Public, Private or both?

[Chris Shelton]

#7532

Hellow traditional bowhunters! I was just curious and a buddy and I were discussing this, so what is it, do you hunt public or private land, or both like I do. I like to have a balanced mixture of the two! Just mearly a matter of curiosity! Thanks
Chris

[SteveMcD]

#62985

I hunt both. But the public areas I hunt are usually “Bow Only” areas or wilderness areas.

[William Warren]

#62992

I have some private land that I can hunt and if I was to hunt public land I would go to the archery only areas.

Duncan

[David Petersen]

#63004

Steve, this “choice” is most often, I’d guess, a matter of what’s available where we live and hunt. Throughout much of the Midwest and East, it’s private land or nothing. Throughout much of the West, it’s public land or nothing, unless you can afford to pay to play on private land. I too am blessed with access to both, but I pay dearly for the public by sacrificing all promising career/income opportunities to live where I do, and I pay dearly for limited private access by acting as caretaker for several adjacent absentee owners year-round (running off a growing onslaught of trespassers( in return for hunting September alone. Here in the West, private land is often the best easy-access big game hunting, esp. for trophy animals, because it has fewer hunters and a growing body of research shows that massive early season public land hunter numbers — archery and black powder — combined with excessive use of ATVs, drives elk and other big game off public lands and onto private, where they are relatively safe because the average Dave or Steve can’t hunt there. And so here we are again (or “here he goes again”) when it comes to public lands hunting: there are too many of us out there, and too many of us have far too big “footprints” by running around on ATVs and in the case of elk blowing on bugles as if they were the Piper’s pipe. Time is coming soon — and already has in parts of many western states — where there can either be lots of hunters and all the motors we want, but very short and low-success seasons … or fewer of us with no motors (beyond “system” roads) and long seasons with high success, as in large parts of Idaho. CO does almost everything wrong regarding big game seasons. So far, the “bull market” CO big game “Wallstreet” hasn’t crashed. But if they/we continue offering unlimited tags and no meaningful restrictions on ATVs, it WILL happen and to those of us who live here and pay close year to year attention, it already is.

Sorry to wander off topic, Sr. but your question was rather open-ended! 😛 Cheers, dave

[Jesse Minish]

#63159

Both but mostly public land.

[Bigbearclaw]

#64042

Both,tonight I was hunting about 60 yards from my back porch.

[Lousyhunter]

#64117

Public land only.

[Rocks]

#7767

I’m lucky, I live surrounded by public land, and next to a wilderness park that allows hunting with no motorized traffic allowed (Willmore Wilderness Park). So I hunt public land alost exclusively, with rare occasions on private land when I’m away from home.

[Patrick]

#8250

Almost exclusively on private.

[Danny Klee]

#8615

I’m lucky enough to be able to hunt on private land. Actually I am the only one who hunts the land so I am very lucky indeed.

Dan

[MontanaFord]

#24754

Mostly public land (National Forest and State-owned or School Trust lands), as well as some public-accessible Plum Creek Timber Company lands. I do have some “somewhat exclusive” access to a few small parcels of private property, but the deer apparently weren’t there this year. Some people are blaming wolves, others are blaming too many does killed the last few years by hunters, and still others are blaming a couple of “hard” winters. Drop in elevation by about 500-700 feet, and the deer were everywhere. Did they move out due to predation? I don’t know. If that’s the case, eventually the predators will follow, and that means into peoples’ yards.

[Alexandre Bugnon]

#35619

Mostly public , but I’m lucky to live in a region rich in State parks and NY DEC hunting areas

[griz]

#41850

I only have public land.

[Killdeer]

#41884

I hunt public land, the National forest and one Wildlife Management Area. I have an offer to hunt a friend’s farm, but I work six days a week and have only Sunday off. There is no Sunday hunting in Virginia.:(

I do not want to hunt on a day before a workday anyway, as an afternoon kill will keep me busy late into the night, and then I would need a day to butcher the meat. So, I take a block of time off in the fall, and do what I can on public land. Hunter numbers are way down up there, which is good, but it is likely because game populations have dropped dramatically. There are many coyotes, and I suspect a lot of poaching as well. I heard coyotes close to camp for the first time this year, and it sounded like a fairly large pack.

It used to be that there were a lot of hunters, and a ton of deer, turkeys and snowshoe hares. Now, I see few deer, but more bears, and I have not seen a snowshoe in about twenty years.

Killdeer

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