Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting for the PA guys

Only coyotes, crows, and foxes.

Dale

I probably won't be able to get to DuBois until late Sunday but I hope to be able to hook up with you guys sometime.



Depends, does he root for the Suckeyes?



That's for sure, let me know, I may be able to help with the fryer

Dale

If it doesn't work out, we'll be fine.

No. A good friend of mine started Hunters United for Sunday Hunting but they lost their court case.

I grew up hunting in Ohio and Pa which still had the old blue laws-no Sunday hunting. I never knew people hunted on Sundays until I moved to Minnesota.

They ran the wrong issue. The right case is the one that Safari Club International was threatening in VA that resulted in the change there. If PA hunters want Sunday hunting, they're going to have to properly challenge the law. Contacting Safari Club International would be a good start.

I agree 4ager. They sued on the grounds of being an infringement of the 2nd amendment and therefore unconstitutional. I felt that was a stretch.

Beyond a stretch; just stupid. The 2A has nothing to do with hunting. If they had sued on the dual grounds of an unconstitutional "blue law" and an unconstitutional infringement on property rights (use and enjoyment), they'd have won.

I could point a guy or 2 in the right direction. If you're not afraid to walk or hunt, you will get into some deer.

All of these guys bitch about it but the hunting is still pretty good. And still better than most states.

It's not like back in the 80s/90s when the stump humpers would see 60 DOE in a day, but if you see 7 a day in my neck of the woods, chances are ones a buck..

Yep, the ratio is improving and the numbers will rebound. Simple biology.

When I moved to Georgia a few years ago I was all in coming back to Pa. to hunt ( I did move back to Pa. so it was unnecessary). I did hunt down in Ga.and found it lacking compared to my experiences in Pa.

I hunt up in Dale K's neck of the woods. The herd has done well now that everyone's settled into the QDM restrictions.

Don't be mad The Buckeyes treat Penn St like a punching bag nine out of ten years.

Here in the center of the state the geography is mostly public land that is open to hunting. 10-15 years ago there were twice as many hunters in the woods. The number of hunters is down 20% across the state, but field time is down by at least half. It is simply amazing to drive 6 miles on forest road and see 5 trucks. In the past it could have been 40. Camps are empty up here. Very sad.

There's lots of older camps in our area, and sadly many of these sit empty these days. We used to know most of the guys on the hill. Camp Misery, Bear's Den, The Flying Dutchmen, all camps with rich hunting histories now sit shuttered on what used to be the biggest hunting day of the year. We used to take off up the mountain and hunt our way to one of the area camps around noon, mooch a cup of coffee and sandwich and head back out. Nowadays, you'd better take a brownbag with you if you want lunch. Those camps are all closed up now.

Does the state still offer long-term leases on campsites on state land? I seem to recall it was an incredible deal.

Lots of folks lease the land their cabin sits on from the state.

Up here the camps are overrun with hunters for bear season. Then it is much quiter for rifle deer. This year there were more at the camps for the deer than in the last few years. Access is becoming more difficult. I also believe that more guys are killing their deer in the early seasons and are hunting closer to home for deer.

How many days of vacation do hunters have? Most are here the Friday before bear. Then they are here until Tuesdsy or Wednesday. So they burn 3 or 4 days vacation. If they are archery hunters, surely they burnt a couple days for the rut.

With all the focus on out of state hunting maybe they used a week on an out of state rut hunt.

Point is, the average worker only has 1 or 2 weeks of vacation time. I "think" most guys use their time for other endeavors and are hunting rifle deer closer to home. This is just speculation though.

Around 1970 the State stopped issuing leases to build camps on. As far as I know they are renewing old leases every 10 years, but new ones are no longer being issued. Camps must meet certain State requirements or the lease will not be renewed.

They were good for the local economy in that they encouraged people to come and spend time there. Problem was many of the camps were not kept up and became run down shacks and the State discontinued the practice.

My Dad's dad was part of a camp that was on leased land up near Lake Erie somewhere. I wish I'd gotten a chance to go see if the building was still standing while dad was still with us.