Shorten the NY Gun Season?

[Helderberg Hunter]

Let's get a discussion going about the NY Deer Season-Gun. Is the season too long? Should the gun season be shortened to a week or 2 weeks? Many experienced hunters I have spoken with regarding this topic refer to states such as Illinois-which has a much shorter season that NY and seems to have monster racks harvested. What to the hunters on this forum have to say? Will a shortened season help the NYS Deer herd?

[bubba]

I think th earchery season should be shortened by a week and regular a week. 

[Helderberg Hunter]

Thanks for the input-opening day I saw 17 deer -just 1 spike -all does---past couple of days or so absolutley nothing - or at great distance-something is amiss

[SplitG2]

I'm not a gun hunter so it would be nice but if people only gun hunted that would be a short season.  The tradition of gun hunting runs too deep in NY.

[bubba]

shortening gun season will only cause less people to hunt. I rfer to places such as alabama which have months of season and you can  take a deer a day. Seems to work for them.  It seems that the elite want to take over hunting. They want to ocntrol gun and ml seasons and let archery have it all. 

[Helderberg Hunter]

My only reason is it seems the herd is being depleted

[Gthphtm]

Deer hunting only comes around ONCE a year,A lot of people save there vacations for this season Why shorten it,If anything start the Archery season October 1st.and let it end as now the beginning of rifle season. Since the X- bow season is going to screw one of the seasons up,next year.Go back to how it was years ago.A party permit with 3 people to one permit for Does.And only One Buck per Year per Hunter and no sighning over tags.That will get the heard back to where it was. 

[bubba]

My only reason is it seems the herd is being depleted

then why does gun season take the hit only? shorten them all.

[Helderberg Hunter]

I'm thinking numbers--deer taken by bow- vs gun?

[jasons75]

I don't think shorting the deer season will help the herd. Maybe reduce the number of tags issued would be a better solution. 1 ... maybe 2 tags max. remove or reduce the nuisance permits that are issued. I think you can get up to 3  tags per season right now.

Maybe Stagger the season start and end dates across the zones so they overlap from 1 area to the next. This could keep the season the same length but shorter per zone. That might help the areas that seem to have the lowest numbers. 

[fasteddie]

I would like to see bow season start two weeks earlier and then take away the last week of bow season and give it to the gun hunters so the two extra weeks would be split .

Check out some of the fields in the summertime and you will see plenty of deer . They go into stealth mode durung the hunting seasons .

[Doc]

If you want to see gunhunters descend on Albany in a full riot turn-out, just start shortening the gun season.....especially after just slapping a huge license increase on them. It doesn't matter whether hunters actually use all of the season that's available right now or not. I do not believe that any of them are in a friendly frame of mind to put up with having some of their hunting rights trimmed. And just what would really be accomplished anyway. I'm not sure just how it is in other areas of the state, but In our area, during the last two weeks of gun season I don't believe I heard more than a half dozen shots in the whole valley, so what's the big impact to the deer population. For what it's worth, I believe you would cause big problems in the hunting community and not impact the harvest numbers enough to even notice. 

[bubba]

so, last year there were lots of deer, this year less?  I guess if you do not see deer every time out, there has to be more deer?  Come hunt where I do where you may see in a good year 10 deer all season and get a DMp maybe every three years.  And you want to take away 2 weeks of the time I have to see them.  Yeah good luck with that one. Maybe they should stop giving out dmp's two and three at a time so there will be more deer.  Hunt harder and smarter, you will see deer. 

[Helderberg Hunter]

For the sake of argument what is your opinion (Bubba) if they shortened the season to 1 week--what impact would it have on the deer herd and buck antler lenght--say they did it for 5 years?

[bubba]

it would depend on if they took away a week at the start or the end.  Start minimal, end none.  Here in the NZ archery starts 9/28 and ml season ended one week ago.  Like I said taking time away will do nothing. Limit the number of tags. If there was a week less, people would just hunt more during the time they have.  The DEC does studies and deer counts to determine the number of tags given out, I know you understand carrying capacity, and the only deer hunters are allowed to take by tags is the over supply. So if the population has dwindled, then less tags need to be handed out.  In 6c where I hunt, 10to 15 years  years ago we were way over populated. Almost everyone got a dmp.  Well now that the population is under control, I may get one every three or four years depending on the draw.  How do you feel abot having the same amount of time and say an archery tag and a buck tag only?  That will bring the population back. 

[SplitG2]

Bubba, are you saying only one buck tag a year?  I'm for that.

[Localqdm]

I wish we could start w/1buck limit, but I do think a shorter shotgun season in SOUTHERN ZONE would help.  Around me they get pushed around ALL season long, and we (the deer and myself  ) would like it to quiet down quicker.  It would benefit ML too.  Basically, they are pushed completely nocturnal for 3+weeks.  I think it would affect take in my area.  Now will it ever happen is another issue.

[Helderberg Hunter]

Bubba

I think anything to help the population--I am game for ANYTHING

[bubba]

I guess you missed my point. The population has to be over carrying capacity, or we would no tbe allowed to hunt them. The powers to be are not going to raise numbers when numbers are already over carrying capacity. I gues like I said hunt harder and hunt smarter.  isn't it a little selfish to say you guys can only hunt certain times so the deer are more likely to be at ease when I get around to hunting? 

[fasteddie]

No deer around ....

[Four Season Whitetail's]

Alot can happen in 3 years.90% of the deer is those pics were more than likely taken out by some farmers light.I dont think there was much of a problem with people complaints about no deer before these farm and landowner tags came around...But that will open another can of worms!!!

[wztirem]

My only reason is it seems the herd is being depleted

How? Seeing deer and actual population are not one in the same. The DEC can only estimate deer populations in given DMU's based upon questionable data. Hunters do no report their kills.

[Chevy]

Here's what happens. Places like pictures above have too many deer, maybe because it is near a private park or private property. But the DEC wants to control them so in that entire DMU every hunter gets 2 dmp's every year. The trouble is we still can't hunt in the area with alot of deer and end up shooting out the huntable land.   

[Doc]

There may also be another problem with just arbitrarily shortening the gun season. What if you live in an area that needs a bit of population thinning. Setting the season shorter takes that management option away.

Here again, we always suggest passing laws or making revisions based on what we see in our township or our own unique acreage where we hunt without ever acknowledging that what we see may not be, and probably is not, representative of conditions anywhere else.

While not perfect, the best way to manage populations is thru the existing permit system. We may not always agree with the conclusions of the DEC relative to that system, but it is the only management tool that we have that takes into consideration local conditions, habitat, and existing herd populations and does it as well as practicality and resources will allow. Arbitrary revision of season lengths considers none of that.

Doc

[Localqdm]

Those pics look like deer yarding up, plus deer populations vary over just a couple sq miles.  Lots of deer there, maybe nothing a mile away.

Bubba, I don't think I'm being selfish, I'm just saying what it is around here.  And I think you're right, in the N Zone the season is fine to be long.  Farms in the S Zone are a lot different than the big woods you hunt.  Its nothing for a 50 acre woods to be broken up 4 ways and have 8 or 10 or more hunters in it. How many hunters per sq mi do you see there?

The deer don't have the cover here they do up there.  When they get bumped out of the 50 acres, they can run .5 mi or more until they reach the next cover, where they get bumped again, and again, and again...or until they find a sanctuary and hole up.  But they won't move again until dark.

On these farms we don't have the luxury of miles and miles of public access.  If the deer are pressured here, we can't just go a couple miles down the road through heavy cover and try there.  We can't pick up a track and follow it for miles.  We can't drive deer over an entire hillside, then go do another hill, and another.

I'm not saying shorten it just for the bowhunter.  Until Wed last week (middle of MZ), when my season ended due to travel,  most deer here were totally nocturnal, except for the fawns.

I don't even like the whole gun hunter vs bow hunter argument anyway.  I hunt all weapon/seasons and think I'm looking at the big picture.  I don't think we need to brand ourselves"Gunhunters" or "Bowhunters" only.  If someone wants to hunt all fall, they can try the bow or ML.

Just consider the possibility that NY has one of the longest gun seasons (esp in the cold northern part of the US) and it might have some negative implications to the deer and other methods of hunting.