You guys ever watch " Montana Secrets" . I really like that show. All public land, it' s what I call a real hunting show.

Point is Jorgy I don' t think every show can do that and survive. Competition is too fierce.

I really enjoy seeing hunts where the only person wearing orange is the hunter. The guide walks around in camo or whatever but the guy with the gun is the only one in orange. I know most guides probably have some form of firearm that they only use in emergencies but they trust the client who may or may not be real experienced in the woods not to shoot them. I saw Dave Watson on Secrets of the Hunt remove his orange vest once to stalk a deer in direct violation of Kansas game laws. The next time he kept it on but wasn' t wearing an orange hat once again breaking KS game laws. All this documented and shown to a national audience. Had I known what I was going to see I would have made a tape for the Ks. Dept of Wildlife and Parks.
TJ

I enjoy watching the Saturday morning shows like " Bill Jordan Realtree Outdoors" , " Hunting the Country" , etc. but the problem is that as hunters, we all know that this isn' t the hunting that we all experience. The naive and inexperienced public sees something very different:

1. The hunter arrives at a high-end hunting lodge
2. Wakes up early in the morning to go to his stand
3. Sits on stand for 5 minutes
4. Sees 3 shooters within 3 minutes
5. Bags a monster buck
6. Shakes the camera man' s hand with excitement
7. " Trails" the buck and celebrates the kill

Most of the members reading this post have likely experienced a quick or lucky kill at some point, but this is not the norm. The non-hunting public sees these shows and jumps to the conclusion that killing a huge buck is simple, it' s expected, and they aren' t exposed to all of the time and patience that it takes to be successful in the woods.

In conclusion, I like to watch these shows on TV but I don' t believe that they depict hunters and the act of hunting in a positive way. There are just too many people watching these shows who don' t understand the way things really are...

Jim

i contacted ttha and asked them about this. they responded that is was not aproblem on a reserve. they also told me i should worry about something else and not bother them.the second response was that the inner workings of the company were none of my business and i did not have to watch the show if i did not like it.ttha puts on a large hunting show every year. it is in 3 cities and called,'
" HUNTERS EXTRAVAGANZA" .it has gotten smaller and smaller every year.it is filled with custom gun makers and high priced leases and hunts.e is very little there for the working stiff.at last years show i asked jerry johnston how fishing for peacock bass had anything to do with ttha.he never answered and walked away. this is the attitude they dfisplay

First of all the TTHA is a very poort excuse for a hunting show. They hunt mostly in game farms, I don' t have a problem about that, but they do try to lead the viewer into believing that these are wild deer, which is wrong. TTHA also promotes small calibers (.22 centerfires) and the so called Texas heart shot. We have argued about .22 centerfires on other posts, and we all know the Texas heart shot sucks.

I like " Montana Secrets" and Mike Eastman' s show but I think they took his off the Outdoor Channel. I don' t bowhunt anymore, but Team Fitzgerald is fun too watch.
When we talk about game farms and the size of deer taken at them what are you thoughts about Ted Nugent? I have seen him kill deer from spikes and does to barely 100 class bucks at these places. This is just a though if we condemn the game farms what about hunter preserves who bait deer with feeders, mineral and salt blocks? I don' t see any problem with food plots, truth is most areas need them.

I have hunted and will continue to hunt at game farms, for wild boar, exotic deer and sheep, but will not hunt elk, whitetails, buffalo or african game.

Some hunters would be surprised at how challenging some of the wild boar hunts are. I have also had bad experiances at some of these farms

while i agree with most of what you say i must disagree wit hunting game farms.that is not hunting. any thing that stops the natural migration or movement is not free range.

dep214,

You are right the game animals do not have " free migration" . But some of these farms encompass many hundreds of acres and some in Texas and other western states have several thousand acres. Like a said above I mostly only hunt russian and ausrtrian boar at these farms. I know of no area where there are truly wild russians and austrian boar. I don' t think we would whant these animals loose in our national and state forests and WMA they are really, really destructive, and our prolific breeders. Once they are grown they have no real predator problems.
I however disagree that this is hunting. Is it a pack in trip in the Rocky Mtns, no. When we hunt game farms I believe the amount of acreage, and terrain makes or breaks the hunt. Most of the boar get the picture, and no what is going on when we enter their area, some do not and we ignore them and look for a " wild" one.
I do however avoid the farms who bring in the game at your request to hunt. I look for places that let the animals breed and roam around on the most acres.

a free migration animal can go anywhere. farmed animals can not. even on the farms tghe animals stay in certain areas. the owners will take you to these areas.ui will just not shoot any caged animal reguardless of how big the pen is.it boils down to these animals being raised to be shot.they have no other purpose and will live their short lifes inside the pen.
i just want the animals to have as much of a chance as i do. i hunt russian boar thru out east texas and nonme are in a farm.

I don' t particularly like ther TTH show, except that I get to see some pretty nice bucks from time-to-time. It' s not a hunting show, with the bait and high fences and game farms, but at least we get to see some nice deer.

Since most shows are this way, we have to enjoy them for what they are!! For me they serve the purpose of ' getting me excited' about the upcoming fall deer season. I also get to see alot of big bucks and I think it helps me judge deer in the field better!

Having said that, I wish more ' real' shows existed, where everything is fair chase and free roaming animals. That' s at least more of the true hunting experience. These high-fenced, deer-baiting places cater to ' shooters' , not hunters! I would be more proud of a small buck I hunted and shot under fair chase than a trophy animal at a fenced farm or a feeding trough. Just my two cents!!