Doc

License sales numbers may still be up, but that doesn't say that they are being used at the same rate and the same enthusiasm as they used to be. Let's face it, in spite of how much we complain, the cost of a hunting license is still pretty darn cheap. I'm sure there are a lot of people who buy a license just in case they get the urge to go out. And then there are the people who want to go out just for opening day so they can say they still go deer hunting. And then there are those that go out on opening day but seem to never make it back after they head out for breakfast or lunch......for the remainder of the season. Then there are people who get counted for each different kind of hunting license that they buy. There's a whole lot more to judging hunting popularity, activity and enthusiasm than simply counting licenses.

I remember the annual winter carnival on Honeoye lake. Tons of people and events covering the ice at the north end. I'm not sure why it was discontinued, but there were never any claim that it was dangerous.

Are there any good books around on the mechanics of proper offhand shooting techniques? How about internet sources from credible experts?

I wouldn't make too much out of that. I have read posts of people desperately searching for hunter safety training classes because they are getting few and far between. Perhaps they are always full because it is getting harder and harder to find instructors.

I think you have to admit that there isn't always a whole lot of common sense out there and you never know when it's your noggin that one of these guys that lacks common sense decides that your indistinct movement in the twilight is enough to warrant pulling the trigger. Common sense is a great thing, but we all know that hunting laws cannot rely solely on common sense. And yes, that 1/2 hour does make a difference. That is the time of day when vision becomes a bit fuzzy, and detail begins to fade, and images behind targets begin to become simply indistinct shadows and shapeless background. I have seen that that half hour is the time when cloud cover and over-story density and fog begin to have their most profound effect on what you are shooting at and the things beyond. Regarding supposedly unenforceable laws, there are times when skillful interrogation can result in arrests that you wouldn't expect to be normally made. At any rate, having the law on the books is a statement of intent. At some point you do have to state what time deer hunting must cease. You can argue all day what time of day that should be, but some limit has to be stated in law (enforceable or not). Frankly, when you consider the quantity of ECOs and how far apart they are spread, you have to admit that almost all EnCon laws are unenforceable or nearly so on a practical basis. Does that mean that we should suspend all laws and throw in the towel and only pass laws where enforcement is easy and likely? We make the laws as we see them needed, and we enforce them as best we can. That's the way legality is established.

That is exactly the problem you run into. That is why the only way to fight this kind of attitude against safety concerns is to catch the bad attitudes early and try to change them before an offense occurs. And the best place to do that is in the hunter safety training courses.

As has been pointed out, it is very hard to catch these birds to turn them in. You can hear it any opening day of any gun season. Shots going off somewhere in the valley, often they happen even when it is still dark. Finding someone under those circumstances is darn near impossible even when the shots are in close. These characters believe that they are above the law and have nothing but total disdain for anyone who shows some concern over safety in hunting situations. You see it here on this forum. Anybody raises issues of safety, and they are deemed to be "wussy cry baby pansies". That is the mentality that you are dealing with. I don't know how, but the only way to stop this sort of thing is to find these attitudes during the hunter safety training courses and either straightening out their thinking right there or denying their certification. That is where you have a chance at straightening out these weird attitudes about hunter safety.

The last time I brought up the subject to a kid of going out hunting, I was laughed at. It's a different world out there with a brand new culture. I am sure that somewhere there is a kid just begging their parents to go hunting, but I have not seen it. I always seem to get that, "Are you nuts? ......You're interrupting my game" look when I ask if there is any interest. But of course that is a whole other subject that doesn't really have anything to do with the effects of gun season lengths.

Ha-ha....It is funny to have somebody thumping their chest over how manly it is to be an idiot regarding safety. I already related the experience that I had with some goofball that incorrectly felt he had the right to determine safe shooting light for himself. So it is going to take a whole lot more than mere name-calling to ever change my mind on the subject. Regarding your concerns about parenting, I really don't get the relevancy, but that sounds like a whole different subject regarding some maternal issues that I would just as soon mot get into.

That is one reason why I don't pay a lot of attention to license sales to figure out the diminishing level of hunting these days. It looks like there may be a lot of people buying licenses without any intentions of using them beyond opening weekend. I think the level of enthusiasm is also diminishing, which does not bode well for the future.

Hunting safety laws are not written for specific locations, forest foliage content, or certain levels of intelligence or eyesight. If you have not encountered plenty of times when visibility was inadequate 1/2 hour outside of current NYS legal shooting hours then that tells me that you are not really very particular as to whether you can see your target and all that is going on behind the target. And by the way, seeing pretty well is not the standard that I want anyone using that is hunting around me. You people seem to think the standard of safe shooting light should be whether you can make out your crosshairs and the outline of the deer or not. Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but there is a lot more than that that you have to be aware of before you touch off that trigger. Apparently there are some aspects of your hunter training course that didn't really take. And for those that rely on the fact that other states have extended shooting hours, understand that because we do not go in lockstep with the most reckless of states does not mean that we are wrong and they are right.

It bothers me to hear people with those kinds of attitudes toward Conservation Law. It sounds like your entire hunting ethic is based on the odds of getting caught. It tells a lot about you.

I have never seen a document so full of double-talk and contradictions as this one. But there was one passage that caught my eye: "This shall not be interpreted, or construed, as a limit on liability for acts of gross negligence in addition to those other acts referred to in subdivision two of this section. 2. This section does not limit the liability which would otherwise exist a. for willful or malicious failure to guard, or to warn against, a dangerous condition, use, structure or activity; or b. for injury suffered in any case where permission to pursue any of the activities enumerated in this section was granted for a consideration other than the consideration, if any, paid to said landowner by the state or federal government, or permission to train dogs was granted for a consideration other than that provided for in section 11-0925 of the environmental conservation law" One thing that lawyers are trained to do is to take ambiguous legal opinions such as this to make a case for a law suit. But not being a lawyer myself, I do not know about the ins and outs of all of this double-speak. I think that if a salesman were to step on your porch and a board gave way resulting in injury to that salesman, I believe there would be a successful lawsuit coming your way. In the same vein, if some hunter were to fall into some uncovered abandoned well or have a building fall in on him, or some other man-made hazard that exists without warning, I think the same principles might very well apply. But I must admit that I am out of my element when it comes the legal world of verbal deception and mis-direction....lol.

This graph of the southern zone illustrates exactly my point of how the significance of extended seasons quickly reaches a point of diminishing returns. So that all tells us that those who would shorten seasons, or those that would extend them really are not impacting the take significantly as many think. I am just trying to put into perspective this whole idea of regulating herd populations and content by messing with season lengths. The numbers seem to indicate that when people start to think that they have these brainstorms about how they can solve the state's hunting problems by some adjustment of season length, season length does not really seem to be that significant a factor. I have to point out that I am zeroing in on the southern zone with my observations as I have never hunted the Northern Zone. And, as the graph bears out, I have noticed that after a couple of days of gun season have passed, harvests and activity drop off significantly. So my conclusion is that season lengths are not as big an impact as many think (either positively or negatively).

Yes, I am talking about harvests of any meaningful significance. I am sure that at any point in the season, some guy, somewhere does get a deer. But in reality it is almost statistically insignificant in terms of what those that would shorten seasons would like to accomplish.

The point of this post is to note that those that have a problem with the gun season lengths in MYS are barking up the wrong tree if you want to change harvest quantities or quality with deer season lengths (shorter or longer). There seems to be a situation here in this state where season lengths reach a point of diminishing returns. Longer seasons do not automatically lead to higher harvests or hunter participation.

I would really like to hear a lawyer say that. I would not be surprised to find out that landowners are still liable for any existing hazards that are present on the property. How about uncovered wells, dangerous and unstable structures, etc. I'm thinking that there may still be plenty of liability situations for a sharp lawyer to work with.

They allow you to pay taxes on it.

Here was my solution: I decided that I don't want people so close that I can hear their arguments or listen to their kids. So I went to Western New York where I could live in the country and still have good lucrative employment, have lots of land at a dirt cheap price, and stay the hell away from neighbors, and build my own place to my specifications. This gave me some darn good hunting land that I can control the hunter density on. Taxes are relatively cheap because we don't demand a pile of services. Every morning I wake up in a nice quiet valley surrounded by wooded hillsides. Every weekend I get to wander the hills and learn the deer movements. It's like year around scouting/hiking/camping surrounded by nature, peace and quiet. The bad parts: for about 35+ years I had a 45 minute to 1 hour commute to work. That's a lot of driving time. It's kind of relaxing when the roads are bare. But they weren't bare all the time....lol. It's a lot of gas and vehicle maintenance. It is 15 miles into town for shopping. Geez....I don't even have street lights and sidewalks. I just looked at what I valued the most and went for it. Never a minute of regret. The good news is that I live in my hunting land and every one knows it. That goes a long ways toward solving the trespass problems. Its not a complete solution, but it works a lot better than having land that is abandoned for most of the year (and everyone knows it).

Interesting that the buck in the top picture (op) is bedded down right out in the middle of a wide open field. They usually pick a more secluded spot.

When you obtain hunting permission, do you always make the landowner sign something in case he forgets months later that he granted you permission? Have you ever had a landowner forget that you are one that he gave permission to? Do you think that asking him to write out a permission slip is maybe getting a bit too pushy or might make him start thinking about legal liabilities that he may be signing up for (rightly or wrongly)? Do you have a check list of issues you want to address like where to park or places where the landowner might have a conflict with your hunting, or some description of the vehicle you expect to be using, or permission for hunting partners, etc.

Ha-ha.... I guess everyone has heard of "suicide by cop". Well, it could be that we have now heard of someone trying to commit "suicide by hunter".

I remember a time when I was heading home when a shot went off that was close enough to make me hit the dirt. It was after legal shooting hours, but apparently that guy thought he knew better than the law. I don't know if the shot was at me, or even toward me, but that little incident changed my whole perspective on legal shooting hours. Look, it doesn't matter how clear you can see a deer that is standing out in the middle of a hay lot. The standard applies back in a heavy over-story hemlock woods too. It applies just as much to that foggy, rainy, heavy overcast day as it does during a clear evening. And it is not all about how well you can see the deer, but also how well you can see what is behind the deer or back in the brush behind the deer. I wonder what kind of fear and panic that guy that shot felt when he heard me cussing at the top of my lungs. I wonder if he realized what a stupid, wacked-out stunt that was. I hope he learned something from that incident. Maybe if we are all lucky, he learned that legal shooting hours is not just a suggestion that you abide by if it is convenient. Believe me, that deer is not worth finding a hunter's dead or wounded body when you go to begin blood-trailing.

There is an unwarranted fear of state land. People have developed a picture of hunters behind every tree, blazing away at anything that moves. They have heard that all the deer on public land have been shot and that public land is a hotbed of drunken crazies that will shoot you if you stand still long enough for them to draw a bead on you. Frankly, it seems to me that most of the hunting incidents that I hear about, happen on private land. And slob hunters seem to show up on all kinds of land, public or private. In fact it is usually private land where guys wander out wearing full camo in gun season, apparently feeling positive that they are the only ones on the land, and obviously unaware of the concept of trespass. But anyway, people are convinced that if you can't find any private land, you might as well not go hunting. That coupled with the fact that more and more land is getting locked up may very well account for the reduction in the hunter population.

I remember the wide-eyed expression on the faces of my two sons the year that my wife took my boots and put them in the ashes of the fireplace and then made tracks from the hearth to the Christmas tree and back. That kept them believing for a couple more years.....lol.