It seems like more & more hunting shows end with a dramatic spine shot. While obviously effective when executed properly, I gotta admit to being concerned by the fact that many shots don't seem to be targeted on the boiler room. As we know, an errant spine shot can end up with a temporarily prostrate animal, who then bounds away never to be seen again. (Or, at least, not until the coyotes are done.)

Anyone else notice this? If so, is it being done on purpose?

There are a lot of "stars" who can't shoot for crap. Hitting the animal is on purpose, by luck. Where they hit it isn't always on purpose. Some of the bow shots are as bad as they get. Center the guts, then look at the camera and scream about smoking 'im. Drives me nuts.

No disrespect intended, but I can't think of many questions I'm happier to be unable to answer.

Their forte is groundsluicing turkeys with a shotgun so I wouldn't expect much more.

I remember watching one show where they showed how they were sighting in their muzzleloaders and it was a hoot. When the shooter finally cut the right edge of a three inch circle, he called it good. I would have said it was 1.5 inches off to the right.

YES !!
Also, one of the last hunting shows I watched was an Elk hunt where the 'star' shot and the bull was seen 'carrying' his right hind leg as the elk limped into the brush.
Next scene, the ?shooter? was posed behind the (or some) elk's antlers.

NAUSEATING !!!!!!

I no longer watch any of them.


Jerry

Not to draw away from the horribleness of most hunting shows. But do you generally take your turkeys on the wing Vern?

My gripe is that they shoot in broad daylight but have "hero" photos using lights. Muddy

I've noticed than most of the animals shot dead in their tracks are done in by Women hunters. I also as said above most animals taken by the so called hunting hosts are shot in daylight but recovered after dark.

As God is my witness, I thought they could fly.

I think he is intimating that perhaps they should at least be shot on the ground with a rifle. They have a head the size of a tennis ball for pete's sake.....

But more on topic, I have wondered the same thing as the OP...but Ive met some of these guys and very few are capable enough at shooting to plan a spine shot.
And the bowhunters....God, don't even get me started on those gut shooting " if in doubt, back out" mouth breathers....

Requirements for a hunting show:

1) trust fund
2) IQ not to exceed 90
3) tacticool gear

Please explain what hunting show stars are. Are they the stars in the constellation Orion?

Steve.

Wish we could shoot them with a rifle around here. I'd be more interested in turkey hunting. You get caught shooting a turkey with a rifle around here and it will cost you a fortune!

You should be one. You have the requisite IQ

Having shot turkeys in the spring and fall, with rifle, shotgun, and pistol, both on the ground and on the wing I must say that a shotgun is certainly my favorite tool for them. Getting them all worked up and coming to the call, gobbling, strutting, and posturing while you try to stay hidden well enough they don't spot you before getting into shotgun range is way more fun to me than pulling up to the hay patch and rolling down the window to take ones head off with a varmint rifle. YMMV

Not legal in Arkansas. miles

Do you know or recall when that changed?

I hunted W of McComb for a number of yrs and then moved back to ArK. in 1986. <<During that time>>, you could hunt turkeys with a 'rifle' or even 'handgun' legally. On one occasion we bumped into a warden while we were hunting.

He was impressed that one of us was using a handgun.


Jerry

Ahumm, he was being sarcastic!


Jerry

That's it exactly. The reason people use shotguns is so the turkeys have to be called into range.

Picking one off at 200 yards with a 22-250, not so sporting.

Partsman; love the WKRP reference

I understand your reasoning completely. Its all in how you view the game. It IS sporting with a rifle if you confine yourself to head shots....and it saves the meat .

I have never been one to get worked up about birds. They represent a change of diet to me from venison. I just want to convert them to edible things as expeditiously as possible. If you want more sport involved you can create it yourself, as we all do with other things we feel are important. i.e. fly fishing instead of spinning, stalking varmints instead of sniping them from long ranges etc.
So carry on and have fun with whatever you are doing!


What rankled me about turkey hunting is the back east turkey hunters lobbied here and got legislation passed that made shotguns only legal in the spring.

I promise you the birds don't care what they get shot with.

Yes, the birds do care. When I hunt with my buds in Nebraska, they only use bows and arrows. I miss a lot, and it makes a big difference to the birds

There's also a big difference between hunting turkeys in spring and fall. We can still use rifles in the fall in Montana, and I can assure hunters who've only hunted gobblers in the spring that putting a .22 Hornet bullet into a big gobbler during autumn can be a pretty sporting proposition, regardless of whether you shoot him in the head or body. Jakes and hens, not so much.

Especially if you're wearing orange.

Don't know when it changed. I've never hunted them myself, just been told by others not to shoot them with a rifle unless I wanted to lose the rifle and pay a huge fine. I did look up the regs before posting and they state clearly that bows, crossbows, and shotguns are the only legal weapons.

Tatel:

Thnx for your time and checking:


Jerry

In most instances, the rifle restrictions on turkey are due to the perception that a hunter would be more likely to hit another hunter with a rifle load than shot out of shotgun as the bullet is thought to travel further. The fear here is driven from hunting on crowded public land, where you never know what's beyond your target.

In truth, a 38 SPL target load would be perfectly adequate to kill a turkey at close range and probably be in the dirt within 80 yards. However, you probably won't see these rifle restrictions coming off any time soon. In reality, if you took my example and said it was legal to shoot 38 SPL at turkey, somebody would then try to push it with a 38 SPL +P and there would be some idjut out there with a .223 REM trying to take them at 200 yards. I see the point. I just wish I could shoot 38 SPL at turkey here in Kentucky.

As to the original topic: I used to watch a lot of hunting shows, but it was because I had a dog that loved to watch them. Barney really took those shows seriously, and we had a lot of fun together.

In my experience, the average TV show hunter is a lot like the average hunter I see coming into the local deer processor. Some deer come in blown in half. Some look like pincushions.
Most hunters start out with good intentions, and it just does not always go so well. The TV guys are not all that bad, they just do it on TV.

The reason you see so many trophy shots taken in the dark is that it takes a while to do the setup, and the video cameras are not as sensitive relative to the human eye. Any deer shot around sundown is going to require artificial lights, even if the human eye can still see it.

Take this as an example:

Tagging out, 2014

I shot this doe at 4:15 PM. She fell just inside the treeline about 60 yards from where I hit her. Sundown was at 5:30. It was right at sundown but still plenty light when I got the truck to her, but I had to use a flash to shoot.

To the human eye, this was a perfect early evening, but to the less sensitive camera it was black as night.

I can't say I've noticed high shots. But I have noticed an inordinate number seem to have very long tracking jobs. I've had a long track with a bow (my first deer). Never had to "track" more than a minute when using a rifle (knock on wood).

Horribleness??? That's not even a word.

You forgot blonde hair and big bazoobas!

May not be intentional but it does appear to be the normal format.

Most of those females are hard for me to stomach. There are a few exceptions.

Is now. Bet you'll think of it every time some Gomer is whispering into the camera 30 seconds after he's discharged a high powered rifle at a deer eating corn.

I think the shows do.. I mean today folks are bored. They demand action.

Shoot a deer in the lungs that runs off, folks will be bored. No one can high five and fist pump themselves off...

They want a spectacular impact and the bullet "knocking" the game off its feet to brag about.

Caveat.. its been years, but after I was involved with filming a turkey hunt for a big name show, I"ve basically not watched much of any other than a part now and then while flipping channels... of any hunting show.

They make my gut wrench with what and how they do and what all they fake and edit...they are a scripted reality show basically... puke....

Just hate " the outer limits " [bleep] always present the worst example of LRH. No buget limits and thats what you get. Target shooting not hunting. JMO

well now, nothign wrong with long range hunting, but shows just generally suck all the way around.

Guess I'm glad I don't watch TV.

Bahahaha! Had to revisit that episode on youtube.

I guess I stirred some shiite with my comments on ground sluicing turkeys.......YES, I have killed three turkeys and all on the wing [hardly difficult either] ....and yes I understand it's probably a safety issue in many areas but just how many hours of "prime time" must we consume with this effort?.....I guess the answer is in the ratings somewhere.

Having seen and been lightly involved in a bit of this Outdoor TV stuff, I feel compelled to give those guys a jab in the ribs now and then but also understand the cost of producing exotic and remote specie hunts so the turkeys and baited deer hunts are affordable hunts to fill some of the contracted time.

I'll say I'll never be connected with that type of filming ever again...

Steven Rinella is the only one worth a schit.

Turkeys ain't hard to kill. We kill quite a few each fall at 100 and even further with sub sonic 22 lr hp. They dont' go far. The shot doesn't bother the deer. Heck it rarely bothers the rest of the turkeys.

What especially gets me is the "stars" who act like teenagers having their first orgasm after they hit a deer. Nowadays the way I watch the majority of shows is with the mute on and my finger on the "skip" button. This way I don't have to crank the volume through the roof to hear the whisperers.

Jim

They walk out of the woods with a Pee-Chee held in front?

Oh, I have no doubt. That's why turkeys were nearly extirpated from east of the Mississippi. The only reason why turkey is hard to kill, is because of all the rules imposed to deliberately handicap the hunter.

Don't get me wrong, if you play by the rules, a spring gobbler is great sport and I really do enjoy it. It just bugs me some times that a $.25 pistol round would do the trick and instead I'm shooting a $2 12 GA round at them.

The states around here make you shoot them with shot out of a shotgun, and most guys end up shooting an $8 round that generates the same recoil as an elephant gun. I don't go quite that far over the edge. I shoot a lead #4 3-inch 12 GA.

I love the term "groundsluicing" and intend on using it this year. It perfectly describes it.

Seems to me that at woods ranges, a mild rifle round is more sporting than 2oz of high-tech shot. We can use both, Spring or Fall. I usually use 2 3/4" shotshells on smaller parcels of public land for safety in the Spring. For Fall turkey, I have to go to a different county where it's allowed.

Years ago, when I belonged to a hunt club in VA, turkeys were legal during the deer season, which added some interest to the hunt as that area was crawling with them.

Well, also on the subject of turkeys, any one of these TV dudes will be the first to tell you how wily and wary they are ( unless they are from the south, then the turkeys are often called 'weary'...)
But Bubba has not much problem sneaking up on them holding just a turkey tail fan in front of his face and ground sluicing them from a few feet away. Literally.
REALLY smart birds!

That's because they use Scent Lok and Ozonics......Duuhhhhh!

Turkey's can be difficult to hunt BECAUSE they are so stupid...

I don't understand why anyone would care how or what weapon you use to take a Turkey as long as it is legal.

Shooting ducks off the water is legal too.

Not while they can edit the unnecessary results out of the final program.

Shooting those ducks on the water can be tricky if swimming with the current.

LMAO

As much as I love calling turkeys, I will be the first to admit they have their shortcomings. It all depends how you encounter them. As the focus of a TV show, they make good subjects. The story is easy to tell and fairly easy to video, especially if you can set up on the edge of a field. That's why you see so much of it on these shows.

On the other hand, I've been out sipping coffee, glassing flocks before season and had 10 gobblers come right up to me and take turns displaying for me like I am a hen. I've had hens come up and peck at my bootlaces. I've had hens come into the blind. One of their biggest shortcomings I have noticed is that they all seem to lose their wariness inside 10 feet. That is, if you get them in really-really close, they stop thinking in terms of you being a potential threat and you just become part of the scenery.

They also can't figure out the whole idea of blinds and the whole this-inside-that gestalt. Pop-up blinds are a complete mystery to them. You can put one out in the middle of the field, and they'll come out and mill around it like it is not there.

On the other hand, after 35 years of hunting, I still can't get over the thrill of having a gobbler honor my call and come and strut in front of me.

I don't watch many hunting shows because I just can't stand the hosts. All about self aggrandizement and the screaming and carrying on when they kill something is mostly nauseating.

Zero respect shown for the animal or the hunt!

What irritates me is that every time they shoot an animal in the evening, they automatically state that they "need to wait until morning" for one reason or another.

I understand that their are circumstances where you might want to wait, but good light for the "walk up to it" and hero shots con't count.

Extirpated

Literacy is a virtue.

But it aint right.

Saw a guide on tv take 12 girls out on a goose hunt. They slaughtered about 20 geese once they were paddling in the water. Then they all erupted like cheerleaders like they had accomplished some great task.

Right? Right for who?

Do you hunt wiht a rifle? That ain't right.. everyone should hunt with a bow for the challenge, and not the wheels and cables kind...

See the point?

And I did not say that I shoot birds on the water but I have before for certain reasons and I will again at some point I"m sure.

I just believe the animals should at least be on the wing or on their feet before you whack them. I won't shoot birds on the water or perch. And I would never shoot a cervid in its bed.

But, I agree with you. Can't say it aint right. Do say I wouldn't do it.

Sorry.