I read about as much of this as I could stand. I got to here (below)

You can't be (whether you want to, or not.....nor can anyone else)....the sole arbiter of someone else's hunting experience. Who cares what you (or I...or anyone else) considers hunting? It's for the person experiencing the "hunt" to decide how to view it.

Someone mentioned "elitism". SPOT ON!

Todd....string up your recurve and let's go kill a few deer this fall. Wait....you don't what????

Nevermind.

(now...doesn't THAT sound silly?)

In the eloquent words of Mr. Rush Limbaugh......"Having an opinion, in and of itself, is nothing noble......if your opinion is dead wrong".

You mean this one?



Want me to help you dig that foot out of your mouth?

Why would I need to do that? And hey...nice bow. What kind is it? Specs? Are those beaver balls?

I think I killed 5 with mine, last year. I've got pictures.....but, posting them wouldn't make me feel any better about posting something stupid in the forum. And besides....I didn't (post anything stupid).

(nice deflection, though)

p.s. Got any pictures of one you killed with a knife? I saw Tred do it on TV. Told me he does it the hard way. Whatcha think he'd think of people hunting over food plots from a tree stand? You don't hunt from a stand......do you? Where does the elitist stupidity stop? Hand to hoof combat?

I got $50 on the deer.

I've finished one with a knife but never killed one outright with it. So Tred has me there and is free to voice any opinion about my style of hunting he so desires. Cause you see, when you are secure in what you are doing you don't need the affirmation of others. The loud screaming of some on here seems,to me, to be exposing their insecurity about what they do. Otherwise they shouldn't give a rip what I think since I have consistently stated that it shouldn't be made illegal.

You would be welcome to come hunt our land. Any stick bowman has my respect. My family has some fine hunting lands along the Alabama river and deer, turkey and hogs are quite plentiful. And as you might imagine you will not see a fence anywhere. LOL!

With no disrespect intended, Todd.....that road runs in both directions.

Post up a link to your hog kill thread. I like reading them. I haven't killed a hog with mine (yet). Was scheduled to go in May....but too busy.

Back to the topic...........

Bear Grizzly, 50lbs, Easton Legacy arrows, and back at that time a 150 grain Wensel Woodsman on the tip. Yes those are Beaver balls on the string. I now use a Zwickey No Mercy 2 blade head. Going for a little more penetration when big boar hogs are also in the mix.

I was serious about the link (to the story). I'd like to read it.

Nicely played Jeff, speak your mind and then kill 'em with kindness. I wish I had your ability to matter-of-factly stitch words. Sadly, my irish hot head and a heavy work load hinders my ability to calmly and rationally expressing my thoughts-not to mention absorbing material presented.

The bottomline, I doubt any of us are here for the purpose of ripping on people. On the contrary, we are here to draw valuable information, to learn, and teach wherever applicible. I lost sight of those objectives, and for that I am truly sorry.

Todd, please accept my apology. We erroneously made a lot of assumptions about each other. Would you please give me the opportunity to get to know you better? Like Jeff, I would love to have access to your successful pig hunting link. I truly feel you and I are more alike than we are different. Maybe through friendship we can bridge our differences-it helps knowing you are a bowhunter. I'd like to give it a try if you are willing.

Nicely said. We are all here to have productive discussions and some times we get a little hot under the collar. It takes a big man to apologize so a lot can be said for your character. We are all of the same flock just not all the same but we should stick together. We are all about 95% of the same mind and some times the 5% gets ugly that we are different on.

+1 Alltlk4 I had not planned on making any more posts on this thread for fear of just blowing up and not accomplishing a friggin thing! After reading the last post by huckleberry I have to say kudos to the gent and that just maybe we are all a lot closer on most things than I thought we were. After all, that is the way it should be in order to keep our great sport alive and well!

The world smiles upon those that smile upon the world! :arms: Kudos to you all!

A deer to fill the freezer? That is not what those hunts are about, because unless the hunt was won instead of paid for, you could fill your freezer, my freezer, and their freezer a few times with the cost of the hunt itself.

I tried to pull it up and I could swear I did post it here under either the bow hunting or traditional thread but it does not show up in my search. but though off topic I'd be glad to repost it here.

I was hunting a neat spot that I love. It's where a field corner meets the corner of an old abandoned gravel pit. The wall of the gravel pit is just 5 yards behind the tree I climb and is so steep and tall nothing can climb it. Anything coming from the thick woods below the gravel pit to this field has to come around it and this spot is the first place they can enter the field. You can face one way confident that nothing can approach from behind you. And the tree I climb is tucked up into a little cubby hole of other pine trees making it next to impossible for an animal to see you until he is in range. I had seen 4 or 5 does, even practiced drawing on a few as they passed me from right to left. I was waiting to see one of the good bucks I know to be in the area. But the only horns I saw were on a little 4 point that proceeded to chased every doe in the field all over the place. Finally it was getting so dark I had started to gather up my stuff to come down when I heard something walking in the woods to my right. This old big boar came out and stopped broadside at 15 yards. As he stood there looking at the deer out in the field, I drew, hit my anchor point, picked my spot, locked eyes on, and released. I saw my arrow hit him a little farther forward than I would have liked but it looked okay. It did not pass completely through and I heard him rattle that aluminum arrow on a tree as he ran back into the woods. I climbed down and picked up his blood trail which was okay but not heavy due to no exit hole. I trailed him to where he dislodged my arrow and kept after him till I reached about the 100 yard mark. I have bow hunted for many years and if I'm not 100% on the shot and the animal has gone more than 100 yards I typically back out unless the animal is just pouring blood. Also the prospect of finding a still live wounded boar hog in a thicket at night kinda sucks too. So I returned and picked up the trail the next morning. Sure enough he had gone another 100 yards where I found him dead. I caught part of his shoulder and in conjunction with his shield it had limited my penetration to about 8 inches. May have just stuck one lung or he could have gone so far just because he was just a tough old booger.

You have mine as well. I'm not nearly the ###hole I can appear to be online. LoL! I am just very passionate about bow hunting and fair chase. But the personal jabs and insults are over the line and I shouldn't go there. So lets just agree to disagree on the topic at hand. Best of luck to you in your endeavors.

Good stuff (story). How many animals have you taken with the trad gear?

Thanks for posting that.

man, theres to many fence places these days. I would take a 120" buck from the wild over a 300" farm raised buck any day. I mean, whats the point in shooting a deer for $20,000, when you can way more fun hunting with some close friends and tellin deer stories from way back. Plus the deer are unnatural. look at the buck in this picture, grosses 510, 510?!? If I ever saw a 190 in the wild, i would probably fall out of my stand!
Attachment 17571

I see some of those deer sometimes and wonder how they can keep their head up. Like a woman who gets a boob job about 2 sizes to big. Just does not look quite right.

To each his own, but my opinion on the subject is: If a deer is born or raised in a fenced in area ( no matter how many acres ) then it can not be considered wild, if that deer is shot then it can not be considered hunting.

Definitions(Merriam-Webster Dictionary):
Wild- A. living in a state of nature and not ordinarily tame or domesticated
B. growing or produced without human care or aid
C. not subject to restraint
D. not inhabited or cultivated
Hunting- pursuit of game
Game- wild animals hunted for sport or food

I came on this late and just had to read through the whole thing. Same old crap, "Lets all stick together". Like hell. If you want to really find out what hunters are, show a couple of tapes to people that don't hunt but have no objection to hunting. Those people will become very opinionated on what hunting really is about half way through the tapes. They are disgusted by them and I don't wonder why because I am too. Somebody said it earlier, it is not the hunters or the anti's that matter, it is the people sitting on the fence. (No pun intended)
Elitism? You bet. I started with a recurve that had a split riser that I screwed and glued. I am still using it. You are not a bowhunter unless you can use all 4 bows like a REAL BOWHUNTER. I love to rifle hunt, and still do. If you hunt land open to the public it is harder than bow hunting. I don't want to hear that nonsense that "I hunt with a bow to challenge myself". What a bunch of crap. I remember when the compound came along and guys that almost never got a deer during rifle season started to get deer every year. Then the bow season was extended into the rut. Everybody and his brother ran out and bought a bow. Then the crossbow. Then the early muzzle loader. Anything to make it easy. After all this venting, what it comes down to is: How many of those high fence "hunters" would still hunt if they did make it illegal and they had to resort to real hunting? As the "easy" deer are being shot out in my state due to the above mentioned regulation changes, more and more people are dropping out of hunting. The first ones to drop are the casual hunters that really don't care about hunting, it was just something to do that was easy. That is my definition of hunting.
Game Farms should be illegal. The only cases of CWD in Pennsylvania were in captive deer. Their is no doubt in my mind that CWD got to the east because of Game Farms. It mysteriously appeared in the 80's out west. My theory is it came in with exotics on some ranch. Probably carried by an animal that is immune to it but is a carrier.
Do what you want to do, hunting is on the way out anyway.

"I remember when the compound came along and guys that almost never got a deer during rifle season started to get deer every year"

I guess I don't understand this point. Are you saying that the compound bow gives you a better chance at kill than a rifle?

If you feel it is unethical to shoot a high fenced critter even though it is legal but you do it anyways then it is unethical. If you hunt high fence and it is legal and you are fine with it then there is nothing wrong with it. If it is legal it is only unethical if it is being done by someone who thinks it is unethical. I think land owners should be able to do what ever they want with their land but I would love to see fenced hunting regulated more in regards to minimum sizes. I have turned many outfitter/owners of high fenced ranches down for selling their hunts due to my own set minimum acreage limits. I have toured a few of the ranches but have never personally hunted high fence so I was and still am not 100% sure in my own mind what is a good minimum acreage for a high fenced hunt and I realize it can differ some depending on terrain and cover but 1,000 acres minimum was my own personal decision for selling high fenced hunts. And no one should get the misconception that all high fenced hunts are walk in the park type hunts. We have one high fenced ranch that is the minimum acreage which is home to a field judged world record blackbuck antelope and I had one hunter do a hunt for him for 4 long hard days and never got a glimpse of him due to the difficult terrain and the immense cover.

Pen hunting is NOT real hunting IMHO. I don't care if the fences are low the deer were raised like cattle and are not wild. This is MY outlook but....

Now here are some thoughts to go with my opinion above.

Hunting public hunting land (at least in Wisconsin) is near suicide. It is NOT safe no matter how much blaze orange you're wearing or how many flashing red strobe lights you have on. This is something to consider when taking kids etc. Hunting in an enclosed area would be much safer if you can not get into a lease or buy your own land.

The cost of these "pen hunts" is based on rack size usually. It's not for the low income hunter. Very expensive from what I've seen.

Your "trophy" will not be recognized in B&C or P&Y records. Maybe the Buckmasters club with all of Jackie Bushman's deer.

It might allow someone to hunt a Red Stag or some exotic cheaper then they could going to New Zealand or Argentina. If the hunt is as described by SJAdventures above I could see that.

I don't mean to bash this kind of hunting since for some it is all they can do. It's just not for me.

That is all.

Alltik4
 

Yes, it is easier to kill a buck with a compound bow than a rifle. There is only one argument against that. If the doe in the area go into heat the same time rifle season is in. I have seen it happen here and in West Virginia, but only for one day. In this state the deer are normally "stupid" only during bow season. " I want to challenge myself". What a bunch of crap that statement is. Pa. had a bow only season for years before the compound bow came along, but when the compound started to get accurate and faster, that is when a whole bunch of people wanted to "challenge" themselves. That is what High Fence hunting and compound bow hunting and early in-line muzzle loader hunting is all about. A large portion of todays "hunters" are just lazy and want to be known as hotshot hunters but just don't have what it takes so they try and buy skill. It ruins it for everybody else, but hey they got their deer.

Ok I understand what your are saying with the time of year to hunt them. I thought your point was, all things equal a it was harder to kill a deer with a rifle than a bow. I am not sure about all the factors where you hunt but for me in the past 10 years of hunting (with a compound bow and rifle) I have killed 2 with a bow and 8 with a rifle and passed on countless deer with a rifle. I find hunting with my bow very challenging. I have missed several deer and have never missed with my rifle. My sucess rate with a bow is very low. I am sure it would be even harder with traditional bow. At this time I don't see the need to make it any harder on myself. I use a compound bow because I like it. You can bash those people all you want. I know far more people that kill a deer with a rifle than a bow, that is how it is here.

Pen Raised Deer
 

Interesting post. I'm enjoying reading. :)

Thanks a lot..

I do O.K. with a rifle myself, but I hunt hard. I don't even go out the first 2-3 days of the gun season. Two years in a row I did not even see a doe the first two days of rifle season, even with 30-40 hunters moving around on the mountain. Compare that to the guys that passed up smaller bucks during bow season to kill a big one in their back yard. We can't all have our little private preserves. One year I was dragging one out (Over 2 miles, I know because we were able to drive down the tracks years ago) and two guys near the road stopped to talk. The deer I had was beat up, one side of the rack broken off, and these clowns start down grading it and telling me about two deer they shot in Illinois that year. It is quite a feat to kill a deer on that mountain the second week by sneaking around. A lot tougher than killing one with a bow at a pay to hunt place. About the only people I know that support fence hunting are fence hunters and operation owners. Even poachers have to put some thought and effort into what they do.

The end of hunting started when it became a business, just like any other sport. There has been a lot of high profile pro hunters busted in the last 10-15 years. It has become a money racket.

Gunplummer, it sounds like you got it a lot rougher there then we do here. I married into a family with lots of farm land. They did not hunt so I have the run of the place. I am very lucky. If I had to hunt public land I would not get my rifle out, to dangerous. As a kid we always had a place to hunt. In 1997 our spot was sold and we had no where to go until 2000. It has become more of a money maker for some than a hobby. So the sport attracted a lot of people that would never have been interested in hunting if it were not for the money. There are still good guys out there.

Hunting public land is tough. My hats off to the hunter that gets any decent buck on public land. And decent buck means nice 6 point or basket 8. You're talking about land where few deer make it past 1.5-2 years old and they are skittish as all get out.

I watch the hunting shows where guys are standing 50 yards away from a mature buck, talking, pointing, putting binos up and down. The deer looks for a second, then resumes feeding. On public land, that deer took off 10 minutes before you were within 100 yards.

Even private land with moderate hunting pressure is a world apart. Big bucks are nocturnal and small bucks and does are walking on egg shells all the time.

Not as bleak as it sounds, there are some whopper deer on those mountains. A couple miles to a soy field in one night is nothing to a deer or bear up there. If they make it through the nighttime crop damage the first year they are smart enough to make it a few more. As far as dangerous goes, there are more hunters down at the farms than up in the mountains any more. The last couple of years all the hunting accidents were down around populated areas. The second week of rifle I can walk all day with only a couple breaks and be lucky to see two other hunters. The first year Pa. started the early in-line muzzle loader season was a disaster. Everybody and his brother ran out to Cabelas to buy an in-line so he or she could "challenge themselves". Never mind that Pa. had a special muzzle loader (Flintlock only) season long before that 1 week September season. It was a slaughter the first year. Now the deer herd is down and there are only enough guys out to scare the deer out of their wits for the rest of bow season. Oh yeah, the old goats (I am almost one) are allowed to hunt 3 days with a hi powered rifle during bow season. How lame can you get? Cross bows are legal all through bow season. The game Commission is trying to pass a hunt on Sunday law. It is like they are trying to compete with High Fence operations.

It has no relevance to me
 

Pen Raised deer of course is not hunting. And when pen raised deer are mentioned, I know there has to be fencing to protect the profits of an expensive "hunt."
Since I've constructed fencing, I know its expensive cost for every hundred yards, and the price of such "hunting". Some could refer to it as hunting, til the cows come home, but I know differently.

But for some people, including some "hunters", people and money are soon parted. And I could never see anyone making a dent, in that circumstance.

If I was out of Venison, I would do a "hunt". certainly cheaper than going to the food store :rolleye0011:

Not much difference between that and killing deer on prime private land...

As far as im concerned if your not hunting pressured deer your really just shooting ducks in a barrel...

Trust me i know... I just joined a hunting club that has 3000 acres and the only time u see any other members is during gun season... From sept to middle of november the deer look up at you in the stand and just put there heads back down and feed... I killed 10 last fall... Like taking candy from a 2 year old... we were tripping over gut piles!!!

i wouldnt consider it hunting,why did he call u several times?sounds to me like he knows its not hunting and is trying to justify it not just to u but to himself also.