Hunt till dark?

[BUCKY]

How many hunt till dark? If not what time do you quit?

[Brock]

I hunt until I cannot see detail any longer...if there are animals nearby I will wait until they depart before leaving my stand area.  Our legal hunting time ends 1 hour AFTER sunset but usually it is too dark inside the woods 20 minutes after sunset.  On a large field with bright cloudless sky maybe 30-40 minutes with naked eye.

I stay until absolute dark usually...but when I cant see well enough to pick a spot the arrow goes back in quiver and bow is hung on limb until I leave.

[jcar315]

Here in MD the DNR sets hunting hours from one half hour before sunrise to one half hour after sunset. 30 min after the sunset for that day would be the absolute latest for me.....sometimes earlier depending on how well I can see to shoot.

Do a search.....lots of threads on this subject. As with most things YRMV.

[damascusdave]

I am getting too old to be bumbling around in the dark trying to follow a blood trail...leaving an animal overnight with the number of coyotes we have around here just would not make sense...I am not a subsistence hunter and will live quite nicely even with tag soup...I go fishing about 2 hours before dark

DDave

[ISP 5353]

When I can no longer see well enough to pick an exact spot on a critter, I head home.  In dark timber that time is often before legal sunset, so I can hunt another spot on a field edge until the end of legal shooting hours.

[reddogge]

Got trapped in the stand last night by a big mouth doe who just wouldn't give up blowing, stomping and creating a ruckus around me. So I got down anyway, I was hungry. According to my tables quitting time was 7:02 which was when I wanted to get out but had to stay 10 minutes longer thanks to Ms.Big Mouth.

[TooManyHobbies]

CT deer hunting, any weapon, is one half hour before sunrise until SUNSET. But we can shoot small game until half hour after sunset, any weapon.

[LB_hntr]

Half hour befor and half hour after sun here too. In thick swamps usually I can't see before legal light ends.
I stay until legal light is over or I can't see anymore.

[VictoryHunter]

Yes I always hunt until well after dark. Legal shootings hours which is 30 min after dark plus a little just so I don't bump deer.

[Blackhawk]

At my age, I like hunting banker's hours...9-5, and with a 2 hour lunch.  :D

[59Alaskan]

Yes.  I hunt withiin legal times.  Which in Ohio generally means until dark. I have killed deer 3 min before end of legal hunting that I had no clue were headed my way 10min before legal end.

Often in early season I quit early because of lack of light though.  Hard to shoot them if you can't see them.  Once leaves fall and snow flies its a totally different scenario

[goingoldskool]

I hunt until I know that I cannot see the individual limbs on the trees around my stand..... We have a point restriction in MO.

  I did make the mistake of calling it too early a couple years ago and lowered my bow down just to have a hot doe bring in a REALLY nice buck come in right under my stand....    Hoping they didn't step on my bow!  

All I could do was watch them until some cows came in and spooked them.  Now I wait an extra 10 minutes, just so that doesn't happen again!

Last Monday evening, a smallish eight pointer came by me.  He was on the wrong side for a shot and behind and down the ravine from me, eighteen yards. He passed by some brush and I could barely see him, when he was 10 feet behind me he smelt me and bolted. It was 7:05 PM, I supposedly had 20 minutes of legal shooting time left. All situations are different. I have one rule for shooting light that I never break, if you cannot see the hit, you cannot take the shot. The second rule is about the same, if you cannot see the twigs and stems you need to shoot through, you cannot take the shot.

[old_goat2]

If we aren't seeing elk, my wife is ready to be at camp by dark, if we are seeing elk, I have to practically drag her off the mountain when it gets to dark for me to shoot, and it gets to dark for her to shoot well before me, my night vision is pretty good.

[glenbo]

Hunt till legal sunset,sit till dark

[Bullfrog 1]

We are 30 minutes after sun down. I can tell you that buck I shot last Saturday was 25 minutes after sun down and I could barely pick a spot on him.  BILL

[Beau J]

Even though I know that the longer I can hunt, the better my odds are of getting a shot, sometimes I will quit early. Like this evening I will probably head home early because of having to work early tomorrow. Beau

[joe ashton]

ok here is the deal.  30 before sunrise to 30 after sun set.  During that time you are a HUNTER out side those times you are a POACHER!
I will stay in my tree until very dark so as not to run off any deer that may come in earlier the next night.

[nomansland4404]

I usually hunt till dark, or about when I cannot see small branches and twigs anymore. I believe I owe more to the deer then to be selfish and wound one for an extra couples minutes to try and shoot.

[59Alaskan]