My forays into public land hunting are typically out of necessity only. Fortunately I still have permission in a few spots here in PA that I haven’t had to do much public land hunting, but when I didn’t live around here I did a lot of public land hunting because there was just so much nearby, and I’m very shy about knocking on doors.

Now my out of state adventure is all public land, because its there & available. It is nice to have a big chunk where I can walk till my hearts content and not run across a property line. Of course I’d love to get in somewhere private, but I don’t see my luck being that good to do so.

Where I live there is only about 3% public land, but a fair amount of it is close to my home. It's also very cheap or free, gets surprisingly little pressure, and has plenty of game for those willing to walk out of sight of their truck. Hmmm... $4 per day to hunt a national forest with thousands of turkeys and deer, no pressure, plenty of easy access? No brainer to me, and there's also plenty of state owned forestries nearby if I don't feel like driving far.

It only takes me 8 minutes from my house and this particular area is not hit hard.
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Here in Tx private land is either non-accessable or expensive. There are a few exceptions to this but not many. Most of my public land hunting has been for turkeys however I'm looking into deer hunting a few places. The WMAs in Tx are highly pressured so you have to look hard to find deer in relatively unpressured areas. There are several National Forest areas in Tx as well as US ARMY Corps of Engineer lands that may offer an opportunity. None of the areas I may like to try are very close. I'll be driving at least a couple of hours if I do give it a go. If my early season bowhunting on private land isn't successful I'll try public in the late season.

One of my very best spots is public land. I hunt public quite a bit for several reasons. It's accessible, and in MO, public lands have some INCREDIBLE deer hunting. I have over 12,000 acres w/in 45 minutes of my home, and that's not all 1 tract. Our conservation department "manages" for deer on these lands, and it's paying off. What do I mean by "manage"? Well, they plant food plots and through regulations control what deer come off of that land. And here's something interesting, and why I question our states QDM practices. They want more does killed in the state, BUT......During firearms season, most (but not all) public land is buck ONLY. NO does. And during archery season, we can shoot does but we can NOT use an antlerless only tag. We have to use one of our any sex tags. HUH? Thought we wanted to kill more does????

Yeah, I kind of understand why they don't allow does to be killed during firearms season. In about 1 or 2 seasons, there wouldn't be any deer left. But, there's not a tremendous amount of bow hunting pressure, why can't I use an antlerless only tag??

Sorry, got sidetracked.....The short answer is convenience, and the deer hunting is just really good on public land. Here's another thought I just wanna toss out there.

I propose that public lands (not ALL, obviously) are actually receiving LESS hunting pressure than they were 5 and 10 years ago. Why? you ask....Well, because of the "land lease" trend. SOOOO many people are now leasing land, and hunting with outfitters, that the public land isn't being utilized like it once was. I shot my buck on public land last year, and didn't see another hunter there all season. That place isn't very big, but one place I hunt is 7500 acres, and I only saw 2 other guys there.

Don:

Your expereinces take away from the "stigma" of hunting public land. Sounds like you have it great, "out there".

Good for you.

$150,000 in student loans between my wife and I. That's why I hunt public land.

Because WVhas a lot of it and you don't need permission to hunt it.

I hunt public land for reason number 1. I used to hunt private land till they sold it about 7 yrs ago.[&o]
That was one of the saddest days of my life. I cried... Literally cried like a little baby.

Sometimes I like to remind myself how good I have it on my private spots so I'll hit a local public spot and try to hunt with at least 2 other hunters within 150 yards of me banging on their rattle bags and blowing their grunt calls like they're playing taps on a bugle during the second week of October. [:@]

Honestly, convenience. I have a couple of public spots very close to home and I can get a quick hunt in there that I couldn't get elsewhere and still have a chance at getting a deer.