WI Bow Season Rant!
 

:mad1:Well im not sure what the hell is going on, but the DNR has something to do with it im sure. Ive been hunting solidly since opening day of bow season in Sept and have seen very few deer. Once in a while Ill see one or two but thats it. I have close to 300 acres of property to hunt all to myself this bow season since my brother and cousin arent able to bowhunt this year because they are working too damned much. Theres very little sign of any deer period. I was pretty much covered in them the last couple years all bow season long and was covered the first few weeks of bow season this year and all of a sudden they disapeared. Its like they left the property. Now granted, we do have cornfields on our property but the deer arent hitting the corn and they arent laying in it either, hell there are very few tracks in the mud. Im ready to quit hunting all together. Now the DNR says theres a deer behnd every tree so they are proposing an extra week of gun hunting next year. Complete BS! Since the DNR has opened all these new seasons and zones the deer herd in WI has dropped to the lowest its been. Mission accomplished! Ive also talked to close to 50 other hunters in other parts of the state that are saying the same thing. THERE ARE NO DEER! This just makes me sick. Hunting is supposed to be fun, but now its turned more into work than fun. The DNR have to get their heads out of eachothers @sses and get back to reality. Listen to the hunters that are out there every day busting butt to put food on the table. The bucks should be moving, the does should be coming into heat real soon, and I have yet to see any sign of any rut, other than hearing a couple bucks fight last night on neighboring property. I honestly dont think taking the corn off around our area will help. We have soybeans across the road from our property and havent seen a single deer in the beans for atleast 1 month or better. I know the low deer sightings isnt because of too much preasure because there is none on our property. Im the only one hunting. I have 6 stands and have hunted 5 of them all season and seen very very very few deer. Now someone tell me whats going on. All my stands are strategically placed in areas where the deer movement has always been the greatest, and NOTHING!! Im blaming this on the DNR! if this continues I will not be buying another license until things change. I will lock up our property so damned tight a damend helicopter wouldnt be able to land on it. Ok im done now.....thanks for letting me bitch and complain...:mad1:

For some reasons we hunters have been restricted and the reason was for the good of all, then as if by turning on a light switch the herd is claimed to be to large for the habitat and teetering on the brink of causing some kind of drastic extinction.

Doesn't help that we hunters express just how much we love what we do to people who are on the receiving end of what they want to sell it for.

I agree. This is the worst year for seeing deer I've had in the last 5. I've hunted 4 different properties in NE WI with the same result. 2 were big woods, 1 was a mix of woods and plots and the last was fields. My trail cams aren't taking as many pictures. I used to see 2-4 does together. This year it was mostly singles. If they keep lowering the herd there is no way you are going to get a 12 year old kid interested if they never see a deer after freezing their butt off in the woods for a couple of days. He or she will stay home and play Wii instead.

Either you Wisconsin guys can complain and get nowhere or you could get together and start do something about that. I have been reading it over and over in different post. I haven't seen much in Iowa but there is quite a bit of corn in.

Shame to hear that I have seen a few deer more deer then I have ever seen actualy here in Illinois,but the dnr also claims that we are over populated here I dont buy it I herd from a couple differnt people that it was because the insurance companies pay them big money to claim that the deer population is outta control when in reality its not the deer herd its the number of cars driving the roads that is out of control.

I'm right across the border of NE Wisconsin in Upper Michigan. I agree, this is the worst season I can remember. I have over twenty days on stand since Oct 1st and have hardly seen any deer. Years before I seen deer every sit. This is hunting several different spots across a 50 mile radius. Either the wolves have eaten too many deer sandwiches or last winter wiped out the deer herd. I'm frustrated beyond belief!

Im seeing close to 10 deer everytime i go out s until this happens to me im happy. ITs all about foodplots and bedding areas and only hunting when wind is correct

trust me... we have been doing a lot.

I think we need to wait until a lot of this grain corn comes off as well.

I hunt Boone County in Illinois and it is the same way here. But, I know what is killing them off....SHARP SHOOTERS!!! To the Illinois DNR:hit:

Has your area been overharvested thanks to EAB.What do you think happens when you shoot doe fawns and nubbies.

If you were seeing deer early and now there gone Id say you have wolves running around. Happens all the time around Mather. One week youll see deer, then all of a sudden there gone. It's the wolves! They need to be thinned down a bunch in the Meadow Valley area. I own and hunt land south of there where we have managed it on our own. Taking bucks no less than 4 on a side and trying to keep the buck to doe ratio 2:1. I see deer all the time. I understand the public property issues, but if people are complaining about land they own, then it's there own fault.

all us wisconsin hunters have tried but nothing seems to affect the dnr. i wish i could go to the dnr offices and have a talk with all the people there and give them a piece of my mind

Last Year, In NW Wisconsin, Near Oliver it was horrible. I own 365 acres and we have 5 hunters, in the 2008 season only a total of 7 does and 3 bucks were seen throughout the whole November gun season, each day was hunted hard.. sun-up to sun-down. I don't know whats going on but the deer herd in wisconsin has drastically changed. For the worse. If the DNR doesn't get their head out of their asses, there isnt going to be a damned hunter in the state that wants to buy a license.

I'm going to have call 'BS' on this one. Unless you own thousands of acres or a game farm, most landowners have very little control individually over the deer herd in their area. Contrary to what some people seem to believe, deer aren't restricted to your 40-acre parcel. That 1 1/2 year old buck that you let pass may get taken out by the hunter on the property 1/2 mile away.

It falls upon the game management agency, the WI-DNR in this case, to formulate a policy that meets the needs of most of their constituents. This means enacting policies that result in deer numbers and doe-to-buck ratios in line with their goals. In my experience, the MI-DNR totally f**ked this up in the Upper Peninsula. In reaction to low deer numbers, they virtually eliminated doe permits in most areas of the western UP, and the long term result is a ratio of 5:1 or even 10:1 (in my personal experience).

Unfortunately, WI seems to be going down a similar road. The ratio is much better here, but overall numbers seem to be much lower. To make matters worse, there seems to be very little restrictions on allowing large landowners to fence in huge areas to create game farms. That just takes valuable habitat out of production to the average citizen...I'd be incredibly irate if I bought 80 acres, only to have the adjacent 1,500 acres fenced off (as has happened here recently). :rant: It's pretty sad when I look forward to hunting the poor deer herd in the UP because I see more deer there than in WI...although there are far fewer big bucks up there, at least I regularly see a lot of deer!

It's all part of the same problem IMO: terrible management on the part of the WI-DNR. If I did my job the way they're doing theirs, I'd have been fired already. The problem we have as sportsmen, is that the gov't bureaucrats in the DNR are not responsible to the average citizen; they only listen to the politicians and special interests (e.g. agriculture lobby).

Whoever above said that its our "hunters" fault they can get the hek out of this thread, they dont know what there talking about... I live in Northern Wisconsin, as wis bow huntr knows, things arent looking good up here... I went to scout a chunk of property yesterday, seen over 30 wolves within a mile.... And they are different ones, now you tell me whats wrong in this picture!!! DNR is BULL**** i say screw the dnr.... As tony knows, im NOT going to be buying another Wisconsin license till this gets better... I will buy a illinois and Minnesota license though. So good luck all, i will be checking in on the website here... have a good and safe season...

:confused0024:to tell you the truth ive been seeing lots of deer this year.

Naturally...you're down near Madison (DNR HQ). ;)

In all seriousness, you don't have wolves, are surrounded by agriculture, and have a milder winter than northern WI. Totally different situation in the southern half of the state IMO.

I hunt both public and private in Chippewa county and have seen quite a few deer this yr. I have hunted the private more than public. The private land I hunt is mostly cropland surrounded by large tracts of woods. Most of these landowners are out for big bucks and don't shoot many does so that helps a ton. The land that I hunt the owner doesn't hunt. Another good thing about this area is the fact there is quite a bit of swamp so they can hide and stay alive when the gun fire starts. I haven't heard of an wolves around here yet, but we do have oodles of bear.

I hunt just north of Chippewa County and the wolves are moving south out of the Blue Hills. Should be in Chippewa County in the next couple of years and we won't have to worry about Zone 23 being Herd Control any more.

Unless we take matters into our own hands and stop the expansion :)

The problem with the wolves isn't that they are alive, its that we cannot do anything about them without going to prison, since they are worth so much more that we are.:nonono2:

My area used to be EAB, that was the biggest damb mistake the WI_DNR could have made. The 16 day season is not another of those in my estimation (Being from Minnesota, and used to it), it gives Rifle hunter another two days (effectively) to hunt, as most cannot hunt during the week days.
Besides that, when you include the (sometimes) Oct. T-Zone and the Dec. T-zone, we have a 16 day season already.

UP guy, I am fully aware of deer movement, as are 95% of my neighbors. About 6 years ago I started getting all of us land owners in 3/4 mile radius around me together and we came up with a management plan that works for everyone involved. It works and it works well for us. There is probably close to 3000 acres in this management plan between all of us. So don't say BS to something until you know the facts.

Some are blaming the warm weather and full moon, clear nights...