Rules of fair chase p&y

[Silent footed]

What do you guys think of this?

Specifically, if I use my phone to navigate to a funnel I marked last week while in unfamiliar forest, to get there and go sit, does this go against the highlighted statement in Pope and Young?

Suppose I mark the coordinates of a funnel on a buddy's phone for him to go there and and have a place to hunt. Doesn't that mean I just used an electronic device to guide a hunter?

Just one more reason I'm increasingly pondering not using mapping tools anymore. Aside from it obviously not being traditional. It's certainly something to consider and a choice to make. Especially if p&y is meaningful to you and your path through traditional bowhunting. What do you guys think?

Does anyone know p&y's ruling on the use of mapping tools?  I'd be interested to know how they land.

[McDave]

This is what your highlighted section says:  “By the use of electronic devices for attracting, locating or pursuing game, or guiding the hunter to such game.”  It does not say that the use of electronic devices for guiding a hunter to a spot where he thinks there might be game is forbidden, so I think you're okay in your example.  A trail camera is used for the purpose of locating game directly, so those might be forbidden.  Likewise using a GPS to return to the spot where your dead animal is might be forbidden, if a dead animal is still considered “game.”  However, since the rules are to define “fair chase”, and the chase is over by the time the animal is dead, I doubt they would prohibit you from using a GPS to guide you to a dead game animal.

If they wanted to state that the use of electronic devices was incompatible with bow hunting in general, they could have stated that such devices could not be carried while hunting, but they didn't state that, so I assume they intend that their restrictions be interpreted literally, and not in a more general sense.

[That_MN_Guy]

Agree with McDave. I think the intention of that sentence is to disavow folks who see game in a certain area or heading in a certain area and calling up their partner to give them a heads up. Walkie-talkie or cell phone. Or coordinating a hunt using such devices. I personally don’t see anything wrong or unethical with using mapping tools or software when hunting, scouting, etc.

[Silent footed]

Mcdave kind of hit on my thoughts on this. Just because you have a good funnel doesn't mean it's 100% certain that you will locate game. I just thought it was good food for thought on this forum.

[Silent footed]

Mcdave kind of hit on my thoughts on this. Just because you have a good funnel doesn't mean it's 100% certain that you will locate game. I just thought it was good food for thought on this forum.

However, if it's one of MY funnels, there is a 100% chance that there will be game...

[Silent footed]

I agree with what mn guy said. Personally, I am kind of liking the idea getting back to not bringing a device into the woods (personal choice).

I have done it both ways. Back home I used to go up such and such creek in the dark, look for such and such feeder stream, go up until I knew I was right, then cut uphill and turn and walk until I was on such and such ridge, all in dark...and when I was a kid, I didn't use a light because I thought it would draw attention to myself throught the woods.

Here, where there is more land and less time, and I haven't spent a lifetime exploring it. I have found myself using a mapping tool to travel (up to a half mile) through forest in the dark to a place I have only explored a time or two on a scouting trip months before...which isn't always as easy as you think. Especially if you hit a swamp or Laurel patch (you'll never make it around those obstacles until the sun is up, and not without spooking game. Not to mention losing all the arrows out of your quiver).

In fact, my first year out here I continued my practice of going slow without a light. However, on my second year, I encountered an honest-to-goodness timber rattler stretched out on the road at sunset. I then decided perhaps it might be smart to begin using a light, and have since had experiences of spotting confused deer in the distance and walking right past them without much alarm.

[BAK]

The entire concept of fair chase is always viewed through the lens of current technology.   I seriously doubt that when it was first written anyone imagined what has become available to the "modern" hunter.

For example, do you consider an antelope taken at 1000 yards with a modern high power rifle/scope combination fair chase?  Personally I think it is everything but.   

[Silent footed]

Okay, here's another scenario. One year while still-hunting I got on a flock of turkeys at sunset until they roosted over a flat bench belting across a very steep slope and marked it on my map.

I formulated my plan that, on fly-down, they would pass through exactly one of two ways: one end of the bench or the other, because it was so steep on either side of the bench. I decided my odds were 50/50 and picked one end and was back prior to sunrise waiting. It turned out I picked wrong and they went through the opposite end. 

Let's say I posted a second guy to cover the opposite direction. One of us would have made contact with those turkeys (and it would have been an awesome hunt).


Now, I say it's a pretty safe bet that if turkeys are marked on a roost at dark, they'll still be there by morning. In fact, it's one of the safest bets we make.

So wouldn't this be getting awfully close to using an electronic device to guide yourself to a game animal? I mean you have him marked on your phone, (even though you originally located him yourself). And the phone IS guiding you straight to him the next morning. Plus, the odds of him still being there are EXTREMELY strong... This is really splitting hairs.

[reddogge]

To me it's a gray area and if it means that much to you I'd find an alternative method of marking your trails in an out.

[That_MN_Guy]

Okay, here's another scenario. One year while still-hunting I got on a flock of turkeys at sunset until they roosted over a flat bench belting across a very steep slope and marked it on my map.

I formulated my plan that, on fly-down, they would pass through exactly one of two ways: one end of the bench or the other, because it was so steep on either side of the bench. I decided my odds were 50/50 and picked one end and was back prior to sunrise waiting. It turned out I picked wrong and they went through the opposite end. 

Let's say I posted a second guy to cover the opposite direction. One of us would have made contact with those turkeys (and it would have been an awesome hunt).


Now, I say it's a pretty safe bet that if turkeys are marked on a roost at dark, they'll still be there by morning. In fact, it's one of the safest bets we make.

So wouldn't this be getting awfully close to using an electronic device to guide yourself to a game animal? I mean you have him marked on your phone, (even though you originally located him yourself). And the phone IS guiding you straight to him the next morning. Plus, the odds of him still being there are EXTREMELY strong... This is really splitting hairs.

I still think this is OK, as you found them and the spot using your eyeballs and woodsmanship. Where this gets sideways to me is if you and your buddy post up on opposite ends and you see the flock heading his way, so you text him a heads up that they're coming. That would be unethical in my mind. I still have no problem marking a likely area on a map, GPS unit, or whatever and returning to said spot.

[Silent footed]

Oh yeah. Absolutely. That would be the equivalent of using Walky talkies.

[M60gunner]

I am in the “personal ethics “ arena. I usually hunt alone so calling up my buddy would not happen. I have a hard time trying to tell the difference between marking a “spot” on a map vs in a phone. Sure it maybe easier to find the spot agian with a phone but if you can read a map and compass shouldn’t be an issue finding it.

[Orion]

Would be nice to have a P&Y member or two chime in and provide their/the organization's interpretation. I know one method the electronic devices clause speaks to, and that's using a cell phone, walkie talkie or other communications device, to direct another hunter to a game animal, for example, during a stalk.  Or calling your buddy and indicating you just jumped a nice buck and he's traveling fence line X. " If you hurry to spot Y, you can get there before the buck does."

I didn't have a problem with trail cameras when they first came out.  Putting one out on the back 40 to see what's there as well as get pix of other critters seemed rather harmless.  However,  nowadays folks set out 20, 30, 40 trail cameras in a relatively small area.  (I read a piece on Stickbow (think it was titled trail camera primer) a while back where a guy had more than 40 cameras on a 300 acre piece of land.)  When you put that many cameras out, you're taking unfair advantage because it then becomes quite easy to pattern one or more animals.  Pretty easy to determine exactly when, where, and how an animal(s) moves.  Not too difficult to then set up to waylay the animal in its travels.

Personally, anymore, I don't consider use of a trail camera in any capacity as fair chase.

[That_MN_Guy]

I would add to the trail cam discussion those that operate on cellular signal and send pictures to your phone instantaneously. That's definitely a bridge too far in my opinion as it has potential to create a significant advantage for the hunter.

I have one trail cam and like to use it to see what's out there, mostly in my back yard. MN has a rule on the books where you can't leave trail cams in the woods on public land (I think state land might be an exception to this, but I mostly hunt WMA, NWR, SNA land). I'd probably put mine out if I was allowed, but it's no skin off my back that it isn't legal. Although I do find a fair share of trail cams out illegally and I tend to turn them off if they are unlocked.

[caleb7mm]

do you consider an antelope taken at 1000 yards with a modern high power rifle/scope combination fair chase?  Personally I think it is everything but.   

I do. Because I know what it takes to be confident and able to make a shot like that. It’s no different than practicing for a shot with a bow. I do however think it Would be unethical to take that kind of shot without the proper practice and same goes for a 10 yard shot with a longbow if the user hasn’t had the proper practice.

[Friend]

We are very good at providing rational arguments in justifying the continued application
of enhanced technologies to pursue deer.

The deer’s ability to develop adequate defenses against the ever changing and more sophisticated
technologies is not remotely possible.

If a new technology were legally marketed this year that would guarantee a shot at trophy buck, if only moderately
affordable, it would be sold out in very abbreviated period.

I do not possess the answer, however, a stance will need to be enacted in order to preserve this wonderful hunting tradition.

[Cyclic-Rivers]

Just because you're using a map on you're phone doesn't seem any different than using a map on paper which to me is no different just more accessible.

Just an fyi many Pope and young members used paper maps printed by electronic printers. Their trophies are published. I'll let you draw your own lines.but to me it's not like you're using a drone to find and pursue game

[Bowguy67]

Okay, here's another scenario. One year while still-hunting I got on a flock of turkeys at sunset until they roosted over a flat bench belting across a very steep slope and marked it on my map.

I formulated my plan that, on fly-down, they would pass through exactly one of two ways: one end of the bench or the other, because it was so steep on either side of the bench. I decided my odds were 50/50 and picked one end and was back prior to sunrise waiting. It turned out I picked wrong and they went through the opposite end. 

Let's say I posted a second guy to cover the opposite direction. One of us would have made contact with those turkeys (and it would have been an awesome hunt).


Now, I say it's a pretty safe bet that if turkeys are marked on a roost at dark, they'll still be there by morning. In fact, it's one of the safest bets we make.

So wouldn't this be getting awfully close to using an electronic device to guide yourself to a game animal? I mean you have him marked on your phone, (even though you originally located him yourself). And the phone IS guiding you straight to him the next morning. Plus, the odds of him still being there are EXTREMELY strong... This is really splitting hairs.

What I do when I roost a bird, I use no light going in and that means phone, I’ll either mark the woods road where I need to turn w a stick, train tracks prob an abandoned rail road tie, etc etc. If I have a bird located the last thing I want is any lights. Even a phone on dim. Something to consider. I also set up close to birds I roost. 70 yards often a bit less.

[Silent footed]

I don't know guys. There's been times I've hiked a legitimate quarter or half mile through the dark to a place I've only visited once in my life a few months before and marked it on my map. No trails or roads, through a forested track of the mountains. Wonderful tool for sure.


However, when I ask myself if I could possibly have found those places in the dark without using the guidance feature on my phone, the answer is no. Not even with a map and compass (and I'm pretty good with those). I think this counts as an unfair technological advantage by allowing me entry into a game animal's secure sanctuary at a time of day I could not possibly navigate otherwise unless I'd spent a LOT more time gaining familiarity with the area. How can I possibly consider this to be meeting the quarry on its own terms if it has spent its entire life learning that tract of land and I am merely using the guidance feature on a phone that I bought and paid for. Friend hit it on the money. How can deer possibly adapt a defense to that strategy?  They rely on this seclusion, nightfall, and inaccessibility of terrain for their safety. And now they are unsafe just about anywhere.

A hunter can now stumble over a funnel or bedding area once, mark it, come back the next day in the dark by using his phone to point him, and more or less arriving there through trial and error looking at the screen watching the distance shrink until he reaches the proper place.

I am really starting to rethink this.

[Silent footed]

(I'm not saying any of you need to rethink anything you're doing, of course).