STOP KILLING THE BABY MAKERS

[huntnnw]

Why not ban bait and trail cameras in the state.  It would make it more of a hunt.  It would reduce the harvest rate substantially in some areas.  It would also help to not suck the deer on to private properties as some folks have very elaborate baiting stations and many cellular trail cams.

this comment basically refers to a user group in mule deer country. Lotta other guys hunting huge amounts of public land baiting whitetails

[huntnnw]

right up there with issuing cow moose tags. I put in and if I draw it will go in the garbage. 15 years ago this was a option and we had great moose populations. Moose pop is nowhere where it use to be yet wdfw just keeps issuing tags all about that money for wdfw

[Lucky1]

Why not ban bait and trail cameras in the state.  It would make it more of a hunt.  It would reduce the harvest rate substantially in some areas.  It would also help to not suck the deer on to private properties as some folks have very elaborate baiting stations and many cellular trail cams.

Maybe we should ban rifle hunting. That should reduce the harvest. Muzzle loaders and archery only. That would make it more of a hunt. What do you think?

[pashok23]

Why not ban bait and trail cameras in the state.  It would make it more of a hunt.  It would reduce the harvest rate substantially in some areas.  It would also help to not suck the deer on to private properties as some folks have very elaborate baiting stations and many cellular trail cams.

Maybe we should ban rifle hunting. That should reduce the harvest. Muzzle loaders and archery only. That would make it more of a hunt. What do you think?

i think you should shhh 😊
You most likely archery or muzzleloader person.

[Romulus1297]

How many lbs of meat does a mule deer doe make?

[huntnfmly]

“I will wait for your response “…..
Dude, gtfu…. Like bone owes you an explanation. You said something stupid. Get over it and quit trying to say you didn’t say what you did.

So here we go saying someone’s opinion is stupid because they don’t agree with you
We as sportsman/woman are seriously are own worst enemy
Antis that are on this forum love seeing us be divided this will be the next issue they work on taking from us

[GWP]

“I will wait for your response “…..
Dude, gtfu…. Like bone owes you an explanation. You said something stupid. Get over it and quit trying to say you didn’t say what you did.

So here we go saying someone’s opinion is stupid because they don’t agree with you
We as sportsman/woman are seriously are own worst enemy
Antis that are on this forum live seeing us be divided this will be the next issue they work on taking from us

This.
You could apply this to just about anything. How about someone buys ALL of the (insert your favorite hunting item, ammo or vehicle, favorite beverage you are looking to buy or need) and then destroys them just because ‘they don’t like them’.
I can guess all of the howling that would be going on then!

Or, perhaps it is time for me to start putting in for those horned critter tags and destroying the tag because ‘hunting for trophies is not ethical’, or some other reason.
I have heard ‘from a reliable source’ it is acceptable to do that!

[Longfield1]

How many lbs of meat does a mule deer doe make?

Got a mule doe in September archery, and I got 42.5 lbs of meat.

[fishngamereaper]

I respect the heck out of Bone and I'm sure no one talks back to the godfather of Mule deer pics and gets away with it....but....
This thread was started because of someone's legal success pics or story.  Am I wrong?
As a hunting forum is it good to have conversations about deer herd health and management. Of course. Is it good to belittle someone's success or personal decisions when it comes to legal harvest....imo no.
Yet 9 pages worth proves yet again that hunt wa is deeply divided on what people think is personally right/ wrong versus legal. Seems to happen all the time.

Is wdfw doing a good job at game management. No. Can we as hunter's self manage the States game population back into shape...imo no. Not unless everyone just stops hunting for a few years.
And it baffles me that people think they are doing their part to manage herds by applying for tags to destroy them.... . That's straight out of the Antis play book. Chapter one. Taking away legal opportunity for someone because you don't agree with it.
Might as well go target practice on the first day of archery season. Or drive through the hills in Winthrop during modern with a siren on your truck.

As a forum I thought we try and encourage all forms of legally harvested animals. Making people feel ashamed of legal animals is a bad look.

Not that it matters to some but allot of our youth watch this forum. My kid actually turned me onto this thread yesterday. Left a sour taste in his mouth. He understands game management but I also raised him to respect people's decisions when it comes to legal harvest and opportunity. So he was a little taken back by the thread... especially when allot of antler less harvest comes from our youth ....anyway.
Just my mostly unpopular opinion.
And no I didn't kill myself 

[NOCK NOCK]

Some very good point/views from both sides of the aisle.

Most here are stuck in their beliefs (right or wrong) and won't be persuaded.

Appears that those who have had many successful seasons killing "trophy" type bucks/bulls lean hard 1 way
Those who just enjoy hunting/eating and are not the stereotypical "horn hunters"  hard the other way.

Bone and JR both have very valid points.


How is it resolved....................Definitely not like this thread is going. 

[NOCK NOCK]

I respect the heck out of Bone and I'm sure no one talks back to the godfather of Mule deer pics and gets away with it....but....
This thread was started because of someone's legal success pics or story.  Am I wrong?
As a hunting forum is it good to have conversations about deer herd health and management. Of course. Is it good to belittle someone's success or personal decisions when it comes to legal harvest....imo no.
Yet 9 pages worth proves yet again that hunt wa is deeply divided on what people think is personally right/ wrong versus legal. Seems to happen all the time.

Is wdfw doing a good job at game management. No. Can we as hunter's self manage the States game population back into shape...imo no. Not unless everyone just stops hunting for a few years.
And it baffles me that people think they are doing their part to manage herds by applying for tags to destroy them.... . That's straight out of the Antis play book. Chapter one. Taking away legal opportunity for someone because you don't agree with it.
Might as well go target practice on the first day of archery season. Or drive through the hills in Winthrop during modern with a siren on your truck.

As a forum I thought we try and encourage all forms of legally harvested animals. Making people feel ashamed of legal animals is a bad look.

Not that it matters to some but allot of our youth watch this forum. My kid actually turned me onto this thread yesterday. Left a sour taste in his mouth. He understands game management but I also raised him to respect people's decisions when it comes to legal harvest and opportunity. So he was a little taken back by the thread... especially when allot of antler less harvest comes from our youth ....anyway.
Just my mostly unpopular opinion.
And no I didn't kill myself 

BEST POST ON HERE>

[huntnfmly]

The sad thing is that we cannot get out of our own way and the antis are going to resolve it for us just like hound hunting and baiting bears and just recently hamstringing baiting for deer and elk.
The definition of what qualifies for a trophy is terribly skewed in the wrong direction due to the hunting industry social media and the ever popular mine is bigger than yours
IMO every animal taken legally is a trophy
Go look at the huge smiles you see from adults and kids behind their does spikes fork horns that is what it is all about

[300rum]

I'm a little bit older now so I have seen some of the changes....

You used to get razzed and/or made fun of if you were a doe shooter, no one in camp shot does back in the day, not even kids, even if you could.  Of course, you wouldn't be caught dead rolling into camp with a man-bra for your binoculars or ladies half chaps.  Things have changed!

I remember the hunting mags pushing doe shooting back in the day, it was entirely foreign to us in the West but they kept pushing their Eastern whitetail stuff on us, including climbing into a tree, clothes made to look like a tree (and then put your hunter orange over top of it, about as stupid as it gets) and "scent blocking" sprays.  I guarantee some of you still have your butt-out tool and likely carry it with you but you won't admit to it.     

Eventually, the everyone-gets-a trophy-crowd came along and they think that somehow our youth won't be happy unless they shoot something and doe shooting became a thing.  Personally, I think it was from the increase in constant kids sports, the kids would only have a day or two to hunt instead of the season, with the men in camp learning and apprenticing.  Now, guys can't leave the truck without a tacticool 1st aid kit and a satellite messenger beacon, they have no traditional skills.

As far as predators go, every house in the country you walked in to had a .22 or a .410 in the corner for anything, and I mean anything that threatened the chickens.  You can use your imagination here, 4-legged and winged, it didn't matter.  The same thing happened in the hunting woods too, that's why we didn't have a predator problem 30 years ago, in fact if someone even saw a cougar it was pretty rare.     

I know it won't change back again.  Just know that your Grandpa and Great Uncle's would mock you relentlessly if they could see you hunt now days.  Between jokes about your outfit and your scope with the big knobs on it, they would get a bigger buck (with iron sights) then you, drag it out by themselves, and throw it on the top of a rig and drive it right through the middle of town waving to the folks on the side of the road as they went by.  All of this in wool or denim pants with nothing other then a sandwich in their pocket and an extra shell or two.     

[elkboy]

Good post, fishngamereaper.

I want to clarify something about my post. When I drew the 2nd deer tag last year,  I had every intention of filling it. But then I saw firsthand the impacts of the EHD outbreak. That was when I returned the tag. I wasn't trying to take opportunity from other hunters; I made a decision based on changing herd conditions that I could easily observe. 

I guess what I don't understand is the absolute position some hold on doe or cow harvest. What if one is hunting in south Alabama, with 25-30 deer per square mile? Or the elk country of northwest Colorado? Is harvest of females not acceptable there?  Someone brought up the San Juan Islands. I've hunted there, and seen the overbrowsed understories.

What is not controversial to I hope any of us, is restrictions or complete halting of doe harvest in a struggling herd.

[jrebel]

“I will wait for your response “…..
Dude, gtfu…. Like bone owes you an explanation. You said something stupid. Get over it and quit trying to say you didn’t say what you did.

Hey, if you don't like the fact that I'm waiting for a response to a respected poster that made the accusation that I called "HIM" a terrorist.....then pack sand.  Bone's comment about me calling him a terrorist is absurd.....I merely made a correlation of what terrorist groups are doing and what multiple members have stated they are doing.....buying tags for the sole reason of destroying them so other hunters cannot partake in a legal form of hunting. 

To be so egotistical to think I am talking about him specifically is laughable......well unless he has a guilty conscious.  One that sits so high on the pedestal to think his way of hunting is the only way to hunt and then partaking in actions that lesson the chance for others to partake in legal hunting is wrong.  Again....prove me wrong.