How do other hunters irritate you ?

[erussell]

I love people who wont shut up on there walkies. I put mine on scan and  listen to where the deer are running to. If I can get there quickly you can head them off and take advantage I also like the guys you ride there 4 wheelers into the woods. I have taken a few deer thanks to these deer pushers, and then they wonder why they don't see any deer :

[bkln]

Well, nobody enjoys having a "johnny-come-lately" hunter trudging under your stand, huffing and puffing in a hurry to get to his stand, stinking with sweat right at that prime time when the deer are starting to move. On state land, that does occasionally happen. Every year state-land crowding gets worse and worse, and these sorts of things happen more frequently.

Then too, there are the guys who use your stand or set up next to your stand making the assumption that you have done the scouting for them.

Doc

I heard that DEC said that we gain 55 hunters for every 100 lost, so how is it possible that woods getting more crowded, how was it 20 years ago Doc? Was it better, worse as far as overcrowding goes...or maybe we have less hunters but then almost all of them hunt, instead of list 1000 members and only 50 hunt, don't know that's why I'm asking...

[papabear]

"I heard that DEC said that we gain 55 hunters for every 100 lost"

I don't know how they figure that every class I teach I have at lest 30 to 60 in each

every one i talk to says the same thing

[WNYBuckHunter]

"I heard that DEC said that we gain 55 hunters for every 100 lost"

I don't know how they figure that every class I teach I have at lest 30 to 60 in each

every one i talk to says the same thing

Look at license sales. Its pretty obvious.

[bkln]

"I heard that DEC said that we gain 55 hunters for every 100 lost"

I don't know how they figure that every class I teach I have at lest 30 to 60 in each

every one i talk to says the same thing

Look at license sales. Its pretty obvious.

Do you have a link handy? I checked DEC website and couldn't find it...

[WNYBuckHunter]

http://www.dec.ny.gov/permits/26368.html

As you can see, its been a pretty steady decline with the exception of 08/09. I am almost positive that had to do with the jump in lifetime sales because of the increase in price. They shot themselves in the foot though, look at last year's numbers.

[Doc]

I heard that DEC said that we gain 55 hunters for every 100 lost, so how is it possible that woods getting more crowded, how was it 20 years ago Doc? Was it better, worse as far as overcrowding goes...or maybe we have less hunters but then almost all of them hunt, instead of list 1000 members and only 50 hunt, don't know that's why I'm asking...

Here's what I have found over the years, and bare in mind that I am only talking one small area of one small valley in Ontario County (one small county) and is not backed up with stats and is only an impression that has developed over a whole bunch of years (50 0f them to be exact).

First of all, there has been an exact opposite change depending on whether you are talking gun season or bow season.

During bow season, back when I first started (1960), throughout the entire archery season, short though it was, I never was aware that any other bowhunter existed ...... anywhere in the valley. I pretty much had our entire chunk of the valley to myself with only my Dad and a brother-in-law. I still remember the shock when I saw my first bowhunter still hunting through the woods, and by the way, almost all of my hunting was done on state land at the time. Today, it is likely that anyone who spends a lot of time on public land knows that that is not the situation anymore. Now, you not only have to find a spot that has deer, but also find a spot where your hunt is not likely to be interupted or deer patterns constantly disrupted. So my experiences show that bowhunter numbers are massive compared to years ago. I am still getting the impression that the bowhunter numbers are continuing to grow.

Gun season hunter population and participation changes are exactly the opposite. Even though actual deer numbers are far larger, the sounds of the hunt are much less. It used to be a case where you could track the movement of a buck across a hill by the shots. Hunters were everywhere. State parking lots were full and overflowing on to the sides of the road. Cars were parked all over the place. We used to go about 3/4 of the way up the far hill on opening morning and get on stand while it was still pitch dark. Looking down on the valley, the view of headlights and tail lights on opening day traffic looked like a long snake with very few empty spots as hunter's cars headed south. Today, the traffic on opening day really doesn't look a whole lot different than any other week day. The shooting these days is a fast and furious little burst at daylight and then around 9:00 or 10:00 it tapers off to just an occasional shot here and there, and the afernoon gets to be absolutely boring. The days after the opener are even worse. Of course there are a lot of reasons besides fewer hunters, but judging by the half empty state parking lots and the empty roadside that used to be lined with parked cars, I have to believe that hunter numbers have diminished significantly. I'm not talking about licenses sold, but rather the actual numbers of guys afield.

So it looks like a lot of gunhunters have moved into bowhunting, and most likely the over-all numbers of deer hunters are slipping severely. Certainly, the level of participation in gun hunting has collapsed regardless of what license sales are doing. We have a lot of 1-day hunters and/or 1/2 day hunters that are buying up the licenses now. My guess is that a lot of those probably will be quitting within a few years. That's just an opinion, based on what I have seen.

Doc