sproulman

early archery season was involved with UBP.

they did a lot to get it started.

then in came IN-LINES AND TOOK 1 OF THEIR WEEKS IN OCT[:@]
then scouting week before.

TOO MUCH STINK.......[:@]

now adding crossbows that they feel is not a BOW,they feel with 4 x scope and a locked arrow, its GUN.

so, their season is being ruined with all these new killing machines in season that they fought to get.

WVCritter

tmontgo1, One reason for this is that there are so many more people that gun hunt than bow hunt. Another reason is the long bow season we have. bucks only gun season runs for 2 weeks. As for check in numbers, bow kills really pick up the first couple weeks of November when the rut hits.

First of all, I'm not a member of the NRA and I really don't think they have any buisness in this fight. That being said, If I was a land owner in one of the bowhunting only counties, I'd get all the help I could find if I wanted to gun hunt on my property. I hunt with a gun as well as a bow and it would suck for me to have to leave my property in my county to hunt in bucks only gun season. I think poaching in those counties might become a bigger problem if they allow rifles in. There's something about big antlers that bring out the criminal gene in some people....[8D] I was at the hunt show last weekend and was looking at the "Wall of Shame" at the DNR booth and most of the illegal kills were from those counties.

cooter144

Of course if they do make these counties open to gun hunting it probably wouldn't take long for the "brown its downers" to to wipe out enough of the buck herdto eventually make hunting there no better than the rest of the state.

Am I wrong?

DannyD

No you are not wrong.
But it should be about setting the proper kill limits to control the herd sizenot aboutbanning guns.
What's wrong with being a "brown it's down" guy? If you want to impose your idea of a trophy on someone else go buy up some land and manage it.

cooter144

Wherein my post didI try to impose my idea of a trophy on anyone? All I said is people want to rifle hunt there because there arebig bucks present...BUT...the reason there arebig bucks there is because there is no rifle hunting aloud. I didn't say there is anything wrong with "brown it's down".

BTW...I dohunt privateland and manage it but thanks for your advice.

madvilledoc

No you are not. Fortunately after speaking with the head of the DNR, they have no plans on opening a gun season anytime in the near future in those four counties. He said the population in those counties are actually down over the last couple of years due to EHD, which hit the area very hard over the last couple of years, especially in 2007.

The legislature, I suppose, could override the DNR, which is why the NRA lobbying them is such a concern.

I plan to go to the DNR Commission meeting next weekend. If I find out more, I'll post it here.

Another item of interest is that the head of the NRA in West Virginia posted on another forum that yes they did send out the questionaires, but the overwhelming response of their members in those counties was that a gun season was NOT wanted. He further said that they have no further plans on pursuring it at this time. This is certainly good news if it is true, but I am still cautious as I haven't seen anything "official" yet.

BowHuntingFool

When you go to the meetings next week ask the Commission if the herd numbers are down why they added Doe tags last year? Something doesn't add up in my book! Good luck!

WV Hunter

It adds up perfectly....if you look atthe track record of the WV DNR. Most everything they do is Bass Ackwards it seems. Certainly one of the worst run I've ever seen. Hopefully they won't open it, but it wouldn't suprise me if they did at some point, they usually make that kind of choice.

I am a lifetime member of the NRA, and my position is they should be worrying about Obama and his super libs right now with all they got...not something like this. Also, for all the folks that are NOT members of the NRA - honestly, you should be. Like what they stand for completely or not....they are the most powerfulgroup fighting for us and our right to keep and bear arms. You might say "I don't gun hunt, I don't care". Its all intertwined....one the anti's begin to gain ground ANYWHERE, they will do what they can to build on that and weasel their way into anything they can.I completely agree that NRA is a PRO-GUN group and that is their primary agenta, howeverin reality PRO-GUN isPRO-HUNTING, since probably 80% of all hunting is done by a gun.

madvilledoc

The EHD outbreak occurred in late August/early Sept. of 2007. By that time the season limits had already been set. I also may be wrong when they added a doe to the mix. It might have been 2 year ago (2006) instead of last year. I don't remember for sure. The EHD was also hit and miss. It devastated some areas while others weren't even affected. Fortunately I was in an area that didn't have any problems.

They did keep the doe in the mix for this year, however. So the population must not have declined too severly. We did have a mild outbreak of EHD this year as well, but nothing like 2007.

RidgeFACTOR

I believe the 4 counties in southern West Virginia you are talking about are Mingo, Wyoming, Logan and McDowell.
I hunt in West Virginia and believe me, the only people ruining West Virginia's hunting the DNR of that state. They (DNR) are more concerned aboutselling extra tags than managing the states deer herd. Their is no antler restriction like neighboring state Pennsylvania and they slaughter way too many does. I have said it for 10-15 years now and it's now finally happening, lower dder kills and less and less deer sightings. I think you can kill up to 10-12 deer a year (with permits) in West Virginia, that entirely too many deer allowed to be able to manage the deer herd and expect to hunt them in years to come down the road.
Since the ban on gun hunting in the mention 4 southern counties of West Virginia, there has been a great increase in high scoring bucks. If West Virginia continues to slaughter their deer like they have been doing, the other 51 counties will experience a deer population like it was in the 40's and 50's.