Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting Virginia mountain boys

Has anyone hunted the Goshen WMA, particularly the Laurel Run access area (on Rt 39 across from the Maury River) that leads up to the power lines in the last couple of years? I was there a few years ago and there were homeless folks living in tents off the trail leading up to the powerlines. Kind of off putting. Not sure why the DWR let that happen.

I fish goshen and mill creek hidden Valley and bull pasture there’s some strange peoples over there I carry always

I did have to take a emergency pit stop this spring and there’s a nice ladder stand about 100 yds up the road where your talking might be a dirty sock around it

We've only 75[ours] but have another 40 or so of a absent neighbor for us only to hunt.
I rarely leave home these days.

For Butch A.
There is some very good hunting in NF from Wythe up the chain towards Rockbridge if one is willing to get a little deeper in than the average pud-hunter.
Plenty of primitive and semi-primitive camping throughout

We got a name for the Rockbridge crowd “rock jumpers” cause they all come over to Amherst to hunt

LOL @ eb

It's wild how things have changed over the past 35-40 years.
Bath & Rockingham counties used to be 'the place' for deer hunting west of the Blue Ridge along with Craig & Giles to the south & west.
There's still big deer there but you'll really need to hike pretty deep to find them.
Have the #'s really fallen off as much as it seems or did the explosion of deer #'s along the east facing slope just make it seem that way?

I haven’t seen a explosion in deer numbers more a explosion in bear numbers the “rock jumpers” have always been in Amherst lots of national forest off route 60

In Montgomery, Floyd, ROA, Bedford the #'s are off the charts for deer and are getting that way for bear.

30 years ago everyone I knew in Montgomery went to one of the four counties listed in prior post to hunt deer.
We had very few here[then].

Oh yeah I can remember back in the day if you did not travel to Rockbridge/Bath/Botetourt county during rifle season you was not a serious deer hunter...I spent a lot of time on Short Mtn in Bath county and North mountain in Rockbridge county, I have some great memories of those hunts 👍....I know several of my hunting buddies liked to hunt the Wythe/Smyth/Grayson county's area too....Hb

I remember the days when deer numbers were low and many of the mountain counties had a one-deer-per-year limit, and Buchanon and Dickenson were close altogether for deer hunting. I remember the old printed hunting regulations you got with your license and paper tags, and Buchanon and Dickenson counties were colored black.

Back in the mid 80's we used to tent camp on NF in Craig Co.
Set up the octagonal army surplus for the full 2 weeks[max time allowed]
The Pines Campground on Barbours Creek at the base of Potts Mtn.
We'd do a little trout fishing too if weather was decent.
The campground also had a horse corral.

Three of us would pile in a truck and take the forest road to the top of the adjacent mountain before daylight and slowly hunt our way down the mtn.
Never drag anything 'up'.
The weekend before the Monday opener was always a blast, basically a big party in the campground.

Good times!

Plenty in Carroll, Wythe and Pulaski too. Places I hunt anyway

Thanks.... I'm either in the Big Levels area, Coal Rd, etc... south of Stuarts Draft, or if I really feel up to it, I'll continue further west to the other side of Staunton and Buffalo Gap, Route 42, etc... and all up and down that huge ridge area of Elliot Knob. Rumors are always around about massive big bucks, but you gotta go way up to find them. Nail one, and you got a loooooooong drag back down!

yep
I just kinda started a crooked line at Floyd going up

I have been hunting Floyd for 30+ years... I have one mid-day stand that I call "The Grocery Store".

Give me a heads up next time through Cash

Back in the 90's used to hunt Alleghany, Craig and Botetourt, Counties. Relly nice around Oriskany, Roaring run, Hoophole trail, the "gas line" etc.

Regs changed for the worst so we quit going for the out of state hunt and stayed in NC

How is the area around West Augusta and Ramsey's Draft these days? A friend has a family farm we used to hunt up there.

I used to hunt in West Augusta and Ramsey’s Draft a lot back in the 70’s. I was close friends with the Dively family who owned a small farm in West Augusta that backed up to National Forest. It was sandwiched between the Charlie Hunter and Allan Griffin farms. But my favorite place was Ramsey’s Draft. It was big and wild and I loved being up there. I used to stay overnight at Sexton Shelter which was a small cabin managed by the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club. From there, I’d walk on out to Freezeland Flat and bow hunt around a few old apple trees that were there. Back in that day there were a decent number of deer in there. I have since moved away but was in the area this past March for a funeral and my wife and I walked out to the old cabin foundation. She and I stayed in the cabin a month or so before it was dismantled back in about 1983 or 84. But much to my surprise, we did not see any deer or any deer sign on that entire hike. Anyway, a lot of fond memories being in that area again. We even stopped at the old Whiteway store and bought a loaf of their homemade bread.

I hope that when I retire I can spend more time in the mountains of Virginia and West Virginia. Awesome place!

Mackey