Originally Posted by
rockport
This stuff has been going on in Illinois for 30 years and has only gotten worse. Its really all good until the demand gets way ahead of the supply then things just get stupid.
I recently reluctantly took to public lands thinking the same as you. How will my kid ever be able to continue hunting?
I was very very wrong and now can't even wrap my head around how stupid I was.
I actually believed I was teaching my daughter how to hunt and woodsmanship the best I could by taking her out on private 200 acre farms and shooting deer when they came by. We still do and enjoying doing that of course and sure we scout and strategize but man have I missed out all these years on public land where I can take my daughter to explore a 3500 acre property with not a single man made food source....I mean looking back how stupid did I have to be to think I couldn't teach my daughter how to hunt there?
I learned this through selfish reasons, I got tired of people insinuating I couldn't do what I do and have the success I have without some kind of advantage so I took to private lands looking to kill a mature buck from the ground with a bow and before I even got that done I had realized what I'd been missing all these years and what I was about to have my daughter never experience. I realized what really gave me a passion for hunting and why I had been kind of losing that passion. It was the wide open adventure of it I had lost, when I was a kid I roamed big woods and huge vast tracks of land, got lost for hours and eventually stumbled my way back home with 3 or 4 squirrels or a story about why I didn't get the big buck I saw and dreams of getting him next time. That is just not happening on a 200 acre private farm.
As season approached this year I found myself daydreaming about that vast public land that just a few years ago I wanted nothing to do with.
Just to clarify I'm not knocking the use of private land at all but I almost guarantee I'm not alone and many who stress about private access of that killer 40 acre property would realize what they have been missing if they got out and explore public hunting lands.
At one point I was going in with like 5 guys who brought friends on a 160 acre property not realizing I was paying good money to hunt land we were pressuring more than the 2000 acre public land up the road.
I agree a 100% with you on public lands can actually make you a better hunter
I know for a cat many private land hunters, have very few actual hunting skills, as they have been more or less spoiled, in knowing where food is and deer come every day pretty much on patterns you can learn and use time after time!
I am also not bashing folks with private lands ( have mine)
but I sure know that growing up as I did without access to farms and private lands, made m,e a a much better hunter, once I started hunting farms and private lands, I found things almost too easy, there wasn't the challange in huntinga s there once was for me
at first it was nice , so much less work and all!
, but as time passed I missed the more challenges of hunting more unknown lands of larger acres without dedicated main food source's!
I found myself hunting all over the state and different states going some place new all the time, to challenge myself
and I also enjoyed the NOT knowing what was out there effect of hunting some place new !
I have hunted my share of places where I pretty much knew every bucks in the area of the farm, from running so many camera's and such,
which also took some of the enjoyment out of hunting places, as it was are a NEW buck would show up in season,
I really loved trail camera's when the first came out, it was amazing to see so many things you didn't get to see in day time, and or, just being able to ID< so many bucks, you never seen or ??
But after so many yrs I also found running camera's took away that surprise of the unknown that was there when I was more of a NEW hunter, walking into a huge forested track t of land and just never knowing what you might see!
SO I agree, hunting public lands can have its perks and teach and make you a better hunter
IF one is willing to make the effort to be successful at it!.
this is the hard part
a s having a gun shop for so long and hearing SO many hunters who lost there PRIME PRIVATE Land, going into public lands and crying how they are so terrible ,. when honestly, its more due to they lack the skills to be successful on public lands, cause they were spoiled for yrs on Private lands that had easy hunts!
also why I think many NEW hunters watch TV hunting show, get on public lands and dis like hunting
as them TV hunting shows tend to hunt on prime lands where hunting is FAR easier(and I was part of a hunting video series so I have actual experience here )
Public lands are there for a reason and they should exist for centuries to come, if folks continue to value them
bashing them on forums, isn't ever going to help save them !
Blaming public lands for how SOME Hunters on them act, is like blaming guns for crimes, its NOT the land , its the lack of respect in some humans or maybe lack of being raised properly!