Great contact info Don, thanks for that. You can also find alot of these name and numbers on the IBS site. Let your voice be heard IL hunters!

exactly we didn't get to have the deer that we do by having a long gun season. My [brother in law] gives me h-ll about bow hunting, says that must of us just wound deer. now after I baged two 8's and a 10 in two years he went and bought him a bow for 30 bucks. now who is going to wound the deer. I liked it better when he played his little army/hunting games just during the short gun season.[:@]

I hunt the firearms season as well as bowhunt.I think the firearms season is just fine the way it is,and the bow season is long enough too.I pretty much hunt for the freezer,the trophy is a resultant bonus.I get so tired of all the emphasis put on racked deer in our state as well as others.Think back on the history of hunting and what it's really about.It's almost like the antlers give guys a testosterone boost or something.Leave it the way it is, it works.I think that charging non residents more for licence is a bunch of crap too,it will be reciprocated by the other states for Illinois residents.

Now, why would you mess w/ success? We have a good thing going w/ how our seasons (bow/firearm) work here in IL. You can't have the firearm seasons coincide with the peak of the rut. I really hope they don't change the dates on our seasons.

Donk, thanks for the info.

I would really have no problem with the season starting in September if it would end as it used too on December 31st. I was talking to a buddy of mine who is a taxidermist. He told me every year a few guys offer him capes from big bucks that were shot during handgun season. Seems a few nice bucks that have shed are killed during this time because they are mistaken for does.

Don;
Do you have any info on where these funds that are recieved by the state from license and permits sales are earmarked to be spent?
Are these sportsmen funds to be put back into the DNR and Conservation, DNR Land Acusition etc? Or are they to be spent on other areas not related to our natural resources?

Lady,

I do not know anything if they are going to earnmark funds for certain things. To be perfectly honest I dont trust our new governor one bit. The head of the DNR had a meeting a couple months back with some bowhunting group leaders. He told them flat out that now is the time to make money off our deer herd and he was going to try to raise the NR tags to 4 or 5 hundred dollars. Now he has come out and said he wants them at 375.

Bottom line is the state is hurting for money and they are going to use the deer herd as a way to help with their debt. They dont care what long lasting effects it may have on our sport................

A couple years ago when they raised the NR tags so high they where supposed to use those funds to increase hunting opportunitys around the state. Since Illinois is ranked 47 or 48th on public land access one would think that this would be a great thing to do. They rasied the rates and did not use the money the way people thought they would.

Also im sure you have been reading about all the layoffs they have done to the DNR staff??? Take a minute and read this article.
http://www.pjstar.com/stories/021205...73CV.052.shtml

We need to get the politics out of our DNR. Get a game commison where they can make sound decisions that will help all involved. Right now a state legislator can just propose anything they want and if it passes it gets in............


Don