RE: Western MA Hunting?
October Mountain & Beartown are great! Big woods... Not alot of deer... but BIG deer!
It is getting harder and harder to find quality land to hunt. Many antis here and much of the good hunting land is not owned by locals, but rather city folks who post it up tight and don't allow any hunting... unless you can get in w/ their caretakers.
Blandford / Russell has some public watershed land I believe too.
Unfortunately, it all comes down to who you know in alot of instances.
We gun hunt October Mountain & Beartown and have some good success. We never seem to connect on the freaks though... but every year there are a couple of slammers taken off the 2 areas.