Five Seasons

that clarifies it thanks. Wayne has been pretty friendly to us armed thugs, so i'll keep a reminder on my calendar next year but also hope for a notice. did you old timers (lol) get mailings?

The last possible day is 5 years from doi? the january stuff is confusing to me. Mine is from 2013 and is plastic.

is this something i will receive a letter in the mail like the dmv though? i didn't re-read all 5 pages but thought there wasn't any notifications.

sunset rules. I've never flailed away at something moving in a bush that i couldn't identify. Or taken a shot at a mysterious silhouette. But too many idiots did.

grow, you contribute a lot to many subjects to this site. Simple likes and quotes alone show you're alone on this one. You can't ask for hunter unity and then call out "young bucks" in the same thread. I also don't see anyone claiming to be anything they're not in this thread. A lot of very honest answers about why we horn hunt. So yes, true sides. Sides you just may disagree with.

the cc topic reminded me about this. did we ever figure out exactly what the deal was?

we will never see any sort of progress with gun laws in ny. Even if they all agreed that the law was dumb, the optic would be a win for "gun nuts", so it'd never pass.

being in the woods in an escape for me. If i ever feel the need to protect myself then i'm looking for new woods. I too have had some hair raising yote moments, but that's mother nature and it's only fair lol. And this is from a guy who carries just about anytime i travel or head out in public.

that's my thought too. A guy who is just going grocery shopping doesn't typically belong to an internet forum, let alone one where he's active daily. If you you're not after big bucks, you've killed hundreds of deer and never made a mistake... why are you here? Don't take that comment with any spite behind it. I'm generally curious.

if you're not posting your buck on a page like nyantlers i think social media is just a modern version of deer camp. I'm only friends with people who are my friends on facebook lol. A good many of them hunters. So with the demanding busy lives we live, it's the easiest way to share success and to give congrats to others. It's certainly not as great as opening day in the barn at deer camp. But it is very much the same.

I want to add one more thought here. I've told this story before. But here it goes. Before moving back to NY last year I had moved down to northern Mississippi with my wife and at the time 1 son. We knew nobody. I knew nothing about ms deer hunting. I was forced to hunt public land with a climber. my whole hunting life had been hang ons that were strategically placed using decades of knowledge from hunting the family land. You were almost guaranteed a deer every sit. I prepped, scouted and hunted all on my own. No help from dad or anyone else. I had no success the first 3 months in the woods. When I finally had a shot at a doe during early MZ season I took it. She was an average MS doe but small for NY. It was probably the most satisfied, happy and elated i have ever been. I took it home and skinned and butchered it myself in my garage using the hoist i installed myself. I had never processed a deer, we always used local butchers in NY. There were none in my new town. Educated myself and bought the tools, a grinder and vac sealer and did it all from start to finish. By far the best trophy I have ever had. And just 2 weeks later i shot a nice 9 not far from where I shot the doe by tracking some fresh scrapes. Still value the doe over the 9 whose european mount is on my den wall.

I'd be lying if i told you it had no importance. I'm raised in a very hunting rich family. At family gatherings hunting is always the subject. All family members are supportive. We educate and help. Sure we have a twinge of jealousy at anothers success. Some uncles still shoot a 3 pointer when he walks buy, others will only shoot a mounter. It's low on my list of why I would want to shoot a nice buck. The main reason I want to shoot a nice buck is the gratification i feel myself. The reward for the effort. But to say it doesn't mean something to get a big ole congratulation bear hug from my dad? Or tons of questions about the buck and a table full of ole beer drinking grizzly deer hunting vets clinging on my every word of the story? That would be a lie. We all do it, whether we admit it or not. It's part of "deer camp". I still do not care what others think. I didn't care when friendly ball busting 2 years ago on opening day for shooting a small doe and her mom within 15 seconds of each other. But I do enjoy the feelings of success being shared with others. Does that work?

you do know that taking a life without any feeling whatsoever is the definition of a psychopath right? You don't have to cry and morn the loss of your food, but to not feel a thing when ending the life of such a beautiful creature is literally insane. I think deer hunters respect deer more than anyhow. I know I do.

I hunted public land in MS where an archer could legally carry. I thought about it but never did it. It was extra "stuff" and bulk I felt I didn't need to add to my climber, bow and pack combo. I think most folks know a hunter is armed with at least a knife and if I see you coming I can't knock an arrow. If I don't see you coming my pistol isn't going to help. Plus who carries a wallet in the woods? Lol

you make some very good points in this thread. As a "young pup" though I struggle with your generalization that it's an age thing. See Moog's thread about what started you hunting. Many of us were taught by our fathers, grandfathers and uncles. The only hunting show I watch is meateater. We didn't even have cable till i was 17. My desire to shoot a big buck doesn't come from TV and also doesn't mean I have a lack of respect when attempting to do so. I've ate every ounce of every animal I've shot, and that includes trying a few squirrels lol. People have been after large horns for a long time, it's just more in your face now with the advent of social media. yes, the pastime has lost some of its lore and competition is more fierce. But please don't generalize based on age. Guys have been jacking deer way before the 70's too.

your harvest number is not the problem. Your claim to have never wounded, gut shot or had to recover a deer over 100 yards that is not believable. You have crusaded against the trophy hunter in this thread and others and in the process made yourself out to be Daniel Boon and Davy Crockett's mentor.

this is well said, but there's a very small minority in this country that do have an open mind and understanding of those different than them. It's not easy to do though. We are all very well rooted in our upbringing, values and tradition. Now all you have to do is view the posts about muslims by a certain member on this forum to see the opposite. And that's the close minded, i refuse to even try to see your side of the story that has really corrupted much of this great country and halted a lot of good dialogue and progress. I'm not a poor single black woman with 3 kids to feed. I can't relate. But the best thing i can do when discussing issues pertaining to one is to at least "try" and see it from their eyes. I know we all would appreciate if the anti-hunter would do the same.

I think you took my comment wrong. I've stated umpteen times that i hunt for food first, woods therapy second and racks last. And what I mean by that is I will make sure my freezer is full but also that i do try and pass smaller bucks and i typically wait for gun to start shooting flatheads. So I'm in the woods hunting regardless. My point about "proving oneself to others" comes from the fact that if you're already a hunter (see caveman analogy), one way to show how good you are to others is to harvest the biggest baddest racks. I never said this is why someone should hunt, that this is why I hunt or that it is the source of hunting. But you'd be in denial if you didn't believe a great many hunters of any era know that killing the most mature buck, biggest bear or tom with the longest beard in the woods will gain them some admiration from their peers in addition to all the other reasons they hunt. Heck, it may have even made them chief in some Indian village. We're all guilty even on this forum when we argue over stuff. We tend to take the advice and side of the hunters who routinely see success over those who don't. Would you rather learn how to cook from a master chef or a 12 year old boy?

Conor's shit talking is funny to me though. just google his recent pressers. He's funny, but to the right person can be obnoxious. Of course he's now being called a racist because he told floyd to "dance for him" and called him a "boy". which i guess is just as bad as the n word to a black guy? news to me. It's just a slang in Ireland. And then of course something about monkeys. idk. i love the spectacle of this whole thing. couldn't care less about the fight.

this is turkey for me. I skipped right to 5. Have only killed 1 bird in 4 years. Don't get frustrated, just like being in the woods in the spring. Would getting a nice big tom put a big smile on my face and dinner on the table? sure. But it's not why i do it. Deer is different though. Personally i'm somewhere with 2 and 4. I want a nice buck, but i also have a family of 5 that deposits my paycheck at wegmans and stresses me daily. So alone time woods therapy I love the most. But I'd be a dirty liar if I told you I didn't want those horns.

where i come from that's a shooter. Past the ears and nice tine length. I think the argument here isn't 3.5 and up, but stubby over here taking out the yearlings because they taste soooo much better than all the meat you got off that buck. That ain't no yearling

did anyone in this thread say they were antler hunting and threw away the meat? The bigger the deer the more mouths to feed right? And yes, even a blind squirrel finds a nut. Not too many blind squirrels find a bunch of nuts. So if I walk into your mancave and I know you hunt average land or maybe even public land and you have some nice racks on the wall then I know you're a good hunter. Sign of strength in the field.

dude. Conor is just as bad if not worse lol.

i think that's why boxing is hurting and MMA has grown as much as it has.

totally agree. I've eaten buck tag soup for 2 years. But my freezer has been full of doe meat. And i passed my fair share of 1.5's during those years.