope it has more purpose than simply satisfying curiosity. To me it sounds like a foregone conclusion that we are going to lose our ash trees. That's a shame, but in our area something has been killing them off for decades, and we have darn few that ever really amount to anything.

By the way, a part of this original post that got lost along the way is about the sale of Hemlock and Canadice Lakes to the state. For those not familiar with this area, this is a pretty big deal over here in the western finger lakes because both of these lakes are the only ones of the finger lakes that are not commercialized and ringed with cottages and basically sealed of from the public. They were formerly owned by the city of Rochester and have been (and still will be) used as a water reservoir. It's been a long fight, but these two lakes have been saved from development and will continue to provide excellent hunting and fishing opportunities. That was a pretty amazing and noteable achievement for a time when the state is pretty much in a financially busted situation. Doc

Have you ever had somebody try to kick you off your own property? I have heard of this happening, but never had it happen to me. Apparently some trespassers think a good offense is better than a good defense, and assume that you don't own the property and pretend that they do.