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Your ideas to fix the future of hunting!

I hate to derail this thread, I have not attended any college in Wi, but grew-up for Saturday afternoon Badger games and Sunday Packer games, no matter how much either team sucked back them. All my credits have come from City College of Chicago and University of Maryland while in the Army.
 
I grew up a Packers and Badgers fan (manditory in my family). Although my "top" allegences have shifted with the location I have lived, secondarily, I'm will always be a Packers and Badgers fan.

However, you will have to learn real quick to be a Titans and Vols fan (if you want to get along with most of the locals!).
 
Rubberduck270 said:
Football Hunter said:
No idea,my son used to wanna go with me all the time,hot ,cold,didnt matter,just loved it.Now,since he turned about 14,he has no interest,maybe been twice in the last 3 years.Baffles me.
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He's more worried about chasing 2 legged Whitetails now. He'll come back to hunting in a couple years.
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+1! It's not you, Dad. It's just the teenage years and socialization with peers. Maybe take him and a friend both shooting and/or hunting - might do'em both good!
 
This is a tough topic, and I'm certain my remarks on fixing the future of hunting will be taken as pessimism and chicken little syndrome, so I apologize up front. I personally don't think we can "fix" the problem for several reasons, not the least of which is most folks today don't see it as a problem for many of the reasons already mentioned. It is a problem/concern for us because we care about hunting (and fishing and just being afield).

Many of us in the 50+ range grew up in a rural area and agriculture was common. That's changed - seems today the kids are mostly urban and agriculture has diminished due to residential expansion and changing work forces, which means there are fewer places to hunt or just get out to enjoy nature. Farming is hard work; farmers (or the children who inherited the family farm) can make more money by selling the property for development than they can trying to fight the regulations, droughts, insects, fuel costs, equipment and maintenance costs, etc.

My Dad took me to the country (and we lived outside the city limits on several acres then) almost every weekend and many week day afternoons. I loved the outdoors and biology - especially field biology - was my favorite subject in high school and college. Today, most biology students in college are going for the lab courses, not field courses. DNA, microbiology, etc. are the hot topics - I took some upper division biology students to do a stream survey last fall and the majority of them would not get near the water because there were weeds between the parking lot and the stream - several bailed early because of mosquitoes. The number of field biology instructors has decreased and the number of lab-oriented instructors has increased over the last decade in many universities.

We know there's a problem recruiting hunters. Our society has changed and it will continue to change - probably not along the lines of going back to what some here have expressed as being the "good old days" of family values and moral behavior. The issues with organized sports (and parents) many of you have so accurately described is now the norm for a growing population of urban dwellers.

As more people become urbanites, the less interest they'll have in hunting and fishing - the consumptive sports. In fact, just the opposite trend might well be the norm - PETA, HSUS et al will gain members thru collective ignorance of wildlife management principles and this will result in more pressure on those who do hunt. There is already a substantial trend among some "hunters' to pay to shoot an animal in a pen and feel like they've really had a great "hunt." Remember the early "hunts" where a guy could sit at his computer and shoot an animal with a mouse click? Awards for shooting genetically engineered animals.

I could go on, but it does seem to me that the loss of habitat, places to hunt, and changing societal "norms" are stacked against hunters of the future. Hopefully, I'm wrong. Hopefully, someone will find ways to reverse the current trend and begin increasing the number of hunters and places to hunt. I sure hope so - very much.
 
In all seriousness, To fix the Future of Hunting, encourage your fellow Hunter,Don't argue over what they shouldn't have shot or what they did shoot. And support a child that Hunts, encourage them not to quit and take time out to pass on your knowledge to them. And invest in land. God hasn't made any new land in awhile (Not saying he can't) so you'll have somewhere to hunt now and you can leave it for your Grandkids to hunt when you go on to meet the Lord.
 
Most of the kids that used to hunt with my group won't even talk about going to the woods to deer hunt. All they ever say when you mention it is "I don't want to go because we hardly ever see anything" They will go coon hunting and squirrel hunting still but won't have anything to do with deer hunting. We have about a 500 acre lease surrounded by public land and the deer are few and far between on the lease and even I gave up on the public land. I think it would be easier to get kids to go if the TWRA would lower the bag limit on deer dramatically(at least in my area) so they would get to see a deer or two if they spend the day in the woods. I think the 3 deer a day limit has hurt the future of deer hunting more than anything. It has let the "if its brown its down" people kill them so thin that the kids refuse to go due to not seeing deer.
 
We do take them small game hunting but why not try to keep kids involved in all the hunting you can. The TWRA has effectively run off a lot of the kids and future revenue by allowing the greedy to kill every deer they see. It's a problem that can be fixed if the TWRA cared to enough to fix it.
 
Hardwoodmaterials said:
We do take them small game hunting but why not try to keep kids involved in all the hunting you can. The TWRA has effectively run off a lot of the kids and future revenue by allowing the greedy to kill every deer they see. It's a problem that can be fixed if the TWRA cared to enough to fix it.
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how many people do you know that kill 3 deer a day? the deer are still there but when you start shooting at them, they make themselves invisible. even with the 3/day limit, there are not enough does being shot in a lot of places. TWRA knows what they are doing.
 
If the deer was still here I could show them to you. We coon hunt a couple nights a week and would see deer with our hunting lights if they were still around. I know a few that have killed 2-3 deer a day for a couple days in a row when the new bag limits started but not now. What wipes out your deer population is the ones that shoot every deer they see every day of season. Especially on public lands. I have found piles of whole deer thrown out in the ditch when the 3 a day limit started. Not so much now since the only ones seeing deer are the ones managing their own private land. The TWRA has completely dropped the ball on this and the only ones that won't admit it are the ones not from my area and the TWRA.
 
Football Hunter said:
No idea,my son used to wanna go with me all the time,hot ,cold,didnt matter,just loved it.Now,since he turned about 14,he has no interest,maybe been twice in the last 3 years.Baffles me.
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Too many other things occupy their high school years......he will come back around prob in a few more..........if he really enjoyed it to begin with. My older did, but my younger could care less, and he never really got into it any way.
 

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