Aldeer.com Forums Alabama Deer Talk Aldeer General Forum The future of hunting

If y'all are worried about the european model of hunting (only the wealthy) you better oppose liquidation of our public lands to private land owners.

As long as public lands stay public, it is the number one issue that will stand in opposition of a move to that european system.

As BhamFred would say....bulldoodoo. I'd like to see a quality peer reviewed publication with those results.

I know,,, that one's way easier said than done ,,,

I think there is more to than just making sure public lands stay publlic. As PCP mentioned, the libs are using the court system with it's liberal judges to change things. It would not surprise me to see hunting on public land challenged in court eventually. The libs will claim that you can murder bambi on your own land, but not the land I help support through my taxes.

Public land access also has to be maintained, it don't matter how many acres of public hunting there is if it's not available to the public.

PCP, I agree with your thoughts about the future of hunting, governmental/societal "progression" will be the force that probably causes it.

The one thing that I vehemently disagree with most people about though is "we're losing more and more hunters." Do what?????
(And I know the DCNR may show reduced license sales, but that just doesn't support what I see in real life) There are more people hunting and fishing today than I've ever seen, it has essentially ruined turkey hunting, greatly damaged fishing, and on the downhill slide for deer. Everywhere is overcrowded, everybody hunts. I just observe the total opposite of the common assumption that we're losing outdoorsmen. I fished on Logan Martin this past weekend---December 2nd---and it was no different than any Saturday in April thru August, absolutely jampacked, just annoyingly crowded. And none of that was pleasure boats, it was ALL fishermen.

I'm 43 years old, have hunted and fished all over the state since childhood. Leased my own land all over SE Bama since the mid 90's, and two things are true for everywhere: There are exponentially more people hunting/fishing, and exponentially less critters. I don't hunt anywhere anymore that has more deer, or a more quality experience, than it did 5-10-15-20 years ago. And the common denominator is the increase in hunters.

When I was a teen in the late 80's / early 90's, we turkey hunted Cheaha Mountain (T'dega Natl Forest). That is 100,000 acres stretching from Sylacauga to Piedmont, and it seemed like there was the same handful of vehicles the whole season. You could go ANYWHERE you wanted, not have to wake up at 2:00AM to beat others there, and have it all to yourself, and hear several birds gobble their brains out EVERY DAY. Now, there are multiple trucks parked at every roadbed and ridgetop, as far as you drive, and you barely hear birds anymore. And you won't jump a deer the whole season walking around.

I've paid $3,500 apiece to lease supreme land in the Chambers/Lee/Macon/Russell area back in the late 90's and early 2000's. You could see 20, 30, 40 deer per day on white oaks or food plots, shoot every arrow in your quiver. Some of those same tracts today aren't worth jack squat, not even good enough anymore for me to make the drive. But Hwy 431 is an endless train of trucks w/ ATVs. I hunt on a military base these days, and on Saturday mornings there will be 200 trucks lined up out the gate and down the road to get in, and there might only be 10,000 acres available that day. But most of that crowd cries about not seeing much/any, then whines about them limiting the doe harvest. I just roll my eyes and sigh.

We're not losing hunters, we're losing "licensed" hunters. I doubt if there's 10 acres of wooded land in Alabama that isn't being hunted, legally or illegal.

I'd have to agree with this. Land everywhere is being hunted, hard.

It really is. And I know I'm sometimes argumentative, but on this matter I'm not just trying to be, it's just the reality of what I see widescale. Last week (on a work day) I traveled to Montgomery one day (about a 2 hour ride south for me), and I swear there was a truck w/ 4wheeler trailer parked at every gate I passed, every pasture has a shooting house, every clearcut is posted "XX hunting club", there is just nowhere sacred anymore. I don't see how we have any deer at all, with the incredible hunting pressure, car collisions, and natural predation. A lot of times I come across as taking up for Sykes and his ways, and it's not specifically because I think people should be trophy hunters, it's just because I perceive him as being VERY conservative minded about deer numbers. I'm on the same page with him.

Absolutely! I laugh every time I hear someone say that so and so property is not hunted. You can almost bet that someone is piddling on every square inch of property around. There is one tract of land real close to our lease - the old man that owns it patrols it with a shotgun to keep people off it. Last I heard all the professional piddlers have moved on to less protected places. We have no doubt where some of our deer go when the lead starts flying, his place!

As for actual number of licensed hunters, I did find a report from federal fish and game with state by state license sales. I could not find anything on the Alabama state website, but will try to look some more. It is a very interesting report and makes me glad I paid attention in my statistics classes. But that should probably be the topic of a different thread, I would be interested to see what your take on it is.

I'm not sure if there's any merit to this, or at least not for comparative purposes, but most insurance statistics will show that anywhere from 30% to 40% of all cars on the road are uninsured (and it's mandatory, right?). And you're far more likely to be caught without insurance than you are without a hunting license, wouldn't you think? I suspect that a substantial percentage of folks don't have a hunting license. Now I would imagine those aren't serious, or maybe not even frequent, hunters. But still.

I said in the harvest data thread a few days ago, "ain't no way there have only been like x-thousand bucks and X-thousand does killed in the state. I'll bet hardly 5% of the harvest is reported."

No doubt you are correct on that. And the hunter survey is also pretty useless now; the % willing to fill it out went down a lot on the last one that was published. I would think it's even lower on the past year. So now we really have no idea how many deer are killed, and won't until GC becomes ingrained in hunters so that the vast majority will participate. I think that will be a long time happening.

I think some people will continue to hunt as long as there is game in the woods. I just fear there will be a day when it won't be legal.