hunting in fall of 2007

[chumbo]

I heard a rumor that a new reg for deer hunting is coming to Alabama. You must harvest 3 does prior to harvesting a buck and buck must have at least 4 points on one side.
I know Barbour County has 3 points on one side now.
This sounds fishy, can't put much faith on this one.
Speaking of fishy, it's time to catch a mess for cook'n.   

[Tom W.]

http://www.outdooralabama.com/hunting/season-limits/2007-08%20Season%20&%20Bag%20Limits%20final.pdf

Here's the tentative info.....

[mbp708]

Tentative ?  Thought it was already voted on. I may be wrong. Has anyone heard how they are going to enforce this ? Tags or what?

[Graybeard]

I sure hope it's ONLY TENTATIVE and that it fails once again. I hate it when a hand full of folks who "think of themselves as TROPHY hunters" ruin what was the BEST system in the entire US for the rest of us.

Point restrictions and such are NOT the way to grow more big trophy deer and it ain't gonna put an 8 or 10 point buck behind every tree as it was promised to do in PA and has failed miserably to attain. All it will do is to cause more deer that fail to measure up to be left to rot on the ground after folks "ground check" them and find they aren't legal under the new system.

Education NOT point restrictions is the way to go if more mature deer is the goal. Most folks in Bama however I think just want to shoot a deer for the meat and if they happen to get a nice rack that's gravy but not really their reason for being out there in the woods to begin with. Besides those older and more mature deer will just go nocturnal when hunting season arrives and unless you use dogs or some illegal means most folks will never see them in daylight anyway.

I've never considered myself a trophy hunter here in Bama and have no desire to become one. If I go off somewhere and pay huge sums of money I'd expect to see and perhaps shoot a big buck but here at home I just wanna go hunting with a fair chance to get a deer. Don't really even care if buck or doe, I'd pass a young buck and take a doe if both were in front of me but in the areas I've always hunted if you see one you best shoot if it's legal as you might not see another that season and for sure not any time real soon. Numbers just aren't that high where I hunt. I've not seen a buck that would be legal under the new four points on a side rule in over ten years on any land I have permission to hunt.

The private land I've hunted most of that time has been "managed" if you can call it that by a rule that bucks must have four points to shoot them. I've not shot a buck there in at least ten years due to it as I've not seen one. I've seen plenty of spikes and some does and taken does for a long time, really ever since the land owner put the rule in place. Before those days I'd see racked bucks every season and usually took at least one and at times more per season.

I'm dead set against any such rule that says you can only kill bucks with a particular spread or point count. In my opinion all it does is breed for failure. It means those that don't meet the standard can live to ripe old age and do all the breeding of does while the nicer bucks that have four points on a side on their first rack will be shot before they are able to develop to their potential. Only education will solve the problem not point restrictions or spread restrictions either as it just lets the inferior sup par deer grow old and breed while nice young bucks with potential are killed off.

I hope those of you who think you wanted this are happy and hope you don't come crying later wishing it hadn't happened because once you've ruined the best there was it ain't never coming back again. We should have left the biologist alone and let them decide what was best as they've been doing all along rather than crying cuz you don't see an 8 or 10 point buck on every trip to the woods. You still won't.

[Tom W.]

Here in Barbour county we have the five year plan for QDM. With luck we only have three more years to go, unless the vocal locals that have the plantations and hunting preserves  slide another one past us.

[rsr1950]

I'm going to have to agree with Graybeard, all they're going to do is Ruin hunting in AL