Several things are true as far as the current state of hunting in Alabama.
A. The DCNR is NOT going to make any adjustments to the doe harvest no matter what data is reported on game check. It's too big of a selling point for leasers and license purchases.
B. Land lease prices are going to continue to increase every year, and there is nothing hunters can do about it.
C. The amount of available land to lease is going to get smaller and smaller and smaller every year, and hunters can't do anything to change that.
D. Habitat change and hardwood removal will continue, probably at an accelerated pace as long as the economy is booming, and there is nothing hunters can do about it.
E. With the smaller amount of land, much smaller amount of deer, the hunting experience that we had in the 90's and early 2000's is gone, probably forever, and there isn't much we can do to get it back without a wholesale change.
I spent 4 hours in a stand for 3 season prior to this one. I sort of missed hunting and decided to start back this year. I killed one pretty good 4 year old, and let 3 other good deer walk. One of the 3 I would shoot if I had a do over, but at least I saw deer, and to me, that is what matters. I was so disgusted with what hunting had become that I didn't want to even be around it for 3 years. I don't care if somebody shoots a spike, a 4pt, or a 2 year old 8pt. I do not care, but watching doe after doe, after doe, fawn after fawn after button head killed just because it's ''legal'' was enough for me to not want to be around it. I hunted 8 mornings and 3 afternoons all season, and only had 1 day that I saw double digit deer, and that day I saw 11. That is not good, I don't care what any biologist says. The experience to me is seeing deer, and I know for a fact the quantity of deer in most of the places I've hunted in the last 15 years is low, and I mean low. Maybe it's coyotes, maybe it's hardwood removal, maybe is CWD, Ebola, or Salmonela, Herpes, or HIV, I honestly don't know, but what I do know is that when point A above became the gold standard for the DCNR biologist, hunting went to S_________T.
