I'm sure you guys know alot of hunters in various ages.Yes I do know a good number of hunters who are hanging it up.A high percentage of those people are middle aged and older.Most hunt in the NC and don't feel it's worth the trip anymore to hunt deer.Deer hunting in this state has always been the bread and butter so of coarse it's going to affect license sales.
There's a few pockets of deer here and there in the NC on state land but you better darned well do alot of scouting to find them.With the current gas prices it's tough for people to make the extra three-four hour drives to do that.In the populated areas land is being posted and lost to developement so it's hard to find a place to hunt around home where deer numbers are plentiful.
As for getting youngsters into hunting.Kinda tough to do without smallgame minus squirrels.Here again available hunting land also comes into play.
At the end of the day we will see a change of guard.Either dcnr will get their wish and take over the pgc funtions or the general public will fund a good portion of the pgc.A license increase won't help much because of the offset of lower hunter numbers.Change is coming.