Hunting a dying sport?

[Classicvette63]

Was looking at the pgc website yesterday and came across something interesting/disturbing.

Hunting license sales have dropped over 150,000 in the last 10 years in Pennsylvania. Some of it is the pgc's mismanagement and just having their head up their arse most of the time, but that can't be all of it.

Too much building and development around here to get into hunting anymore. Locally the state games lands put the D-day invasion to shame on opening day of any season. Not a situation conducive to getting new hunters or keeping hunters.

How is it in your neck of the woods?

[Dan Morris]

Dropping...regrettably. Even sport shooting is down. Ammo prices/ fuel prices...
Dan
:(

[Nulle]

About the same with a drop also and they keep hammering the heck out of us on license fees.

[Adam Helmer]

Classic,

The small game hunters numbers are way down here in Tioga County, PA.

Many kids do not want to sit all day in a deer stand. We had quite a few hunters out yesterday for the deer opener and today I had the woods to myself.

Adam

[maineguy110]

I think a lot of the older hunters have passed on. not many people are taking kids out. alot of hunters are waiting for a family member to get old enough. dont wait there are alot of kids who want to go but the dad doesnt hunt or is not in the picture. so go take them out i bet you if hunter asked around he would find atleast 10 kids willing to learn So it is up to us to take kids out and teach properly also think of the memeries you can make. also what you have taught will be passed on and you will be remembered

[Lilred]

Many kids do not want to sit all day in a deer stand.

That's cause they can sit in front of the tv and hunt...
I know dam well when I was a kid, and I was told to sit there all day...I dam well did! And loved every minute to boot :D

[fabsroman]

Here is an article that my future brother in-law sent me this morning. The stats on declining hunters sucks.

http://vault.sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1148866/index.htm

[M.T. Pockets]

I used to be able to hunt every farm I asked around my home when I was growing up 25 years ago. I used to go to South Dakota pheasant hunting and knocked on doors and got permission to hunt almost every time, and when the owner had to turn us down they'd apologize.

Now all I see is NO HUNTING signs.

People are still hunting the land, it's just being bought out or leased up.

The biggest threat to hunting's future is not gun control, it is access to hunting land.

[MtnMike2]

Great article Fabsroman - thanks. I'm trying to do my part to increase the number of hunters. I intro'd a friend to it in '07 and he took his first elk in '08. I've taken both my boys hunting although they neither one hunted the last couple years (maybe I should speak to them about this...).

Mike

[Dan Morris]

My kids quit on me several years back............have had several
others go to range with me...nothing regular. Guy that went with me last year had fun and I had a great partner. MT is right about access.....
Dan

[Nulle]

M.T. I hear you and in South Dak. it's all about the $ .

[Steverino]

Good article Fabs, reminds me of another that I read a couple of years ago about pipeline techs being stalked by groups of wolves as well up in Alaska.

I also agree about the access of hunting property being the biggest threat to the hunting way of life for future generations. In Iliinois, public property is being closed off to hunters because the state DNR has been sold off by the beaurocrats in power and private property is being increasingly sold to either outfitters or land leases.

I have been privilidged to have had the opportunity to hunt on private property for the past several years and I have savored each and every hunt knowing full well that it could be my last on this land. Nothing lasts foever and when I am relegated to hunting public grounds once again, I will, reluctantly and with new tactics but will fondly recall the days of the quiet woods to myself.

[fabsroman]

I agree completely about access to land being the problem. I used to have four private farms to hunt on and now I only have 2 1/2 and those are pretty tenuous at the moment. The owner of one of them passed away last year, but his daughter is still letting us hunt it. The other two are owned by the same person, and he started selling lots out of the front of one of the farms, so that is my 1/2. It just gets worse and worse. After we buy a house, I'm planning on saving up for a farm on the Eastern shore so I will be able to hunt some time in the future without ever having to worry about anybody telling me I can't anymore.

[Classicvette63]

Available land is probably the biggest issue and it's one that can't be addressed. Once it's gone, it's gone. No one is going to tear down a mall or housing development just so folks can hunt.

[RagingBullPa]

our biggest problem about the hunters decline lies in the generation , they are too much in a hurry to take the time to let themselves unwind and they don't have the time to spend with the youngstersbecause so they say their "careers" are more important than teaching someone about the outdoors or even enjoying them , they spend the money on their playstations and xboxes and put the kids in frontof them and say here is your supper don't bother me , i have seen this too much over the years with the new generation , they also claim i'm too busy i have no time for it that is bullcrap too

[Brother Rockeye]

I know that here in Sk. the biggest hit that hunting ever took was the gun law.
I bought 2 rifles from long time hunters that quit because they didn't want to go thru the BS involved in being legal.And it was the same family-Grandfather and Father of a buddy of mine.

I guess their stupid law worked if reduced revenue from hunting was their goal.too bad the criminals didn't stop committing crimes because they didn't wanna register THEIR guns!:mad:

[PJgunner]

The last time I went up to Nevada to see friends, I also stopped by the several rnaches I used to hunt for free. Now the tarif runs from 3 to 5 thousand doallars for the privelige of hunting their precious land. These were ranches where I used to do their predator control work for them as the yotes and occasional Mountail Lion did numbers on calves and cows. A pox on the whole bloody bunch. :mad:
Paul B.

[Nulle]

I moved from Eastern part of South Dakota to the Western part and one of the reasons was at least I have Forest Service land to hunt on. But I sure miss my pheasant hunting on a regular basis I had back East.

[Dan Morris]

Deputy ......friend of mine.....up by Green Mountain Res got me a special rate on a ranch....elk at the guys 'family rate'.....$1500.......man, I'm sure glad I'm not a stranger!!!!
No, I didn't go.
Dan
:D

[skeeter@ccia.com]

Land access most of the problem... and ditto on the state game lands here..almost the only place to hunt and there aren't many critters left roaming around there..brown is down...seems everyone that buys land puts up the 'all mine, keep out'..signs...in fact it is quite ugly when on a drive in the country..yellow posted signs littering along all the roads...hard to see the beauty anymore...even if you know you can't go in...oh and Fabs, you best act quick on the land thing..after all....they don't make any more ...(sort of like when someone waits to start a family till they can afford it..you never can..so not wait there)...lots of the people I have talked to on 'take a kid hunting' is worried about the liability issue...ah, the way it is now days...can see their point....
I got a new house in the woods and put up a tree stand only about 50 yds from the house...(got deer in archery out of it)...and a neighbor said someone was in it the first day of deer ...I wasn't out there and property not posted...???..yet? At least when they in my stand, they are pointing the other direction if they would shoot...but the guy in back corner has his tree stand right against prop line along with the 'posted..private...keep out signs'..I did put 'safety zone' signs up for him to look at when he is in his stand...if he wants to be that way...bet it was even him in my stand...had problems with this guy on another farm over 10 yrs ago...farmer told me other day he wish knew what he did to me back then..turns out this guy told farmer this year he would shoot all his critters etc if they came on his property...then had gull to ask..can I hunt your farm?....geez...so now the guy is stuck in his little patch of woods.1/2 acre...just happens to butt my line...one in every crowd guess......you know that is the very first deer I ever shot out of a tree stand...even though I own 4 of them....lol..even the buck I took this year I was eye to eye with him...but took doe from stand...got me one of those tree lounges and love it...only put on tree once to try out..never got to use yet..did part with my loggy climber though..ok..gettin off track with this guys post here...but...one more note...FAbs, that farm is the one that I told you is for sale...they dropped 200g and that deal fell in other wk or so...shame of it all is...my wife grandmother owned all the land out that way at one time...sold it off cause none of the kids they had wanted anything to do with farming..oh well...as stated ....nothing lasts forever..but I did manage to get a corner of the pie.whew..