Glad to see you were into them for at least awhile Marc, and good luck with the rest of the season.......pretty cold the next few days.
Ken, never took anything you said as ill spirited. What I am saying is that hunting in the northeast is different, and I personally think a lot more difficult.
I've had three different members of this site here with me in NH at different times, one from Ct, one from Ohio, and one that now lives in South Carolina. All were amazed at the lack of deer and deer sign they saw. Heck, two of them saw way more moose than anything else......
I think one of the things to understand here is the dynamics of our seasons and how fish and game manages them. While archery season runs from Sept 15 to Dec 15, muzzleloader runs for ten days at the beginning of November, followed immediately by a rifle season that last through the first week of December. In essence, there is a firearms season that runs for thirty plus days in the middle of the rut. Couple that with doe management that calls for "Anterless Days" dependent upon wildlife managment areas and the southern areas get pounded. (Those areas have the longest Anterless Days). New Hampshire's total deer kill with every weapon in 2008 was 10,900. Compare that to Vermont, our neighbor, which is essetially the same size, which had a kill of 17,000 deer in 2008. That's a 70% difference!!!! Any research will show that New Hampshire, followed by Mass with a 2008 kill of 11,300, lead the northeast with the lowest deer kill numbers. I don't care how you cut it, just by sheer numbers, it is hard to hunt here. I don't know what the bowhunter success rate is now, but a few years ago it was around 6%.
As far as other animals, we can hunt bear, moose by permit drawing, coyotes and such. I did hunt bear this fall, that was a three week season that was fun and productive. I didn't shoot a bear but did have one regularly hitting our bait site. I hunt turkeys in the spring with my bow and am fairly successful there.
I hunted 17 different stand sites this fall, most from trees, but a couple natural blinds and one from a Double Bull. I hunted mornings, evenings and mid day. I rattled pre rut and during the rut. I called by grunts and doe bleats. I am very careful as to trying to reduce my scent and I hunt the wind religously. I have entry and exit trails cut to stand sites to reduce noise. The only thing I didn't do was to use bait or hunt any field edges, only because there aren't many fields aroung here. That big woods thing again.......
I am all ears as to what to do differently, in fact I appreciate the suggestions........
David
Topic: Wow, What a Season! (Read 1360 times)
