SB 748- Deer Hunting Crop Damage Permit Wild Venison

[fabsroman]

I don't exactly think it is a great idea but anyone who thinks deer are going to be "Eliminated from the landscape" anytime soon is crazy.

Yeah, they probably felt the same way about the buffalo and ducks 100 years ago. Then, we needed to put laws in place to prevent the killing of the species in its entirety. How about those wolves?

If I could make money off of killing deer, I can assure you that during my free time I would be up on a stand. As it is right now, I prefer waterfowling over deer hunting, so I have not been in a stand for almost a decade now. If I can make $100 to $200 a deer, I'll kill 10+ a day given the opportunity. That is more money than some people make in a month.

 

[outrider58]

So what do the farmers ask in return of female hunters? I have no idea how to run a tractor or bailer, or the physique to toss hay bales into a barn. I never had issue with my trapping, no one asked me to do anything like that in return. Maybe since I am removing pesky raccoons and chicken eating foxes? I did offer to put some racks on panels, and one guy said he would love that but had so many he wasn't sure which ones to have done. Then one day I found out he was kinda mad at me for not doing it for him? He never bought any out for me to do! Other landowners I sent christmas cards to a couple times. I am so busy that time of year I forget though! Before the nuisance trapping laws were changed in MD, I use to trap some groundhogs in return, if there were any needing trapped.

Your critter control is helping farmers besides, there are plenty of things to be done around the farm that don't necessarily require a big, hulking farm boy.

 

[capinyoass]

Looks like the bill is dead.

 

[outrider58]

Looks like the bill is dead.

Sorry to those who were for it, I'm not gloating. I just think there's got to be a better way.

 

[44man]

I don't exactly think it is a great idea but anyone who thinks deer are going to be "Eliminated from the landscape" anytime soon is crazy.

when I started hunting 45 years or so ago the deer were under control. hunting was bucks only. I remember when they started having lotteries at the firehouses to get doe permits. people knew how to hunt back then. we didn't need crop damage permits because we had them under control enough they weren't needed. now with urbanization and large tracks of land not being hunted because of housing or whatever there are too may deer. what needs to happen is they need to make deer a nuisance animal, like ground hogs and let everyone shoot them all year long. if something doesn't happen soon enough mother nature will take over and even more will starve, get disease and get hit by cars until the population gets low enough that it controls itself.

if they all were gone I guess I would miss them or at least the fun of deer season with the guys, one or the other but it wouldn't really hurt my feelings.

 

[Vandy]

I guess I must have real crappy land to hunt. In my area I do not see a lot of deer (southern Anne Arundel). The last couple of years, more often than not, I will not see a deer the entire day. I think the most I saw, actually on our land, in any one day last season was 4. I took every reasonable shot that was offered last year -- zero during bow season, zero during muzzleloader, and three during shotgun. Two of those three were on a property in Charles County we had one time access to.

 

[wilcam47]

I guess I must have real crappy land to hunt. In my area I do not see a lot of deer (southern Anne Arundel). The last couple of years, more often than not, I will not see a deer the entire day. I think the most I saw, actually on our land, in any one day last season was 4. I took every reasonable shot that was offered last year -- zero during bow season, zero during muzzleloader, and three during shotgun. Two of those three were on a property in Charles County we had one time access to.

do you have game cameras up? Just because you dont see them doesnt mean they arent there at night or at a different time.

 

[foxtrapper]

Do you set bait out for them or have food plots? Could be every other hunter on adjoining lands is doing this and it draws the deer off the one you are on. I think when several have bait/good plots, the deer go back and forth to the different ones. My neighbor in Cecil may bait, and has a field with grass in it too ( which I do not have), but I had plenty of deer coming to my corn/Lethal Weapon piles. They did get pretty nocturnal after opening day of rifle though! 2 of my 3 deer I shot when there was only maybe 20 minutes of hunting time left. The 3rd I got when someone disturbed a bedding area and these 3 does were jumped and ran over to my shooting position, about 4:10pm.

 

[Vandy]

I do have a few cameras on the property. We have one mineral/salt lick and one feeder. Last year we had about 15 deer showing up, with a fairly even split between bucks and does. Before the season even started they mostly went nocturnal. After the opening weekend of bow about half of them stopped showing up at all. They started showing up again at night in late December.

Granted, this property is only about 17 acres in size. Route 4 is the boundary on one side, property on the second side does not allow hunting, and properties on the other two sides do hunt. Nothing has changed in terms of that over the last 15 years. Same properties, same hunters (or lack thereof), etc... The one adjacent property is trophy hunters only - I think they only took one buck last year. The other adjacent property that has hunters takes about 10 a year.

We usually take a handful of deer a year on the property, but for some reason, daylight activity the last two years has just fallen off a cliff. Talking to hunters on nearby properties (within a couple mile radius), they said they have experienced the same thing the last two years, with a ton of drop off.

We'll see how it goes this year to see if it was just a blip or if it is the new "normal"

 

[Sticky]

Your critter control is helping farmers besides, there are plenty of things to be done around the farm that don't necessarily require a big, hulking farm boy.

We pay a relatively small fee for property that we hunt, but in addition to that, we have insurance to protect the landowner, we police the property (there was a trespassing issue before we started to lease the land for hunting), we post the property boundaries every year, pick up any trash or debris along the road side of the property and also do our best to keep the place free of as many groundhogs as possible, since it is in a pretty active horse riding area (also a great time to take the AR out for some head practice!).

We treat it as if it were our own property, being careful about driving in the fields, never when it's wet out. Pretty simple, basic common sense and respect for his property. He also appreciates us keeping the deer population in check, as it is a feed farm for his other horse farm.

We have had the lease for years, never had any issues and I know for a fact he has been offered far more for the lease than we are paying him, but we are a responsible group and he likes us.

ETA: I am glad this bill is dead.. selling of wild game meats is bad.. always has been. Greed is a nasty thing when left unchecked, just look back at the market gunning days on the Shore and what it did to waterfowl populations for decades!