Empty cartridges

Are you always good about picking up your cartridges when hunting? I wonder how much brass is never picked up and accumulates in the woods every year. I make it a point to always pick up mine. Just wondering if others do the same or if there are some who don't care if it gets picked up or not.

I only pick up the ones that kill something and I have 9mm and 40cal shell casings laying all over my yard. I guess thats not the most environmentally friendly answer but it is an honest answer

It's negligible. If you're worried about the environment, you should be far more worried about the lead that gets left in the fields, in the form of lead shot. I bet that amount is massive. (I'm not worried about it)

I normally do now, if I can find them. But never thought about it years ago. When we dog hunted back in the late seventies and early 80's, I piled all the buckshot hulls up next to a pine on my most productive dog drive stand. It was a pile of them there when we stopped hunting that area. haha

I always keep the emtpy cartridge and throw them in a box with the date written on them. Turkey hunting, I make sure to grab the hull and will try to find the wad too, along with picking up every feather I can possibly find and kicking dirt or leaves over any blood on the ground......I'm like serve pro of the woods when I kill a bird........."like it never even happened". I leave NO EVIDENCE.

I don’t think it’s much of an issue, Mother Nature reclaims what’s hers. I pick all mine up anyway since I reload and all my brass is Lapua

I pick up any I see that can be reloaded. I even pick up the ones at the range that people leave.

Just curious on the amount. I saw the 19-20 deer kill report on the DCNR site. Almost 30,000 deer reported so far. Imagining in my head what 30,000 empty brass would look like in a pile. If 75,000 deer are killed by the end of the season and none of the brass was picked up that's a bunch. Over 50 years of it? (just picked a number I got no real data) That's almost 4M cartridges. How big a pile is that?

Go check out a good duck hole on public land. Deer hunters and the brass they leave are a drop in the bucket compared to what some duck hunters leave floating around.

I pick up every round from hunting, dove and duck hunting included. The only ones I don't pick up are the one's the .270 BAR slings into the next area code. If by chance I do find them, I wait 10 minutes before I pick it up, as they come out the temperature of lava.

I love it when I find shell casings on public land. Tells me where someone shot at one. Walking down a road last year I found 5 empty 300grain slug 12guage casings in one spot. Someone can't shoot. I pick up any I find and what comes out of my gun.

Always pick up my rifle casings so I can load em again and shoot another deer with it.

It’s amazing the amount of trash in the woods. I always like to leave it better than I found it.

Always police the brass

Always police the brass

I keep it when I find it.

I pick it all up and save them to sell to reload. I tumble them clean and sell them.

I pick them up and reload them again ..

Less than a few dump truck loads. That much shucks blows out of the back of Morris's rolloffs every couple hours

I always keep mine. The only ones I don’t are the ones that in a heated moment the bolt got jerked back hard and flung it somewhere I couldn’t find.

When I was about 12 we went on a dog hunt with pretty good size redneck club. Now I had never beeen there and I'm in the truck with head honcho. We stop and he says "Boy, my legs are hurtin you go on down to the killin tree..then proceeds to tell me take 135 paces and look for the biggest oak there and I'll know if I pick the right one....so off I go and there's the big oak (still wondering how I will know it's THE oak) and I walk up to it and it looks like you shot skeet with buckshot! in all stages of new and rust I counted 107 hulls! Been some death right there! I added 1 hull and 1 death to the total!

I reload mine. Remember Leave only your foot prints and don't even do that if you are a turkey hunter.

I pick mine up lapua and nosler brass is to high to not pick up

I pick up my brass and hulls on public and private land. Except 22lr I have no ideas where the 10/22 flings them.i might be over thinking it but like mentioned above about public land I try and leave no trace. I also stick random reflective tacks in trees close to the road on public land. You'd be surprised how many people just follow those reflective tacks with no idea where they lead

Naw, you gotta make the others think several have been killed and none are left. I used to carry empty hulls and spare feathers for public land hunts.

I always pick mine up.

100 years from now, some archaeologist will surmise that a helluva firefight once took place in my backyard. Most brass gets picked up but some hides from me....

My first concern is making a good shot on the animal im shooting at then I concern myself with brass or shells
Sometimes they get away from me and its not a going concern even though I reload everything I shoot

Ain't ^ this the truth especially the lava part

I pick up all I shoot primarily because I reload it. Backyard is covered in 22 casings, can't do anything with those.

Only time that I don’t catch my brass or hulls are duck hunting, shooting.22’s or pistols.

Large bore rounds never get ejected. I just open the bolt and grab.

Damn...you found my honey hole. I knew I should have picked those up!

We've always left the empty cartridges in shooting houses as a sort of resume of death for the particular stand. I was also in a club that ran dogs that would leave hulls on killing stands to mark that spot.

I always pick up hulls from bird shoots (duck or dove).

I've been known to eject a spent cartridge under a certain persons stand ,just to make him wonder. but normally pick it up to reload

I reckon ive never picked them up. Unless I just saw it laying there

I even pick up brass in calibers I don’t have. You just never know.

I try and pick them up when I see them.

For those of you concerned about the environment; y’all do realize where brass comes from right?