Or if you gave them $99 they'd bitch about it not being $100.

You could let them make their own rules and regulations and they'd still bitch about it.

The petition is from local residents that live inside the forest. I agree, i hunt it hard and its terrible. There are hardly no deer at bankhead wma or the national forest. Thats why. Cause it sucks. When you have multiple land owners that live inside the forest that plant nice green fields and watch them like a hawk and go all year and see 2 deer in the field...thats a problem. Its not just one land owner, its a lot. Bottom line, when you hand out, i dont know exactly but maybe 300 permits to hunt zone b and there are about 4 deer killed then that is a problem. And its always like that. The amount of acres, the number of hunters on a wma hunt only shooting a few deer needs fixing. Yall must not hunt that land much or you would agree. Bankhead needs some serious attention. Its a ghost town. Matt Brock i thought you would agree that Bankhead is terrible? Look at the permits handed out on zone b...look at the deer killed in relation to those permits. All that land should have more deer. The forest and wma needs more attention. If the wardens and biologists had to hunt it then things would be different i think.

Of those 300 permits issued, you’d be lucky to get 3000 hours of hunting in a season.

You must not hunt bankhead forest or its wma enough to know that its the worst place to see a deer.

No like: Black Panther Quota in Bankhead

And its so huge, i never see any law enforcement riding around except on wma hunts. Its probably getting poached like hell during the day and at night. They outta put up gates and lock it down during the summer. Kinda like what wheeler does in the winter. There are beer cans thick along the roads. I have found a few feeders in the wma's. If the government guys had to hunt there with their family and no where else then things would change real quick. The wardens are really nice, im not bashing them at all. I know they can only do so much, just like the biologists. But i wish somehow whomever is in charge would listen to the people that live there and hunt there. It needs desperate help on the deer herd. Im done ranting. I been waiting for a bankhead thread for too long. Its a shame that we have 193k acres with just a handful of deer in it. I can hunt tva land that gets hammered with tiny acreage and see deer. Bankhead is a waiste of my time. But i refuse to leave it.

Who is our Aldeer member who has famously killed a couple of absolute giants in Bankhead? I'm sure he love this thread as it really says " No deer in Bankhead. Stay away!".

I believe it was MTeague

No, it wasn't him. As I recall, it was a Polish sounding name, like Ofuski, but not him. He and the deer were featured in a couple of magazines. Some of the oldtimers with a better remembering machine than I will sound off.

I live within 10 mins of Choccolocco WMA and hunt there some (basically when it's the only option I have). I won't go so far as to say it horrible, but it's just extremely low odds. I suspect Bankhead is similar, and probably for the same reasons. Chocco is 57,000 acres of mostly large, mature, steep hardwoods. Frankly, that SUCKS for deer, almost never will have a high density in that type cover/terrain. There has been some good timber activity here in recent years, so I think it will help. Other than that, I don't think doe restrictions or antler restrictions will have barely any effect....it's like saying, "please don't shoot the handful of does and small bucks we DO have." They'd either have to import a trainload of deer to immediately boost the density, and/or make half the place clearcut to give them what they really want/need. I'd rather have 1 acre of cutover than 100 acres of hardwoods.

It is Mteague

I hunted both the national forest and the WMA a few times over the years, and I saw deer on more hunts than not, and saw a couple of nice bucks. I killed a doe with my bow on a food plot. I never did see a lot of deer, but there are deer there. There are also quite a few hunters on that area that see plenty of deer and bring out a few great bucks each year. It’s NEVER going to have high numbers of deer. There’s a certain percentage of the place that received little to zero management because of the wilderness designation, or minimal impact designation. Only congressional action can change that. The hunters I’ve talked to say the numbers seem to be getting better since the reduction in antlerless harvest, but it’s not going to happen overnight. Spotlight surveys indicate there’s more deer than y’all think. I can’t go to a food plot out there without seeing tracks and grazing. The population is low, but I don’t think anything will change that short of drastic habitat improvement.

We have a winner.

Springhill grocery

You N AL guys crack me up. Most of us guys down south would trade a testicle for a 100 acres of hardwoods instead of the 1,000's of acres of pine thickets and clearcuts.

Matt laid it out pretty good. Jake the snake you should just leave the it then if you hate it so bad. You can't base deer numbers against permit numbers. Most folk that hunt there will let alot of deer walk because of the terrain,it's steep,and ruff . Don't use your poor hunting skills as an excuse for not seeing deer learn to hunt the place if you want to see deer, I'm still learning it my self something new every time I'm there but usually see a a deer or two every time I'm out there. I only hunt the WMA not the national forest.

Seen two bucks after thanksgiving with in 45 mins of one another. And shot the second one. Last year I seen a few spikes and a 6 point and several does. I know folk that hunt there and have been for years and they drag some good deer out every year either from forest land or WMA over there. Point is just because you can't see deer over there doesn't mean there is no deer there. With almost 200k acres to cover the only way you'd see more number vs permits is if was so crowded you could stir them with a stick. And thats why most people hunt there for the space/per hunter. If you like bumping shoulders with hunters in the next tree and watching them walking around or in on you go some where else like Sam r was this last time I was down there

MBrock kills a 150 inch buck every year on the 50 yardline of Legion Field.

If there was one living there I'll bet he could do it.