Badger Mountain Charlie SASS #43172 Posted October 16, 2020 Share Posted October 16, 2020 Looking at the autumn colors on Utah Bob's thread, got me to thinking. Always a bad thing. I grew up in Southern Illinois. Dreamed of deer hunting as a boy would. Not a deer to be found in Southern Illinois. In 1956 I moved to Michigan. Deer hunting at last. But, and there is always an ugly but, Southern Illinois introduced breeding deer not 15 miles from where I grew up. They took off and went fourth and multiplied. Now they are feasting on acorns from all the giant oak trees growing there. But BMC was not there to take advantage of it. However Michigan did permit me to stalk some big Whitetails. But a day late and a dollar short for Illinois. Phase II. Moved to Michigan as above. Fished for local fish, perch, bluegill, bass. No Salmon, and never heard of a steelhead, much less seen one or fished for one. Moved to Washington State in 1966. Michigan imported some coho salmon to take care of the alewife coming into the Great Lakes via the St. Lawrence Seaway. Millions of alewife = fat salmon. No more stinky beaches for Michigan. At some time later they also imported some chinook (king) salmon. Both species grew fat and large and bountiful. But, there it is again, BMC was not there to take advantage of it. In the meanwhile, Washington has had to reduce the harvest of fish for what ever reason you a want to believe. I must have the stink on me! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sixgun Sheridan Posted October 16, 2020 Share Posted October 16, 2020 Washington state is abundant with wildlife, but the leftist tree-huggers don't want you to harvest any of it, even if you're a local tribe! The cost of hunting licenses is through the roof, and the places where you can hunt legally are shrinking with every year as hikers and flower-sniffers demand that every wooded area within 20 miles of a hiking trail be closed to shooting or hunting. I'm sure it's just as much a PITA to go fishing as well. One wrong tag or wrong box marked on your permit and it'll be a stiff fine from the fishing police. The anti-gun people like to point to statistics showing that hunting is on the decline to prove that gun ownership is also on the decline. What they don't realize is that many gun owners simply don't bother with hunting anymore because the fun and enjoyment has largely been taken out of it due to excessive regulation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maddog McCoy SASS #5672 Posted October 16, 2020 Share Posted October 16, 2020 I remember when I saw my first deer in Southern Illinois. Looked out the back door and i saw the head of a deer at the tree line of our woods for just a brief second. It was around 1974 or 1975. Last night I was driving from town to my farm and I had one on the side of the road that thought about running out in from of me, and 6 that ran when I turn on the road to the farm, and one that just looked at me and flipped it's tail up in salute and slowly walked away through the cornfield. On an average day, I see 5 -10 deer and the other day I had a mother and 2 small deer about 20 feet from the back door in front of my practice targets for cowboy. The deer are so plentiful now that they ruined 20 acres of beans on the other side of hill on my neighbor's property twice in 2 years and he finally gave up planting the field as he could not get a crop off of it. The DNR has turned loose Bobcats and has tracking chips in them., They turned loose coyotes years ago and they are open season year round due to the trouble they cause and I can hear them howl every night and they are getting closer to the house daily. I have 2 deer permit for shotgun season and my brother in law got a small buck 2 weeks ago with his crossbow. I have not seen any turkeys in a couple weeks but saw as many as 30 of them in a group last spring. Sometimes I wonder if the DNR knows what they are doing and I have one neighbor trying to get a nuisance permit for deer as they are destroying a lot of his crops. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Badger Mountain Charlie SASS #43172 Posted October 16, 2020 Author Share Posted October 16, 2020 13 minutes ago, Maddog McCoy SASS #5672 said: I remember when I saw my first deer in Southern Illinois. Looked out the back door and i saw the head of a deer at the tree line of our woods for just a brief second. It was around 1974 or 1975. Last night I was driving from town to my farm and I had one on the side of the road that thought about running out in from of me, and 6 that ran when I turn on the road to the farm, and one that just looked at me and flipped it's tail up in salute and slowly walked away through the cornfield. On an average day, I see 5 -10 deer and the other day I had a mother and 2 small deer about 20 feet from the back door in front of my practice targets for cowboy. The deer are so plentiful now that they ruined 20 acres of beans on the other side of hill on my neighbor's property twice in 2 years and he finally gave up planting the field as he could not get a crop off of it. The DNR has turned loose Bobcats and has tracking chips in them., They turned loose coyotes years ago and they are open season year round due to the trouble they cause and I can hear them howl every night and they are getting closer to the house daily. I have 2 deer permit for shotgun season and my brother in law got a small buck 2 weeks ago with his crossbow. I have not seen any turkeys in a couple weeks but saw as many as 30 of them in a group last spring. Sometimes I wonder if the DNR knows what they are doing and I have one neighbor trying to get a nuisance permit for deer as they are destroying a lot of his crops. I suppose you can thank Stinky BMC for that. My cousin lives in Cape Girardeau, over the Missouri side. He has been able to hunt over there since day 1. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Forty Rod SASS 3935 Posted October 16, 2020 Share Posted October 16, 2020 Where I grew up in Logan, Utah we had mule deer and elk all around. In the winter they were found n town on school grounds. on the tabernacle square, in streets, and in yards all over the valley. I left there in 1965 and never hunted there again. The town has grown and my brother-in-law says he hasn't seen a deer in years, BUT three years ago he sent me a few pictures of four albino elk in Logan Canyon about ten miles up. They were wading in the ice cold river and grazing along the banks. They are apparently gone now. He hasn't seen them since and has no idea what became of those three. We have mule deer, white tails, black tails and something about the size of a collie dog called coues (SP?) deer. Lots of them on the VA hospital grounds and in some of the parks around. In the hills west of Prescott they are roaming around the housing developments all the time. We akso had Pronghorns in my neighborhood up until four years ago where the relocated" then so people could buy ticky tacky houses on their range. Saw on elk a mile north of my house the first year we were here, but that is the only one. Even the javelinas seem to be disappearing, but we still have bobcats and foxes around.....a few. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michigan Slim Posted October 16, 2020 Share Posted October 16, 2020 Your always welcome in my camp. I promise you will see deer. I promise you that you will get a slight hangover. I promise you that you will gain a few pounds. The salmon run up every creek around, some two inches deep. Steelhead in all the streams right now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sixgun Sheridan Posted October 16, 2020 Share Posted October 16, 2020 3 hours ago, Forty Rod SASS 3935 said: Where I grew up in Logan, Utah we had mule deer and elk all around. In the winter they were found n town on school grounds. on the tabernacle square, in streets, and in yards all over the valley. Where I live we have deer wandering the neighborhoods all the time. I think they're using us as human shields. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Badger Mountain Charlie SASS #43172 Posted October 16, 2020 Author Share Posted October 16, 2020 27 minutes ago, Michigan Slim said: Your always welcome in my camp. I promise you will see deer. I promise you that you will get a slight hangover. I promise you that you will gain a few pounds. The salmon run up every creek around, some two inches deep. Steelhead in all the streams right now. 11 minutes ago, Sixgun Sheridan said: Where I live we have deer wandering the neighborhoods all the time. I think they're using us as human shields. This was my orchard before I moved. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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