Possible new ESM Deer regs?

EASTON — Del. Johnny Mautz, R-37B-Talbot, is planning a public workgroup session for 4 p.m. this Saturday, Jan. 21, to discuss proposed deer management legislation for Talbot County and the Eastern Shore.
“We’re trying to think outside of the box and come up with ideas that won’t get bogged down in controversy here in Annapolis,” Mautz said. “There are arguments on all different sides and ideologies about who should be able to hunt when. I don’t want to argue with any of those. I understand where they come from, but I just want to find some results for the citizens.
“You want to take in everyone’s concerns and make sure you come up with the best fit so we can fix the problem,” he said. “We definitely have a problem and we definitely have to do something about it.”

Mautz said deer management has been a challenge not just throughout Talbot County but the whole Eastern Shore.
Not only does and uncontrollable deer population affect farmers by eating their crops, but also regular home owners, and they’re a big threat to drivers, he said.
“Just about every day there’s another deer on the side of the road,” he said. “I hit one this year, and it was very expensive and I lost my vehicle for a couple weeks. It’s the same just about everywhere you go on the Shore with the population.”
Mautz has two proposals to manage Talbot County’s deer population.
The first proposal originated from the farm bureau, he said, and it would allow the holder of a crop damage permit who has received a shooter proficiency card from the Maryland Department of Natural Resources to harvest deer with a rifle on their property in Talbot County.
“Farmers, in particular, are looking for any way they can to improve their ability to manage the population,” he said. “We’re not harvesting the number of deer that we need to, and the farmers, they’re frustrated because they don’t have an afternoon to be able to go out and hunt. They just want to be abel to harvest the deer, so they’re trying to find the most efficient means of doing that.”
Throughout the years, there have been various efforts in the legislature to allow Sunday hunting in different counties throughout the Eastern Shore as a means of managing the deer population. Mautz said there are so many different Sunday hunting proposals that it’s hard to keep track.


“We’ve come up with this hodgepodge of when you can or can’t hunt, the average hunter doesn’t know when you can or can’t hunt,” Mautz said. “One day you could hunt with a rifle in Caroline County, but you couldn’t hunt with a rifle in Dorchester or even Talbot.”
Mautz’s other proposal is to expand the hunting firearm season two weeks at the beginning of November. The current firearm season starts on the last Saturday of November, he said. Under the proposal, January would also be a firearm season for deer. Mautz proposes this be a five-year program, at the end of which the legislature would have to either make it permanent or make changes to it, depending on the impact to the deer herds.
The workgroup on the deer management proposals is planned for 4 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 21, in the Wye Oak Room of the Talbot County Community Center, 10028 Ocean Gateway, Easton. Representatives from the Maryland Department of Natural Resources and the Talbot County Farm Bureau will be in attendance.
A copy of the proposed legislation may be viewed on the Talbot County government website at www.talbotcountymd.gov. Mautz’s office may be contacted at 410-841-3429 should anyone require communications assistance or additional information.

Anybody go? What happened?

My suggestions:
Firearms Deer season should be extended and run for a month statewide;
Sundays should be allowed for all counties statewide;
Bow season should be extended to the end of February statewide;
When hunting with a bow of crossbow safety zone should be reduced from 150 yards to 150 feet statewide.

Put these in effect and review the numbers of deer killed in 5 year and see if additional changes are necessary.

I was staying below St. Michael's the past several days. On each trip to town St. Michael's and one trip to Easton there was a fresh road kill each day. We need to expand hunting. Having sharpshooters or farmers with crop damage permits shooting deer and leaving them in the woods should not be the primary manner of control. Hunters should be that control.

Good luck

Jerry

I think that firearms should be cropped back to a one week season and then supplemented with one or more split seasons that are not concurrent with the first, allow more Sunday opportunities and then have a pistol season with some expansion to MZ at some point like DE. As far as farmers are concerned they are already able to get a substantial number of crop damage permits. They could easily make an allowance for the landowner to distribute them to who ever they like to rid the area of problem critters. The trick is getting all that done while not interrupting the waterfowl hunters who may lease some ground and are water-fowling and not deer hunting. The last thing I would be worried about is roadkill, more than likely the same people who are hitting deer are the same ones who are looking at their phone instead of the road. I also don't know of any other locality where such a problem exists on the peninsula, maybe Mautz is only trying to placate his constituents delicately by making this everyone's problem instead of just allowing the local residents to dictate to the Ag community on how they are not managing their land properly.

Statewide Sunday hunting on private land
Longer/more firearms hunting. Extend the late season to a week and either extend the regular season or add an early season.
A year round private land bow season. Limited to 1 doe per month outside of normal hunting seasons.

jtb81100 said:

Statewide Sunday hunting on private land
Longer/more firearms hunting. Extend the late season to a week and either extend the regular season or add an early season.
A year round private land bow season. Limited to 1 doe per month outside of normal hunting seasons.

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Sounds good and that would suit me well, but the problem in Talbot I think is how better can other peoples land be managed by others and Johnny may be caught in the middle of it.

Sounds like a shed horn, body shop cornucopia over there.

I would NOT advocate any more splits than there already are. It's ridiculous enough now trying to keep up with the splits. DE is worse, nobody know what season is in at any given time. Open the season Sept 1 and run until Jan 31, Sundays included. Weapon of choice. Period. Then change the seasons again when/if the deer population is where the DNR wants it. You can't make firearms one week; it crams all gun hunters into the woods in one week. Two weeks is better; 4-8 weeks even better.

As crazy as it sounds at first, there are other states that have much longer seasons, like VA, and there are no issues at all. But all of this is moot because the bow hunters (I am one) in general (not me), whine and cry every time the muzzleloaders or gun hunters encroach on "their" part of the season. They fought the 2nd gun week, the early muzzleloader season, the 2-day late gun season, etc. Whether anybody likes it or not, when it comes to significantly reducing deer numbers, the gun hunters are who gets it done. Extending ML or archery ain't gonna get it done, nor is shortening gun season.

They already know that when the highest concentrations of hunters are in the woods more game is taken. In Pa when the game commission over issued doe tags they already knew winter kill wold crop a bunch back. Biologist also already know that a species will proliferate when it is aggressively being hunted. Do you really think the DNR should bear the sole responsibility for getting the deer population "where they want it". At least in this instance John invited public input into the forum, I'm all about expansion for more hunting opportunities as long as its done wisely. As far as keeping up with the splits all one has to do is read the regs. In regard to Virginia, Ill leave that one alone, nearly every county has different regulations. Imagine having to only be able to shoot from a treestand on one side of the farm and then keeping up with something different if your farm borders two counties.

The way I see it, we(certain areas) have more deer than we can possibly use. We don't have enough hunters to keep up with an ever increasing deer population.

Doco Overboard said:

Do you really think the DNR should bear the sole responsibility for getting the deer population "where they want it". At least in this instance John invited public input into the forum, I'm all about expansion for more hunting opportunities as long as its done wisely. As far as keeping up with the splits all one has to do is read the regs. In regard to Virginia, Ill leave that one alone, nearly every county has different regulations. Imagine having to only be able to shoot from a treestand on one side of the farm and then keeping up with something different if your farm borders two counties.

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I never said the DNR should bear sole responsibility. Don't know where you got that. They should be the one to set the target numbers and then hunters should bear the responsibility for getting there.

Splits are totally unnecessary. If it's deemed that a total of 4 weeks of gun season are required, have 4 consecutive weeks. Don't have 2 weeks here, 1 week there, 3 days here, and then 4 days over there. Makes no sense. The only changing dynamic during the season is the rut. Mold the seasons around that if you must.

I still believe the full season should be weapon of choice. First thing that pops up in people's minds with that is floods of pumpkins covering the woods every day of the entire 120 or so day season. I believe if you were to elongate the season, it would just offer more choices of when people could go which would result in less hunter concentration during any one time.

outrider58 said:

The way I see it, we(certain areas) have more deer than we can possibly use. We don't have enough hunters to keep up with an ever increasing deer population.

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Absolutely. The annual harvest still lags the reproductive addition to the population. We as hunters have to get this under control, and the only way to do that is to increase opportunities to the groups of hunters most likely to get it done. I DO NOT want the population to get to a point where the state feels they have to hire (at my expense) "snipers" to thin the herd as has happened in other circumstances. We all lose then. Increased state taxes to fund it. "They" will determine that the snipers are more effective and thus more are needed. Hunters will have less impact and thus less input. It may even get to the point that in the interest of public safety, all population control should be handled by the state.

outrider58 said:

The way I see it, we(certain areas) have more deer than we can possibly use. We don't have enough hunters to keep up with an ever increasing deer population.

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So true, and no access to get to them.

No Bisleyfan 44, you said "if the population is where the DNR wants it" in post #7, I'm asking if you think that burden should be their sole responsibility? Me personally I don't believe it is and the responsibility for control has certainly been purposely out of the states control by lack of ownership by the state in relation to private lands for some time, they have already relegated the requirement for license to only extend to non land owners and certainly dont want or need the headache of having to be responsible for a bunch of deer ruining someones car. The important thing to remember here is that in this instance a problem exists in Talbot county, I for one am not aware of a similar problem in Dorchester or any where else on the shore where the deer harvest is not adequate to provide an acceptable margin of public safety.I'm really not over-concerned about the arrival of state designated sharpshooters coming on my land or having to pay for them anytime soon either and I'm also pretty sure a 4 week firearms season is not going to do anybody any favors if applied to such a broad area, even if its only done incrementally. I do agree with your statement on weapon of choice, I could never figure out why a state would want to determine choice of weapon with a one buck limit like PA unless its just to pacify anti bow-hunters or non traditional muzzle loader hunters ruining it for the firearms hunters. As far as to actual deer numbers I don't believe DNR has a clue since the check in stations went by the way side. How many hunters do you think would report taking additional antler-less deer just to be able to tag a buck if one comes along? Do you really also think that all deer that are taken are also being legitimately checked in as well? If folks are worried about access and money all Chesapeake lands that were purchased could be opened to public hunters, probably only 10% of it is being utilized at any one time anyhow... and for some hunters, the refuge doesn't count towards state bag limit and you might even be able to leave a portable stand attached overnight, plenty of access there you just have to hump it in old school style and know where the boundaries are.

If you ask me the deer population is exploding In areas that hunters don't have access to.

There are many farms that don't have hunters on them for what ever reason.

Have incentives for farmers to use hunters to control herd numbers.

And put a cap on leasing prices, that's more out of control than the deer. Losing a lease because someone out bid you is wrong.

There are states that don't allow charging for hunting rights.

I don't know if private leases are where the best deer hunting is, I collect a lot of bones on public lands. Private leases are where the easiest deer hunting is. For 4 wheelers, baiting, driving trucks around and just getting away. I see the same thing every year, once the 4 wheeler rodeo starts the evening of the 24th, its over for the most part. After opening day it slows up real quick and even then most deer that are killed are more than likely being driven by someone else. Thats when the highest probability is for success, when people are in the woods, even on big pieces of land. Thats why I advocated a one week firearms season earlier on and then supplementing it at intervals with different methods for people who are in to advanced hunting or who cant make it for some particular reason. I get a real kick out of those who lease lands and then begin to start to think they own them, to the point that they want to tell family and friends what to do when they see them on there. Raising the rent is just a polite way of getting rid of people and the most painless way for a landowner to give the boot. The last thing a guy around my way who tills a lot of land is worried about is paying the rent, especially if theres timber there.

hammer said:

If you ask me the deer population is exploding In areas that hunters don't have access to.

There are many farms that don't have hunters on them for what ever reason.

Have incentives for farmers to use hunters to control herd numbers.

And put a cap on leasing prices, that's more out of control than the deer. Losing a lease because someone out bid you is wrong.

There are states that don't allow charging for hunting rights.

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Incentives are a great idea. I would love to see more states adapt more of a Texas type rubric(if you will), where individual ranchers are educated on land/game management and control there own properties base on land carrying capacities and other determining factors in conjunction with state assessments.

Caps on leasing is an enticing idea, one I, as a poor boy can understand. Especially out east here where the number of hunters in a given area sometimes have to compete with fewer and fewer places to hunt. I think if we adapted a more liberal management program, letting farmers and property owners manage their own lands with the help and guidance of state biologists with the same goals at heart, might be a more (hate to use this word) 'comprehensive' way to deal with this problem.

Maybe a good incentive would be for the state to ease up on nutrient management programs and stop trying to get hand dug ditches from the 30's to run north?

Doco id like to invite you to hunt tuckahoe on opening day , it's ridiculous what goes on there.

Or take a ride to pocomoke state forrest and look at what the state did to the woods.

I don't know what percentage has been clear cut, but most of what I used to hunt is unhuntable. The woods have grown up so thick that the deer have a had time getting through it.

It's a free for all on most public lands. I'd will quit hunting than put up with the shenanigans and probably live longer too.

I apologize to the person who started this thread, it wasn't my intention to hijack it.

hammer said:

Doco id like to invite you to hunt tuckahoe on opening day , it's ridiculous what goes on there.

Or take a ride to pocomoke state forrest and look at what the state did to the woods.

I don't know what percentage has been clear cut, but most of what I used to hunt is unhuntable. The woods have grown up so thick that the deer have a had time getting through it.

It's a free for all on most public lands. I'd will quit hunting than put up with the shenanigans and probably live longer too.

I apologize to the person who started this thread, it wasn't my intention to hijack it.

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You haven't lived til you've had rounds popping by your head.

Last time I almost got shot was by someone on private land, they had leased a piece from Mr. Shufelt and it was while I was walking down Hicksburg Rd. They wanted to know if the situation could be minimized because Jim or Joe or whatever that amateurs name was worked for NSA. Oh, okay that makes it all good, the SOB tried to pull some John Wayne running shot stuff at a doe and didn't see me until he almost hit me in the foot. To top it off, they drove a van out into some no till and got it stuck to the frame, but that's another story and guys wonder why people wont let them on. But I can guarantee you one thing, that's where the deer are in a clear cut area, but yes it is a problem if you are looking for a total experience and you don't want to stare at a two by two hole for 9 hours until a booner comes through after passing up 30 does. I hunted all the places you describe and yes I know it gets tiresome and access can be a problem as well, but the thinking that some have of whats yours is mine is blowing my mind. I had a guest hunter from private property come on me ( where my residence is) and smash up a wooden box feeder because he thought it was some sort of Blind! It was in the alfalfa field right next to the house. Last time I checked you need to be at least 150yds. and the owner had to apologize big deal. Like I said there is more than enough opportunity to have quality time on public lands and with a little homework it can pay off. I'm driving down 404 this afternoon and look over and see a potential honey-hole right along the construction zone in plain site. The state clear cut a big piece right up the rd from me and I cant wait for it to turn into a cut-over mess chock full of deer. I could go on and tell you about the time I was watching a small buck over at marshy hope with field glasses and someone shot it in full view of the binos and wasn't even wearing orange, but hey that's state right? so I know your pain without the exception of mine that night dragging a 4 point out. My bottom line is this, if there is a problem with deer wreaking havoc in a small area address it there by whatever means are appropriate by meaningful landowner/public relations, but I for one do not favor an expansion to a larger geographical area which could potentially harm the resources that are already there and are somewhat balanced just because buffy/biff has a hard time keeping a straight bumper on her car in Talbot Co. The dupe here is, hey lets open it up and have a month long firearms season and its good for hunters and easier to know when all the Sundays line up in different counties and so on. Ask a PA hunter how that goes after a while.....nothing. Historical time period photographs and face to face actual hunter accounts do not corroborate an increase of the size or quality of antlered deer to any greater extent than what it is today from what I have observed. At least where I hunt in Schuylkill co. If that story came off with a number of deer/per acre number that have been determined by a method, to be present, I could buy some of it but I'm not digging it. They forgot the basis and on the outward appearance it seems as if its a win for sportsman I just don't believe its beneficial in the long run.....that's all. See you at the next public forum, if I'm aware of it or I'm going to say something to Johnny at the breakfast if he comes.

Get a state issued qualification card to shoot crop damage on your own land? I wonder if there is sensitivity training as part of the syllabus.