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Whitetails the way of the pheasants

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pamarcole

pamarcole
This season has become an even bigger disapointment than last year, and last year was a bigger disapointment than the year before that.
I have great memories as a kid riding the gravel roads counting pheasants with my dad, those day's are gone! I'm afraid the same thing is happening to our deer. Over the last few years I've seen less and less and less deer. This year has become the worst I my have seen in over 25 years of bow hunting deer. I spend a lot of time in the woods in the fall, the avg. trip out I would see 3-5 deer. This year my avg. was, get this. less than one! Infact I went 8 straight trips to the woods at one time and didnt see even one, and this was during prime time in Nov.
I dont have to be killing deer to enjoy my time in stand, as we all know as bow hunters! But watching deer, patterning deer, creating game plans, understanding food sources, telling deer stories and of course all of the memories, ah yes the memories, this year "not many"! I found my self (and I'm not the only one, almost everyone I've talked to feels this way) sitting in stand bored and a little pissed the state has taken one of the things I enjoy the most and make it very boring.
I understand there are places that still hold a lot of deer and those places still might need the herd thinned some?? But this does not hold true everywhere. We are very low on deer in my area but we can still by more doe tags, and there is a speical doe season I beleive this weekend....Why....Because we have to many deer...are you kidding! I see and hear stories from other states that have completely screwed up there deer herds by over estimating the whitetail population and allowing to many deer to be killed, and now it's happeneing here!
Deer hunting for me is great intertainment, the entertainment is no longer as entertaining as it use to be. On one hand than want people to hunt and enjoy the great outdoors but on the other hand they are making it hard to enjoy!
 
I'm dealing w/ the same thing. My bowhunter survery has made one thing very clear to me. What I thought was "OK" deer hunting is really terrible when I look at the recorded data. I need to find a new place to hunt. :confused:
Going to hit the public ground this weekend....then it's time to get ready for ice fishing.
 
Do you guys hunt near me? Good to hear I am not the only one kinda bored. But not good to hear. Deer Hunting in some of IA, following pattern of other states.
 
make sure the DNR in your area, and your state representatives are also hearing your complaints. "preaching to the choir" will do nothing. one of the factors in setting antlerless quotas is input from hunters. if you aren't seeing enough deer, tell them. if the hear the same thing from enough people in the same area, they should lower antlerless quotas, wich will let the herd numbers rise. it won't happen over night, so some patience will be needed.
 
They'll only listen to the insurance companies.

Next year it's one doe tag only for me. I'd shoot none but I prefer the way they taste.
 
I bought 2 does tag this season just because I hunt in 2 different counties.I wish they had a statewide doe tag then I would only buy one to put some meat in the freezer.But both are still in my pocket.
It's bad when you can hunt 40 days like I have and not have a shot at a doe.
 
teeroy said:
make sure the DNR in your area, and your state representatives are also hearing your complaints. "preaching to the choir" will do nothing. one of the factors in setting antlerless quotas is input from hunters. if you aren't seeing enough deer, tell them. if the hear the same thing from enough people in the same area, they should lower antlerless quotas, wich will let the herd numbers rise. it won't happen over night, so some patience will be needed.
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:way:

I'm absolutely not looking forward to next season in my spots.....it was rough this year.
 
I don't know what you guys are talking about, driving through the west side of Des Moines in the evening from downtown to waukee anyone can see 30-40 deer in town running through fields and ditches. Of course little to nobody is hunting here.

Drive 40 minutes out of town to get to my "hunting spot" and sit for hours and hours on end with few sightings. On my way out run into 3-4 other hunters that are heading back to Des Moines with no sightings until they hit the city limit...

I like the insurance quote earlier in the post and I believe the city has real problem with over population. Dead deer on the road everywhere in town.

It seems the people who are making the laws and regs must be spending a lot of time on the golf courses and not out in the country where most "hunters" congregate.

Just my $.02
 
They need to get rid of the thanksgiving doe hunt (what a joke) They say its a way for familys to get together and enjoy the outdoors, most people that hunt 2 days a year dont care what they shoot and if it has a nice rack on it, they are going to shoot it plain and simple! And for the doe tags per county i wish they would get rid of that also, the deer numbers just aren't what they are saying they are, in the areas i hunt anyway. Use to be nothing to see 20-30 deer a night now its like 5....sad
 
I have to say I'm glad I don't see the same things you are all seeing. The areas I hunt still have very large deer populations. From what I understand, via Tom Litchfield, is that pressure will continue to be put on my area to decrease numbers for sometime to come.

I still believe a couple farms I hunt need a few doe taken out and I will continue to do so. I just hope that the balance doesn't swing too far and I start having to same complaint as some in other parts of the state. I am well aware of the possibility of this happening and try to think conservatively on how many deer need harvested on these farms.

As long as I continue to see the large number of deer that I do and the neighboring farms are unable to grow crops other than alfalfa. I will continue to harvest 5-10 deer a year.
 
I think a big part of the problem is perphaps the areas that have a large deer population are large areas owned/hunted by just a few people and are just after that mature buck and maybe a couple does. That allows areas like that to sort of become a sanctuary. Then the DNR goes and does the aerial surveys and roadkill counts and such and these areas come up as high deer population area. Then just a few miles down the road there could hardly be any deer becasue there is a ton of pressure.
Theres a large christmas tree farm just down the road from my where I can count 50+ deer yarded up in the winter time. This summer I asked for permission to hunt there but was told that two people already hunt and I was denied. I talked to the poeple that hunt there and they are just strictly after a mature buck. Of course, the landowner still complained about how his Christmas trees get ate up.
 
Hunters have been doing what most landowners have been requesting. Shoot more does. Landowner down the road from me harvested 46 does off his land a few years ago. Not sure what tags they were using but that area went from seeing deer every time you drive by to hardly seeing any the entire fall/winter. We can put some blame on the DNR for the extra tags but for the most part there are a tremendous amount of landowners telling groups shoot more does or you will not get to hunt there.
 
To quote a farmer,"I keep the gun by the back door,shoot on sight". To quote a talk show Host," Deer are nothing more than brown RATS". Good luck to us changing opinions.
 
You can't blame the people setting quotas they don't make you buy them and fill them. I saw more deer hunting public land this year than the private land we over hunted the last few years. I've seen 5 deer while hunting this year and I just had 11 days off starting on the 18th of nov. It's very bad the rest of this year I will not be shooting does and next were I usually hunt.
 
Apples to oranges. The public areas I hunt hold an abundance of deer, despite a lot of it being over hunted. Ive only had one hunt this year in which I saw no deer. Travel 15 miles to my acreage and I have only seen 1 deer in the 7 years ive lived here (in the middle of 1st season shotgun).
I run a small trapline in the few sections around my house and even footprints are seldom seen.
We sell doe tags by quota county by county and offer urban tags to thin the herd, but how do we bring deer to the places where they are few?
 
The topic was this morning on WHO. Lady called in,,not sure where she was from,,but she kept up the mantra," We were driving just a short distance and saw so many dead deer,,the DNR is doing a poor job, we need to reduce the deer".
 
loneranger said:
The topic was this morning on WHO. Lady called in,,not sure where she was from,,but she kept up the mantra," We were driving just a short distance and saw so many dead deer,,the DNR is doing a poor job, we need to reduce the deer".
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That was a great call from that lady.:rolleyes: She went on to say it should be an open season with no restrictions at all. Unfortunately that type of attitude is what we are dealing with.
 
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