Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting Hunting in RI

Hey all,
I currently live in NYC and am moving to Providence, RI in a couple of months for Business. I've been hunting deer my whole life, but I am unaware of any rules, regulations, even places to hunt in RI. If anyone out there could help me out with providing some information to me, I would greatly appreciate it. Thanks.

The best Deer hunting in Rhode Island..... is in Maine!
There are Deer in the littlest state, but it is a very, very small state and there is limited access to the limited areas. Do the math. Hop on Route 95 heading North and you can be in Maine in two hours or less.

That's funny, I've got my deer here every year (two at one time this year). I saw over 50 this season and would as a board certified wildlife biologist state that we have a deer overpopulation problem in a good part of the State. The last two years, we've been implementing an Earn a Buck program to kill more does to bring the population down. We don't give deer contraceptives here or hire snipers to kill them over bait like you all did in Princeton. We have plenty of good habitat and harvest quality deer. You can kill six deer a season here without bonus tags. In Maine you can only kill one, and a buck at that unless you draw a doe tag. My Brother and I have been hunting Maine 20 years and there are not the numbers of deer up there there were when the old timers hunted the Golden Road. We have big management areas like the Great Swamp, Arcadia, and Big River (I've killed deer in all of them), Prudence Island (there too), Block Island, and private land.

Rob,
There are deer in Rhode Island as I stated - but the lack of any big woods does create an issue with access and the sheer number of hunters. I'm originally from Taxachusetts and would shoot at Warren and Narraganset at times. I don't actually enjoy the shooting deer in a barrel approach when the number of deer per squre mile are as high as they are in Rhode Island and parts of New Jersey. Hunting with the sound of cars passing by doesn't do it for me. I guess I'm much more of a big woods hunter.
By the way, they not only hire sharpshooters in Princeton, NJ. I have them literally in my back yard. I've had to kick them off my property and have them relocate by ten yards onto conservation land that abuts my property and I'm only 35 minutes from New York City. I have deer in my yard, within 20-30 yards of my house, almost every day and I'm sure, every night.

I had no idea MA was that small. It is three hours to the bridge, six hours to the Garand match, and nine hours to Detroit for me.