Some buddies and I put in for the St Vincent Sambar hunt draw every year and just like years past we did not draw this time. However, I did find out that they have whitetail/hog hunts as well which are first come first serve. They opened today so the four of us bought our permits for the January hunt right off the bat. Anyone ever been on the island before? We're looking forward to a weekend of roughing it on an island and chasing tiny Florida deer.

I’ve fished all around it and read up on it a lot. If I am ever drawn we will rent a house on the mainland and just boat back and forth. Heard the biting flies(Yellow?) are real bad. Some people bike to get around on the island. I’d go with a light mobile lock on setup

Go on the website and buy you a whitetail permit for Jan and come on with us. There are still quite a few left.

I've always wanted to go down there for the hogs and deer. Sounds like a blast, other than the flies and snakes and gators and ...

If you're going in January the flies and snakes should not be a problem.I've explored the island a little and it is beautiful. You should have a good time.

Went on one of the deer/hog hunts with my brother several years back. All true sand walking conditions. Some guys tried a bike but ditched em after a few hundred yards. Better off to use a deer cart to pack stand/gun/pack on and drag it in with ya, that way you can get an animal out too. Wardens run the perimeter roads at certain times with atv to bring animals out. We went in January and it warmed up a bit and the no seeums were still pretty bad; be prepared.

The flies and no seeums are horrible! Bring lots of bug spray. Sand is deep on trails. Good idea to bring a bike or pull cart. Lots of snakes, saw several hogs. Deer are really small. Camping on the island is PRIMITIVE. You only have what you bring with you. If you beach your boat be careful. Tide moves a lot and you can ground your boat. Lots of scrub oaks and palmettos.

Very cool! are there people/ companies that can be paid to shuttle you and your stuff back and forth, or do you have to have your own boat to access the island?

Not sure how much different St Vincent Island is than the cape but I have a place on the cape and I have seen pictures of bucks that many of us would shoot. Bodies don't seem that small. One of these days I will venture over to the island. Apparently, the campground at the end of Indian Pass is for sale and there are citizens pushing for it to be purchased and added to St Vincent. The campgrounds would be eliminated though.

I went several years ago we hunted for 2 days and all killed bucks with the help of the game warden. It was a fun but like others have said no seeums and flies are really bad at times

It can go from freezing cold to burning hot in the same day. It can be blowing so hard it's difficult to stand (very few bugs) and calm in the same hour. If one doesn't realize why blowing hard and freezing cold in a marine environment are important, one might want to do some more research. If it's over 60, bugs of every sort will be abundant. Eastern diamondbacks are abundant at the same temp as the bugs. Not as many alligators as one would think but they are there.

The employees all ride over on the ferry. Hunters are not allowed and have to find their own way via boat and beach (LOLOLOL at the term "beach"). The waters around all sides are very shallow very far out and landing on the beach is difficult even at high tide (the ferry uses a blasted out channel). It takes a boat with about 8" of draft to land. Once landed (if possible), one needs to get their gear up on the beach asap and their boat back out and at anchor. They generally lose a boat or two a week due to sinking during hunting season. The waves will pound any boat to death if left beached and will move a lot of them around because anchoring is difficult. The bottom is hard and not many holes in it for anchors to set even if the water person knows how. It's limestone with swiss cheese holes - need to set three anchors in as many directions to do it right after finding the needed holes. Two of them can be as close together as 15 degrees or as far apart as 50 degrees. Two will hold if set correctly and slack is correctly set to allow for tide but doing so is questionable at best. Remember tide swings when the anchors are set. If the anchor ropes are too tight, she will swamp from not being able to swing with the waves or be pulled under when the tide tops out.

More likely, one will have to wade their gear ashore through the waves for 50 yards or more. Plan for this. Once ashore, gear can be unlimbered from watertight containers and left all week or however long one intends to stay.

Here's a pic of the beach. I have a lot more to type out that will be of help - please give me time as I have to go cut grass and cook.

You da man Geno, thanks!

Damn. I don't hate a deer or hog that badly.

Once ashore, the going is basically the same as a loose sand beach. Fat tire bikes may work - may not due to limbs/trees. I have not been to the island since hurricane Michael so the trails may be blocked by blow downs - I do not know and can't help in that regard - sorry. The island took a direct hit from that hurricane. Be prepared to walk every day and every where through thickets of hardened wood. If you can bike it's a real plus. If one was a cheater, one would take a bunch of frozen raccoons. They have problems with them and invite folks to shoot them. If one shoots a thing during the day, one can ride back with the game wardens (hint, hint - a raccoon placed in one's pack will thaw during the day there if left in the sun). They will let you load up a bike and your gear and ride back in a truck or a wagon pulled by a truck if you shoot a raccoon/hog/deer for them.

Thomas Forbes (yep - the forbes) owned it originally but never did anything notable with it. The island was a weekend getaway for a very rich family from Buffalo, NY. From the National Wildlife Refuge history page:

"Dr. Raymond V. Pierce purchased the island from Alexander in 1907 for $12,500. Pierce from Buffalo, New York, was a successful doctor and medicine man. From 1908 to 1909, R.V. Pierce spent close to $50,000 developing the island. He built 30 miles of roads/pathways, cottages, barns, dams, and sluice gates for duck ponds and waterways. He imported sambar deer (e.g., large dark brown, 400- to 600-pound deer native to southern Asia). St. Vincent Island was known as a productive cattle ranch with the herd reaching over 400 head. Dr. R.V. Pierce died in 1914. His son, Dr. V.M. Pierce, managed the Pierce Estate. The island was sold in 1925 to Vernon Price Williams, a Miami land-boom speculator. He then sold the property in 1927 to Big Four Investment Company; however, the Pierce Estate had not received payment for the land. After a long controversy over ownership and title, the island was sold in December 1932 at public auction at Franklin County Courthouse back to the Pierce Estate. During the 1940s, the first timber was logged off the island via a bridge. The bridge known as the Kenny Mill Bridge linked the island to the mainland (at the refuge's 14 Mile site).

In 1948, Alfred Lee and Henry Loomis purchased St. Vincent Island for $140,000. The well-known natives of Tuxedo Park, New York, continued with the game preserve, introducing zebras, elands, black bucks, and a variety of exotic birds, including peacocks. During the 1960s, St. Vincent Island was logged again. The timber was removed by barge."

The USNWS got the island in 1968 and tried to eradicate the non-native species. The sambar are so closely related to the swamps there that it was impossible to remove them all. There's a study somewhere that radio collared a bunch of the sambar and recorded their movements during several hunting seasons. I have not been able to find it yet - the stupid google search engine is useless for guns and hunting now - will have to switch to another engine.

I went on a Sambar hunt about 15 years ago. Pay one of the oyster guys out of appalachicola to take you across, much easier than bringing your own boat. Hunting is about like a jungle. There’s a whole lot more Whitetails and hogs than there are sambar deer, but I wouldn’t consider it high quantity of any of them, unless things have changed. Sure enough primitive when it comes to camping. Y’all should have a good time, it’s about the closest thing to an “adventure” that you can get in the south.

https://talltimbers.org/product/eco...incent-national-wildlife-refuge-florida/

This is the book written based on the research. If you know someone that has access to peer reviewed papers - the research was done by University of Wisconsin - Madison. They have maps that let you know the movement. The sambar stay in and close to the swamps so those fingers you see running north/south of water on the island when looked at from google earth are the key.

The island is also the epicenter of the red wolf restocking program. The only breeding pairs outside of zoos reside there. They are as secretive as you would expect wolves to be so probably won't see them.

5 to 15 feet of chain right off the anchor and it needs to be a danforth. Same weight in chain as the anchor and you're good. 50' of rope out per anchor to allow for all the nastiness. That means 150' of rope on each anchor set so you can run out past where it needs to be to set the next two. The water will only be about 4-8 feet deep.

Me either