True or False?

scn said:
That would be a big T for me. There isn't much hunting ability exposed when sitting over a bait pile.
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For me, true as well. Or should I say, no need for hunting skill. Doesn't mean the hunter doesn't have skills. And that goes for sitting over a 1/4-acre food plot. Chip-shot for anywhere in the plot. I have such plots, but I don't hunt over them, unless I'm trying to get a young person their first deer.
 
Never mind "baiting" for certain game animals in certain states can be "legal".
"Legal" doesn't necessarily mean "good idea".
Prostitution is also legal in some places.
Good idea or bad idea, depends on who you ask.

But "Baiting" for deer & turkey seems to be prostituting one's hunting ethics?

Where illegal, baiting is most certainly "stealing".
Those who kill game over illegal bait are stealing from those who play by the rules.

I will not say baiting for deer is "cheating" when it's "legal",
but if you kill a deer over a bait pile, it was more about shooting than hunting,
and ironically, very little shooting skill needed either.

And best I can tell, those who routinely bait, never develop or simply lose what most might consider real hunting skills.
 
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It CAN be one of those "value" issues as to just where one will draw his lines.

"Food plots" are in most situations considered "legal".
So are big fields.
In my experiences, the larger the field, the bigger it's draw to deer.
A 1/4-acre "food plot" commonly has less attraction to deer than a 4-acre mowed field.

I do not consider sitting over a 1/4-acre food plot a compromise of hunting ethics anything like as much as sitting over a poured on the ground pile of corn. Personally, I look at most small food plots as fool plots. Routinely hunting them can be as counter-productive as productive, and usually very counterproductive in terms of harvesting older deer.

By contrast, sitting over a continuously re-filled corn feeder continuously brings deer to the same spot. This does not happen when sitting over a field, and we can actually state "any" field is to some degree a "food plot". The smaller that field, the more akin to a bait pile.

At what point is the outing more about shooting than hunting?

Is hunting a large hay field (without any "food plots"), where you can shoot deer 400 yds any direction, more about shooting or hunting?

And with some species of hunting, the very nature of the sport may in fact be more about shooting?
Think of dove hunting.
"Baiting" in the doves, whether legal or illegal, may contribute to shooting skills more than hunting skills?

Just saying, the lines can get really blurry really fast.

This is why many state game agencies allow "legal" baiting via "cultivated" fields (or even 1/4-acre food plots), but draw the line at any "food" item POURED from a bag, and/or simply thrown on the ground or into a "feeder" (to be "fed" rather than "grown").
 
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Spotlighting is real challenge of hunting … I mean there is no hiding the fact you are there, shining my 100 million candlepower spotlight when everyone else is worried their 10 lumen light will spook the deer when they are going to the stand,. Not to mention the straight piped v8 and the natural ice cans falling from the floorboard when I jump out and take aim
 
I have hunted in a lot of areas and have a different perspective. Should it be illegal like it is in TN? Yes. Should baiting be legal for deer in places like Florida, Georgia coast, etc, like it is? Yes. The only other effective tactic in much of that palmetto infested area is to use dogs. This is simply my opinion.
 
I've only hunted over bait one time. It was legal where I did it. It was also one of the easiest hunts I've been on. It's not for me. All that said, there was a science to how my buddy baits and when he hunts his baits. There is a certain skill involved. It doesn't meet my implied definition of hunting, but it does his. So, my final answer is "false".
 
To me, as long as it is legal it's fine. Skills come in different forms, there are many here that require dogs to follow a blood trail and others that can do it in the dark. Some make extensive use of cameras, and others just go in "blind", while others go on guided hunts.
 
Rabbitkil said:
Spotlighting is real challenge of hunting … I mean there is no hiding the fact you are there, shining my 100 million candlepower spotlight when everyone else is worried their 10 lumen light will spook the deer when they are going to the stand,. Not to mention the straight piped v8 and the natural ice cans falling from the floorboard when I jump out and take aim
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Jump out and take aim? I just put the sandbag on the door and squeeze the trigger all the while having my Luke Bryan music going and the heat on 🤣. You're roughing it if you get outside the truck to shoot
 
I have hunted KY all my life where baiting was legal up until 2 years ago. I'm in one of the 5 counties of the high risk CWD BS. I have used corn in the past but can honestly say I've never killed a buck over corn whether it's a young buck or mature buck. I would put corn out mostly July through Sept to just get an inventory of what might be around. Once acorns start falling in Oct they will pass up 1,000 lbs of corn to find acorns. I can take it or leave it as it's never been an issue for me whether I, or someone else is baiting or not.
 
BSK said:
For me, true as well. Or should I say, no need for hunting skill. Doesn't mean the hunter doesn't have skills. And that goes for sitting over a 1/4-acre food plot. Chip-shot for anywhere in the plot. I have such plots, but I don't hunt over them, unless I'm trying to get a young person their first deer.
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Thanks for mentioning the Food Plots. Heck it can be a whole acre and you can cover it with a rifle and maybe a ML or shotgun, depending on design.

We discuss this every year sometimes 2x in a year and I will continue to say the same thing every time, which is there is no difference in a corn pile and a SMALL food plot, or really an AG field with food on it IMO. This goes back to my land managers vs. hunters thread, where I asked are we now more land managers (manipulating habitat to draw deer) than actual hunters.
TheLBLman said:
I will not say baiting for deer is "cheating" when it's "legal",
but if you kill a deer over a bait pile, it was more about shooting than hunting,
and ironically, very little shooting skill needed either.
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Again same applies to planting food plots and sitting in a shooting house then shooting a deer. As an FYI I plant food plots and sometimes sit over them and kill deer. Everyone I know who hunts generally does or has ag farms that they sit on cut corn fields etc. There is not really any true hunting skill in any those methods (bait, ag, or food plot) IMO. Marksmanship skills... sure, but not any real hunting skill.
 
knightrider said:
I really see it as no different than hunting over any other food source , still just waiting there to shoot something coming to eat whatever fiod source your "hunting" over
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To a point, this can be correct.
But it often isn't.

As to any "baiting" controversy, "baiting" seems to be more productive & more unethical for killing turkeys than killing deer.

When deer have certain wild-growing plants growing just about everywhere, they will often be cued in to simply roam around "browsing" for those plants. This could be honeysuckle, ragweed, greenbrier, even acorns, whatever. But if you have a steadily replenished corn feeder, that turns deer into habitually feeding at a specific "spot", instead of their normal roaming around "browsing" over a much larger area.

Sure, someone can argue a productive oak tree (when acorns are scarce) is someone akin to hunting over a corn feeder. I would argue you place & replenish the corn feeder, while you have to hunt to find that productive oak tree, which likely isn't the only one around.

I sometimes hunt near some big fields. I have at times positioned myself to have a 400-yd shot in 3 directions, yet never know where within that 400 yds a deer may step out. But more typically for me, the older bucks have a tendency to just suddenly be seen running full gallop never offering me a high probability shot.

For that reason, I usually pick a trail leading to the big field, and just hope what I'm after will choose the trail I'm watching instead of another. This is very different than hunting over a corn feeder.
 
TheLBLman said:
To a point, this can be correct.
But it often isn't.

As to any "baiting" controversy, "baiting" seems to be more productive & more unethical for killing turkeys than killing deer.

When deer have certain wild-growing plants growing just about everywhere, they will often be cued in to simply roam around "browsing" for those plants. This could be honeysuckle, ragweed, greenbrier, even acorns, whatever. But if you have a steadily replenished corn feeder, that turns deer into habitually feeding at a specific "spot", instead of their normal roaming around "browsing" over a much larger area.

Sure, someone can argue a productive oak tree (when acorns are scarce) is someone akin to hunting over a corn feeder. I would argue you place & replenish the corn feeder, while you have to hunt to find that productive oak tree, which likely isn't the only one around.

I sometimes hunt near some big fields. I have at times positioned myself to have a 400-yd shot in 3 directions, yet never know where within that 400 yds a deer may step out. But more typically for me, the older bucks have a tendency to just suddenly be seen running full gallop never offering me a high probability shot.

For that reason, I usually pick a trail leading to the big field, and just hope what I'm after will choose the trail I'm watching instead of another. This is very different than hunting over a corn feeder.
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Ive never hunted over a corn pile, but as easy as deer are to kill out of a producing oak, wheat plot, hay field, saddle between ridges, or even a ditch line funnel between wood lots i cant imagine a bag of corn on the ground would be any easier than what i already do, now i can see where it would be easier for folks who dont know how to hunt or who target turkeys with corn.
 


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