Archery High Buck Hunt August 15th-August 30th

[crabcreekhunter]

IMO I am not really for that archery guys already have two weeks starting sept 1st-15th to hunt most of the high hunt areas as well as everything else. I feel that is more than adequate time, a lot of these deer get pressured hard from sept 1st until December, even until the first of the year in some gmu's with the raffle, governors, incentive tags plus the Indians doing a lot of damage.  Enough is enough sometimes, the fall and early winter is a very crucial time for a mule deers existance. Do your scouting in August, learn an area and it'll pay off in early September, everyone wants more. Just my two cents,

[MtnMuley]

IMO I am not really for that archery guys already have two weeks starting sept 1st-15th to hunt most of the high hunt areas as well as everything else. I feel that is more than adequate time, a lot of these deer get pressured hard from sept 1st until December, even until the first of the year in some gmu's with the raffle, governors, incentive tags plus the Indians doing a lot of damage.  Enough is enough sometimes, the fall and early winter is a very crucial time for a mule deers existance. Do your scouting in August, learn an area and it'll pay off in early September, everyone wants more. Just my two cents,

 
That's exactly how I feel word for word.

[Branden]

IMO I am not really for that archery guys already have two weeks starting sept 1st-15th to hunt most of the high hunt areas as well as everything else. I feel that is more than adequate time, a lot of these deer get pressured hard from sept 1st until December, even until the first of the year in some gmu's with the raffle, governors, incentive tags plus the Indians doing a lot of damage.  Enough is enough sometimes, the fall and early winter is a very crucial time for a mule deers existance. Do your scouting in August, learn an area and it'll pay off in early September, everyone wants more. Just my two cents,

I agree that the deer get pressured a lot. But that cause we have general seasons. It's ridiculous that there is two general rifle seasons and only one general archery season in these units. Also the Pasayten has no separate archery season from the high buck hunt.

Also as for scouting in August that works and it doesn't. My buddies and I hunted one buck for a few years. Only one of those years did we ever see him once the season opened. I believe every time he rubbed his velvet he disappeared in the thicker stuff after.

I hunted another buck. Watched him for 3 days before the season. Opening day he was gone and I never saw him again. Hunted that area for a week. I did see his smaller buddy though that was still in velvet.

I'm all for having a limited archery season and also limiting the rifle hunters. Seems fair to me?

Regards, Branden

[crabcreekhunter]

Branden you have some good points, you kind of hit on why other states are allowed to have an early archery season is because they have a more limited seasons and most people don't have the option to hunt every unit in the state every year, we are very lucky to be able to do so especially in this populated state.  I agree that the high hunt should be a limited number of tags for rifle hunters and same for an August season but that would need to cut the late season archery tags to offset that.  For the mule deer benefits I'd rather see more tags early than later.  As for the deer disappearing act that is true but they never go to far and stage in the same area year after year until they start migrating out.

[Branden]

I guess my point of view is I doubt 20-30 archery tags in each wilderness area during August is going to have any affect at all on the mule deer. Compared to the 500-700 rifle hunters in September in those same wilderness areas.

For all the guys saying its to much pressure on our deer herds I hope you are sending in comments to ask the commission to do away with the high hunt. Cause that puts 100 times more pressure on the herds up there then what Shane proposed.

Regards, Branden

[WashingtonBackcountry]

IMO I am not really for that archery guys already have two weeks starting sept 1st-15th to hunt most of the high hunt areas as well as everything else. I feel that is more than adequate time, a lot of these deer get pressured hard from sept 1st until December, even until the first of the year in some gmu's with the raffle, governors, incentive tags plus the Indians doing a lot of damage.  Enough is enough sometimes, the fall and early winter is a very crucial time for a mule deers existance. Do your scouting in August, learn an area and it'll pay off in early September, everyone wants more. Just my two cents,

Rifle hunters get to hunt the Pasayten during the high buck hunt and the general season (4 weeks) I believe. There is no archery season in the unit which is one of the best trophy units in the state in my opinion. Also if you look there are many more rifle hunters who are a lot more successful than bow hunters. I am talking about a limited number of tags somewhere around 20 in some of the units that are not open. Of those 20 how many people are going to be successful or put a lot of pressure on the deer?  If you look at the buck & quality hunts the WDFG offers for bow they are very little compared to rifle. We have about 2 decent units open in the late season and they get slammed with people because of this. I am all for hunting with all weapons as I enjoy hunting with a rifle as well.

[crabcreekhunter]

I had a conversation a while back with a very knowledgeable individual, probably one of the most on this site about season dates and said they proposed as a group to limit late hunts to decrease pressure (actually looking to manage our herds) and it was shot down because of monetary reasons the main driving force behind a lot of our seasons in our wildlife so called management.  I would like to see the high hunt turn to permit only for rifle and I'll give some earlier archery tags as you suggested, but in turn shut down the joke of a hunt the late swakane and Manson archery hunts are,  no wonder there is a lack of big mature bucks wintering in those units compared to the surrounding units.  Have to give some to win some.  The high hunt, if tags are allocated properly should be a quality hunt over a buck hunt in my opinion, with less pressure those hunts would be awesome once again.

[bobcat]

All mule deer hunting should be permit only in this state. There are just too many hunters and not enough deer and public places to hunt, IMO. Look at Oregon- they have LESS people, MORE public land, and MORE deer. Yet even they do not sell an unlimited number of over the counter tags like we do. They have to draw a permit in order to hunt the rifle season for mule deer.

[teanawayslayer]

I had a conversation a while back with a very knowledgeable individual, probably one of the most on this site about season dates and said they proposed as a group to limit late hunts to decrease pressure (actually looking to manage our herds) and it was shot down because of monetary reasons the main driving force behind a lot of our seasons in our wildlife so called management.  I would like to see the high hunt turn to permit only for rifle and I'll give some earlier archery tags as you suggested, but in turn shut down the joke of a hunt the late swakane and Manson archery hunts are,  no wonder there is a lack of big mature bucks wintering in those units compared to the surrounding units.  Have to give some to win some.  The high hunt, if tags are allocated properly should be a quality hunt over a buck hunt in my opinion, with less pressure those hunts would be awesome once again.

now why would you take a general season high hunt and make it permit only? There is less people that hunt this season than any other. You must be an archery hunter blowing off steam. 

[Branden]

Pretty sure Crab hunts the high hunt every year and does quite well. And I agree everything should be permit only.

These general seasons are not game management. They are money management.

Regards, Branden

[jackelope]

I had a conversation a while back with a very knowledgeable individual, probably one of the most on this site about season dates and said they proposed as a group to limit late hunts to decrease pressure (actually looking to manage our herds) and it was shot down because of monetary reasons the main driving force behind a lot of our seasons in our wildlife so called management.  I would like to see the high hunt turn to permit only for rifle and I'll give some earlier archery tags as you suggested, but in turn shut down the joke of a hunt the late swakane and Manson archery hunts are,  no wonder there is a lack of big mature bucks wintering in those units compared to the surrounding units.  Have to give some to win some.  The high hunt, if tags are allocated properly should be a quality hunt over a buck hunt in my opinion, with less pressure those hunts would be awesome once again.

now why would you take a general season high hunt and make it permit only? There is less people that hunt this season than any other. You must be an archery hunter blowing off steam. 

To improve the quality of the hunt and the quality of the deer. Nothing worse than running into other guys screwing up your hunt when you're 7 miles in. I'm a rifle hunter and I'd support it.

[teanawayslayer]

I had a conversation a while back with a very knowledgeable individual, probably one of the most on this site about season dates and said they proposed as a group to limit late hunts to decrease pressure (actually looking to manage our herds) and it was shot down because of monetary reasons the main driving force behind a lot of our seasons in our wildlife so called management.  I would like to see the high hunt turn to permit only for rifle and I'll give some earlier archery tags as you suggested, but in turn shut down the joke of a hunt the late swakane and Manson archery hunts are,  no wonder there is a lack of big mature bucks wintering in those units compared to the surrounding units.  Have to give some to win some.  The high hunt, if tags are allocated properly should be a quality hunt over a buck hunt in my opinion, with less pressure those hunts would be awesome once again.

now why would you take a general season high hunt and make it permit only? There is less people that hunt this season than any other. You must be an archery hunter blowing off steam. 

To improve the quality of the hunt and the quality of the deer. Nothing worse than running into other guys screwing up your hunt when you're 7 miles in. I'm a rifle hunter and I'd support it.

i generally buy the multi season for the high hunt alone. It's a lot less stuff to carry and less thing go wrong. I have carried a muzzy up there and have killed deer on the high hunt with it. Just prefer to hunt with the rifle on this hunt. I guess it's all about where you go on the high hunt. If you pick a place that's 7 miles in and can get there easily by trail that just doesn't cut it. This year with the fires closing the area I go to we scrambled to find a place to go. We looked at stuff 7-9 miles in but opted not to go there because it was way to easy. Ended up finding a spot and didn't run into a sole. Where we normally go I have seen one other hunter in 6 years. Get away from any trail and find the roughest country and you won't run into people.

[jackelope]

I had a conversation a while back with a very knowledgeable individual, probably one of the most on this site about season dates and said they proposed as a group to limit late hunts to decrease pressure (actually looking to manage our herds) and it was shot down because of monetary reasons the main driving force behind a lot of our seasons in our wildlife so called management.  I would like to see the high hunt turn to permit only for rifle and I'll give some earlier archery tags as you suggested, but in turn shut down the joke of a hunt the late swakane and Manson archery hunts are,  no wonder there is a lack of big mature bucks wintering in those units compared to the surrounding units.  Have to give some to win some.  The high hunt, if tags are allocated properly should be a quality hunt over a buck hunt in my opinion, with less pressure those hunts would be awesome once again.

now why would you take a general season high hunt and make it permit only? There is less people that hunt this season than any other. You must be an archery hunter blowing off steam. 

To improve the quality of the hunt and the quality of the deer. Nothing worse than running into other guys screwing up your hunt when you're 7 miles in. I'm a rifle hunter and I'd support it.

i generally buy the multi season for the high hunt alone. It's a lot less stuff to carry and less thing go wrong. I have carried a muzzy up there and have killed deer on the high hunt with it. Just prefer to hunt with the rifle on this hunt. I guess it's all about where you go on the high hunt. If you pick a place that's 7 miles in and can get there easily by trail that just doesn't cut it. This year with the fires closing the area I go to we scrambled to find a place to go. We looked at stuff 7-9 miles in but opted not to go there because it was way to easy. Ended up finding a spot and didn't run into a sole. Where we normally go I have seen one other hunter in 6 years. Get away from any trail and find the roughest country and you won't run into people.

Which exactly makes my point. If you can't get away from people 7 miles in, that's a problem.

[teanawayslayer]

So what your saying is lets hunt in the middle of August when it's 99+ degrees in the back country. Man you could get a great trophy in velvet and leave your meat behind because it's spoiled. Makes sense to me.

[jackelope]

So what your saying is lets hunt in the middle of August when it's 99+ degrees in the back country. Man you could get a great trophy in velvet and leave your meat behind because it's spoiled. Makes sense to me.

Negative. I don't think a hunt in the middle of August when it's 90 degrees is a good idea either.
Specifically what I'm saying is permit only mule deer hunting in this state is a good idea.