Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Optics Utah DWR takes away scopes from Muzzleloaders

Yeah, only takes 20+ years for most ml tags.

Darn simple, that’s illegal!

Originally muzzle loading season was created to let people hunt like their forefathers back in the flintlock and cap lock era of 1750 up to the civil war without competing with Hi powered rifle. There were limited licenses and people wanted to experience that. Today it's just another F__king hunting season. One more chance to put more meat in the freezer. It's Little more than a single shot center fire rifle without a cartridge case.

Exactly. Glad to see this.

This is like a rehash of the crossbow discussion. The real reason special seasons are created is to sell licenses and provide hunting opportunities with limited effect on game numbers, not fulfill pioneer fantasies. No one is preventing anyone from using their old-timey guns or bows as they please. I started with a TC Hawken around 1980, before Maryland had a ML season, and because I considered it a superior tool as opposed to the smoothbore slug guns we were limited to where I hunted. We have a short sidelock and stickbow season here in January and weather permitting, I’ll be out there with my “new” Greyhawk or PH 1858 Enfield. I’ve been snowed out a couple of times. PA started with a Flintlock season years ago, and has added an “open class hunt” since. Seems to work.

20 years for a tag is just nuts. Maybe they’ll free some up after the smoke clears under the new rules. That would be a good thing, and a good tradeoff. The West seems to be getting tougher and tougher to hunt. I’ve got three down and IIRC I can still take five more if I wanted to and was lucky enough. Only one more buck though.

You really have to understand how special a limited entry deer or elk tag is in Utah. This isn’t Pennsylvania! It’s a dream tag for most. Worth $10k+ in a lot of cases if you compare it to similar landowner, Expo, or outfitted hunts. Because of this passions run high. To maintain the quality of these hunts, to be worth the wait, something had to be done! Can’t control the extreme weather conditions affecting the herds, so the state has to use the things they can control to manage objectives.

ML hunts were originally designed to bridge the difficulty gap between archery and rifle seasons and were given season dates and better draw odds accordingly. They had harvest objectives which allowed for so many tags. With the original 1x scope limit, this worked fine. Then along came these custom ML’s shooting 209, a 215 primer, ridiculous speeds, with scopes with turrets and nearly every bit of the capability of a magnum centerfire round. I know of several deer and elk shot at 5-800 yards with these things. That’s not a limited or primitive weapon at all. Harvest objectives went out the window. They were just too lethal, and deemed unfair given favorable season dates.

So here we are: if you want to shoot a ML you gotta use one that fits with the original intent and conforms to management objectives. The real hunters I know, even the ones who spent $5k+ to build these fancy ML’s, all understand. It was never right to begin with.

Imo, I like Idaho. Exposed ignition only. Make ML hunting ML hunting!

Here in Montana we didn't even have a special muzzleloader season until very recently, though a few Wildlife Management Areas that don't allow cartridge rifles did allow them. Other than those small small areas you could use muzzleloaders of basically any type during the standard rifle season.

A couple years ago the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks Department did initiate a short "heritage" muzzleloader season in the middle of December:

"During this season, subject to the provisions of 87-6-401( 1) and rules adopted by the commission, a person may take a deer or elk with a valid license or permit using plain lead projectiles and a muzzleloading rifle that is charged with loose black powder, loose pyrodex, or an equivalent loose black powder substitute, and ignited bya flintlock, wheel lock, matchlock, or percussion mechanism using a percussion or musket cap. The muzzleloading rifle must be a minimum of .45 caliber and may not have more than two barrels.

The first is untrue and the second irrelevant. Oregon's ML season was created only after substantial lobbying by a group of traditional ML shooters. It was PRECISELY intended to "fulfill pioneer fantasies", as you put it. (I think of it more as Jeremiah Johnson fantasies, not pioneers.)

Let the modern ML shooters continue to hunt regular season with the centerfire rifles instead of spoiling the ML season for the people whose efforts brought those seasons into being. Nothin' like carpetbaggers trying to get in on someone else's "deal" and wreck it for everyone including the people who actually did the work, put in the time and effort to show up to hearings, etc.

Tom

Did you read the part about scopes with more than 1x being illegal?

That may be true where you are, but not here. In this region, whitetails are like rats, and due to various reason, lack of access being a big one, they just can’t kill enough of them.

You get TWO barrels? We only get one, and can’t even use underhammer guns.

It looks like you are missing the point. Which is to get closer.

You are wrong on one point.......smokeless muzzleloaders have never been allowed in Utah. I had to buy $150 a pound Blackhorn last year so that my hi powered Leupold scope could fail on the last day of the hunt

It's been that way in Oregon for ever. Guys that use these, should be familiar with iron sights anyway. Some guys in Oregon chose muzzle loader season because they run into more bulls during the rut. The season is also much longer than the regular rifle season. The tags are also easier to get in the controlled hunt areas. I used to kill many a jackrabbit with muzzle loaders out in the desert. Some of these guys need to quit their biotching and get out and practice more.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/vBpGFgQkSs5mc1pp6

15 yds close enough for you?!!!! I like to be able to use the tools out there and which are available. I get the point. I don't mind getting closer. I like close! Worked in the Archery industry for some years. I know close! I prefer to be more precise and that means if I want to take a 100, 200 or 300 yd shot, dialing 0, 2.7 or 5.8 moa with a muzzleloader then damn it, that's my choice. At my age, i'm not sure open sights will work. I'm sure I'll find out. Wanted to find out if anyone knew of any 1x "scopes". Not turn this into some traditional vs modern MZ dick wagging contest.

Only such scopes I know of are the 1x prisms like the Primary Arms Cyclops. They’re compact and generally lighter than regular scopes. The view through them isn’t tinted like red dots and they can be focused to your vision. Eye relief is limited, just like a scope, and they’re generally illuminated. Most have ranging marks, but how well they’d work with a ML I can’t say, as most are designed for .223.

Thank goodness at least that season can get back to hunting vs shooting.

I usually draw a general ML tag every other year and have been successful the last four hunts. I shoot t/c encore with a 50 cal Bergara barrel 2x7 vortex viper. It usually is about 2 moa. Only one of those shots was over 80 yards.

Glad I didn’t get rid of the 1x Nikon that I had on it earlier.

I’ll will probably give a 1x prismatic scope a try at the range this spring.

Try that and get back to us. Or take an unplugged shotgun on a waterfowl hunt but only put three shells in it.

Thank you!

Thank you!