BigEarl

Win.88, Yeah I knew certain areas were allowed crossbows, but the post I was refering too mentioned WMU 2G.

Livbucks, Yeah they can be used during the early muzzleloader season, but isn't the early season doe only ? The way I understood it: Early season you need muzzleloader and doe stamp to use a crossbow, late season muzzleloader stamp and you can use a cross bow and shoot a buck and doe if you have a tag. In sproulman's post he said something like a lot ofbucks were being killed in the early season. I just thought maybe I wasn't aware of something. Maybe I'm confused ???

livbucks

No, you are not confused at all.
Sproul contends that many guys hunt with crossbows and Muzzys during the early muzzy season, and when they see a big buck, they don't hesitate to shoot. Then they tag it as a bow kill or some sort of thing. He will clarify what he meant, or you can look back at his posts to see what I mean. Probably easier to just wait...and he will tell you I'm sure.
I believe he was talking about the use of crossguns in early muzzy season in WMU 2G.

Buck Hunter 1

More deer , more hunters higher kill, hm-mm that makes sense. Also tighter quarters t hunt in, c'mon this is not hard and quit the rote of the evil manufacturers and lobbyists as you bow groups have commercial supporters as well. First you got to find a deer then you can shoot it, maybe. According to you all you have no deer, then you have deer and are killing tons and don't want anyone but Compounds to kill anymore. Then you have soewone saying all the bucks are killed early.........Face facts Xbow does not affect as much as you want to beleive and look at other states that have successful Xbow programs. Get over ot LivBucks and BTBow dude you have some sense of what is happening in the world, Livibucks I hope you own your own ground or hunt Public because w/ your attitude and delivery you would never get on mine, or my neighbors or his neghbors. I'll bet you get pissed at the evil Philly hunters who shoot your deer or the Burghers? I just get the feeling you want what you want and no one elses opinions count. It can't be that your opinion is wrong and that people aren't as anti everything as you would have us beleive. In addtion to your conspiracies of manufacturers blah-blah! Just let people hunt and go find a deer, adapt, overcome and just go hunt. I work too hard to have to worry about anxious people such as you who want it all to yourselves/ "Oh, by the way I saw 2 guy's w/ go into a bar and they were compound bow huntersand they just looked like they are ready to tresspass, work for manufacturrers and have to be deer wounders, why I'll bet they shoot em' in the butt because they over estimate what thier compounds are capable of !" Oh that's right, thatis only Xbow hunters that act like that!

livbucks

I have also met up with enraged dopeheads in the woods, that want to fight you for a stand site, on private property theywere trespassing on, and I wasn't.
Yes, it seems I get all the winners.
I feel safer on public land half the time. Nobody around.

sproulman

BIGEARL,welcome.

crossbow have been legal in wmu2g for while.

you have to be DISABLED.

you can go to millers gun shop in mill hall,pa. and see lots of big bucks shot by old farts like me.

what you wont see is they used a CROSSBOW.

i gave warning before and i will again,DONT get a disabled permit unless you dont expect to get hurt at work or want to file a lawsuit at work or in car wreck etc.

insurance agents and company lawyers are checking this out after a injury and i know of 3 cases that were thrown out because employee had a DISABLED PERMIT to use a crossbow and DID NOT REPORT that they had a disabled health problem to their employeer.

sproulman

no, you are not alone on the IGNORANT ones.

i hunt sproul stateforest all my life.

last year i had 2 incidents.

1 guy put a threatening letter on my window of truck.

i also had incident in SGL252 hunting pheasants.

guy came up the hill and said he was here first and i knew that and i better leave with my dog.

100 years ago i would have shot a person like these and left them for buzzards

i had kids with me on sunday before deer season opened.

we went up to show kids where they would be hunting, on path was 2 adults .

they said HEY, WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU ARE GOING?
i said , UP TO SEE WHERE WE WILL HUNT ON MONDAY.

they said,OH NO, WE WERE HERE FIRST.

all these were out of area or out of state hunters.

this was great thing for kids to see and hear.

they were real scared to go there on monday, so i took them elsewhere.

what needs done is no hunter should be able to tell anyone they cant hunt on stateforestland.

their should be law on this to stop these low lifes.

45 years i hunt in this area, now i have IGNORANT so called hunters chasing us out of woods.

[:@]

Buck Hunter 1

Doper Xbow carrying hunters....getting better, and now Livbucks you and Sproulman are on the same page together with stories of Xbow h=gangs running rampant in the woods , tresspassing, drinling, smopking dope and shooting bolts at anything that moves. . You know i have hunted for 40 years and never, never ran into these crazed people in the woods. Tresspassers usually mouth off some and leave when they know their wrong. I have seen many amzing tales of woods slobs and Xbow crazies in this rant. I guess noine of us are any good! But your stories are getting somewhat more interesting. Now I'm afaraid to go in the woods! Good for you Livbucks & Sproulman as we don't belong.

BTBowhunter

BH1

How would YOU assess the folowing information that has develpoed over the course of this thread?

in 2004 the crossbow was legalized in area 2B which is in southwest Pennsylvania

Over the next four hunting seasons the archery harvest (which includes the harvest from both weapons) increased by 70% where the harvest in the rest of the state remained relatively stable. That certainly seems to support the concern that unlimited use of crossbows in archery season will lead to a spike in the harvest that could lead to shorter seasons. The only variable apparent in these facts is the crossbow!



You can call it a sense of entitlement if you want. I for one worked hard for our current season.I was part of the grassroots effort toextend our archery season into Novemebr and was right there in Harrisburg ( got seated right next to Ted Nugent actually) with the contingent from UBP at the PGC meeting when it was approved. Entitled? Yes I'm entitled to want to defend that!

This IS pennsylvania not Ohio or any other state. Ever since the season was extended to it's present length, there has been repeated attempts by a jealous few devout rifle fans to cut the bow season.

BH1, you come from a state where the harvest is apparently not currently at risk of getting too high. The Ohio DNR webiste indicates that antlerlesss tags are, more or less, freely available. That indicates that hunting pressure does not need to be further restricted in your state. Our antlerless tags sell out well before demand is met in many management areas. That means that ANY changes that could have an effect on harvest must be considered very carefully.

Bluebird2, deaddeer, ddear beenthere is being especially dingenuous. He has consistent in his criticism of all PA harvests claiming the harvest goals are to large statewide yet he professes support for an additional weapon that clearly, by the numbers he provided, skewed the archery harvest. His motivations and agenda appear more and more seem to be simply to cause controversy and to agitate those who have the audacity to dispute his consistant deluge of statistical distortions.


Here's a thought! Statewide, over the last several years, the numbers show that the archery harvest makes up 15-18% of the total harvest.
Archers currently make up about a third of all Pa hunters so the archery harvest is well within it's "fair share" All curent information indicates that crosbow support comes mostly from the industry trying to create a new market. The majority of support from everyday hunters comes from those not currently involved with archery.

Now lets look at this objectively.....

1 Archery hunting takes 15-20% less than it's fair share of the available harvest based on hunter numbers

2 Gun hunting currently takes more than it's fair share of the harvest

3 Gun hunters make up most of the non commercial support for liberalizing crossbow opportunities.

If the crossbow has enough support from hunters and not the industry , a point yet to be proven, it seems like the fair and easy solution is to carve out part of the gun season and give the crossbow proponents their own season.

bluebird2

What is disingenuous is claiming that the PGC may reduce the length of the archery season due to an increase in the total archery harvest when the PGC promoted harvesting more doe in Oct. verse in the concurrent season.

If you knew where to find the harvest data and knew how to interpret it, you would see that while the buck archery harvest in 2G increased by 70%,the antlerless harvest increased by over 100%. So introducing x-bows in 2G did exactly what the PGC wanted it to do ,which was to increase the harvest of antlerless deer in OCT. The significant increase in the harvest had no adverse effect on the breeding rate because the B/D ratio was not effected significantly. However, the potential exists for it to have an adverse effect on genetics over the long term ,since more big bucks are being harvested before the rut.

BTBowhunter

First of all we are talking about 2B not 2G. No one here is disputing the value of the increased doe harvest in Oct in 2B.

The concern about the effect of crossbows is in the rest of the state wher the PGC has expressed satisfaction with the current doe harvest structure in most areas.

Second, You have produced no evidence that more bug bucks are being harvested before the rut. Most of your posts have been complaints about less bucks of anyage being harvested. It's pure theory on your part and has nothing to do with thetopic of this thread which is crossbows.