ORIGINAL: tky1187

I do apologize on the length of this post, but a co-worker and I who are both above avid hunters had a very intersting and really sad conversation the other day that I'm sure alot of you will be able to comprehend with.

We started discussing how we both just enjoy hunting and actually just harvesting deer. My friend is 34 and myself 24 so neither of us have hunted nearly as long as alot of people but we both hunt multiple states on public ground and private and just enjoy hunting and harvesting deer. Now I would not consider either of us to be trophy hunters. We are both as happy harvesting a 4point as we would be a 10, but I'm not making this post either for or against antler restricitions because it doesn'tmatter to me either way if we have them or not,but I do believe so called trophy hunting is one of the main things ruining hunting. It really makes me sick when I hear someone say why would you want to shoot a scrubby 6point when he may be a 10 next year? Who cares?!?! If someone wants to shoot the first legal buck and it makes them HAPPY then let it be. Myself and my friend we are Happy shooting the first legal bucks we see along with 75% of the hunting world. I'm not going to deny that shooting a monster won't make me happier than shooting a spike but I will not lose any sleep over it. 10 years ago you had very little of this bickering and fighting like you do today over shooting big bucks. People were more apt to share there hunting spots or allow you to hunt there land, but now with the big push for ''trophys''it's made people downright greedy.People are forgetting that hunting is supposed to be FUN and this is what I think is sad that people areforgetting that hunting is supposed to be FUN!

I enjoy shooting my bucks with the bow and have been very successful doing so, but I also enjoy hunting with ainline, flintlock, or a rifle so I'm not strictly a archery hunter, but enjoy hunting with any weapon. I have people say to me every year, why don't you wait for a big buck? My response is any buck with a bow is a trophy and I will stick to the till the day I die. These same people will say is theres NO deer so why are you filling all the doe tags you get!?!? I have2 responses tothis. First I say well if theres no deer then how is itthat I manage tofill all my tags? Now I will say that Idohunt most nights after work and everysay throughoutthe season soI do put alot of time in butI am by no means a full time hunter who doesn't work a 7 to 3:30 job.My next response is well how long ago has it been since you quit harvesting small bucks or no does? Most guys I have this conversation with are say 40. and there response is 5 years ago. Well I say ok so you were 35 when you quit harvesting does and little buck so that gives me 11more years to do so. This usually gets them thinking and changes there attitude a little bit.It all comes down to the fact that people forget where they came from and what used to make them happy! I'm sure the day will come when I start passing on small bucks and all the does but I assure you a young hunter laying the smack down and legally filling all his tags will do nothing but make me smile!!

The final statement my friend made was how he actually believes archery is one of the things destroying hunting. Now he is a avid archery hunter also and lives to archery hunt so this isn't coming from someone who hates archery hunters or anything like that. It took me awhile to agree with him but this made sense to me. The only way my friend used to hunt deer before archery hunting was in a gang with 25 guys. 10 years ago they could hunt on any of the gang members property and anyone could shoot any legal deer anywhere they hunted, because they were there to have FUN. Now as archery hunting and trophy hunting got more and more popular thisguy or that guyin the gang wouldn't want the 25 guys on his property possibly shooting the buck he watched all through archery season. This eventually led to the end of most of the gang hunting where so many hunters had so much fun for years and years. It sucks to admit but he's kinda right and if archery hunting wouldn't have grown so much in popularity where would we be? Don't get me wrong I will never quit archery hunting or lose my desire to send a arrow through a deer, because I think thats the best feeling in the world, but it is something to think about.

Sorry to be so long winded but these were just a few of the things we discussed that I thought many of you whether a full blown trophy hunter or someone like myself who doesn't consider himself a trophy hunter may want to think about.

ORIGINAL: Lanse couche couche

It is always interesting for me to read the threads from folks out in the northeast where deer hunting is more of a longterm established tradition. Even though Illinois (where I grew up and still own land) is now viewed as big buck paradise, it has only emerged as such over the last twenty years. In that time, I have already seen the sport start to become divided up into separate cliques. I've already lost track of how many lectures I have heard from bow hunters (out there with state of the art compounds) that theirs is the only true way to shoot deer. Of course, they line up at Gander Mountain just like everybody else to buy every kind of scent masker, attractant, and call that is available. At the same time, I see folks out there with firearms who throw a fit if a small game hunter comes thru the same general area, even if they have just as much right to be there as the deer hunter. You now literally get fistfights over who gets to put their stand where, even when neither person owns the land and they both have permission to be there. I have cousins who own large tracts of land who have threatened to post their land to all deer hunting because they are just sick and tired of having to deal with all the fighting and arguing amongs the people they let deer hunt the ground. They never had that type of problems with small game hunters or even deer hunters back in the day when it was less trophy and competition oriented. Right or wrong, deer hunters, in terms of particular styles or in general, are increasingly viewed as acting like a bunch of spoiled brats that can't get along. And that is sad.

ORIGINAL: BTBowhunter

Jimbo, talking about regularly harvesting big bucks with Blueboy is kinda like a surgeon discussing delicate brain surgery with the hospital janitor. He understands that it can be done but he'll never understand how.

ORIGINAL: Confused

I’m glad this post was started and would like to get some of it back on track before it degenerates further. Congrats to the young men that started it. They are the future of this sport in PA, and have pointed out the elephant in the corner that has created a schism in our ranks and will ultimately divide us.

I don’t think anyone, no matter their age, should be made to feel badly about taking a legal deer. Somewhere in this thread there is a post about a family talking about how they enjoyed each deer they bagged, including a button buck. That was a super post, and we should pay attention to it. Too often I read comments here about how shooting a small buck “isn’t a challenge” and that no one should be proud of a doe. Honestly, such chest-thumping statements may well reveal more about the person who makes them than their hunting prowess.

I grew up in PA and was fortunate enough to hunt all across the state, from big woods to cackling roosters in cornfields. I have been very, very fortunate to now have land to hunt in a more southerly state and have killed some tremendous bucks there.

Having said that, I think the hardest pill for me to swallow about AR in PA is that, well, we didn’t travel back home to hunt in PA to kill a big buck. We didn’t expect too, frankly, and we had a BLAST! That doesn’t mean that hunting back home in PA was worse than where I live now....it was just DIFFERENT, unique, something to be embraced for that fact. It was PA deer hunting, not Ohio and we loved it for that fact. Besides, in the laurel or popple thickets of my PA youth we had a hard enough time seeing if it “had horns” let alone counting points, and many a youngster was counseled “if you try to count the points, you miss, son. Count ‘em when he’s on the ground.”

Remember those days? Somewhere amid the Saturday TV shows and big daddy rabbits, replete with visions of sugar plums in our heads, we forgot them.

Does shooting a 1.5 year old buck make you less of a hunter that holds out for an older one? Nope. Each person’s circumstances AND perspective is different. If you appreciate and respect the day, the deer, the woods, the camaraderie, that’s[/b] the point. Too often now I read it’s only a legitimate experience if the animal is a “mature” or a under some circumstances a “cull” buck (He’s okay for a “cull” buck! I mean, wow, you really hear that!).

Somewhere, somehow, a hunter who probably had the purest of motives, shooting a deer because they enjoyed the venison it provided, has been vilified; supplanted by antlers measurements and talk of G2’s. Honestly, if find yourself identifying with the latter I respect your right for doing so. So long as you don’t denigrate the former.

To me, that’s what’s been lost in PA. A doe is now a number on a doe harvest report, something akin to shooting rabbits, and a buck, well, he only counts if he’s a trophy. They aren’t the one deer a year you thought about and cherished and relived through the stark, long off season. In changing the way we think about deer and deer hunting, we appear to have lost not only respect for the deer, but for ourselves as well.