Hunting Washington Forum

Big Game Hunting => Deer Hunting => Topic started by: Phipps14 on October 19, 2021, 12:27:01 AM

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Title: Harstine Island deer hunting
Post by: Phipps14 on October 19, 2021, 12:27:01 AM

A buddy of mine mentioned that he used to hunt deer on Harstine Island, however looking at onX it looks like a lot of private land. Are there any public lands open to hunting?

Title: Re: Harstine Island deer hunting
Post by: swanderek on October 19, 2021, 06:25:33 AM

I got permission to hunt there for
Muzzleloader 2 years ago. We drove all over the island and just found deer in the end with all the houses. We didn’t see anything on the timber lands.

Title: Re: Harstine Island deer hunting
Post by: fishnfur on October 19, 2021, 11:10:02 AM

It's virtually all Manke Timberlands.  They used to allow hunting on all of it.  Seems like they've been restricting access to more parcels over the past few years.  Contact Manke Timber, in Tacoma I believe and ask about recreational access. 

There are lots of deer on that island but they tend to stay hidden pretty well.  I think Manke allows tribal hunting on their lands.  The word I got was those hunters drove around in a van and pile their harvests up as they drive, taking advantage of what is essentially open season.  That presumably puts a lot of pressure on the herd to stay hidden.  Whether that has any truth to it.... IDK

Title: Re: Harstine Island deer hunting
Post by: ibuyre on October 24, 2021, 09:16:36 AM

I hunted it a couple of years. It was great for a while. But last year when I went to hunt it, there where sneak rds around what seemed like all the gates. Tons of the properties I used to hunt, now marked no hunting. Manky told me they where letting the neighboring property hunters post it no hunting if they where having problems. To me it looked like TONS of poaching pressure. Not a deer to be found, or even much sign. The island has a large tweeker population that likes to run around on quads. My thought on what is happening/happened (to some otherwise GREAT HUNTING, that is now gone and destroyed) is.

    People driving around in areas that are supposed to be closed to vehicles, poaching the deer day and night, out of season, pissing off the neighbors and getting places posted no hunting. BUT the poachers don't respect that, and it just continues and locals get more and more pissed.  I don't even bother to hunt it any more, waste of time. Areas I used to see 20+ deer a day, I now can't even find a fresh track. But there's fresh quad and 4by tracks everywhere (that are often left at night).