• If you enjoy the forum please consider supporting it by signing up for a NES Membership  The benefits pay for the membership many times over.

Doe tag day today!!

Mark from MA said:
First off, im not telling anyone not to use a permit. If your happy with the herd in your hunt area then by all means shoot. If its the only deer you see all year.... Well thats not so smart.

I hunt places where there is a good herd and hunting ma is like a barren wasteland to me. People that hunted average areas in MA have no idea what a good herd is

Yes, trust the state, we trust them on this website all the time right?

My belief is they dole out permits based on what the insurance companies bitch about. If it was up to them there would be no deer
I have not heard of them doing arial surveys of deer here, maybe the do i dont know but that is the professional way of doing it. I think they guess for the most part or use kill stats which are very unscientific. .

There are good pockets of deer west of 495. Where Arlow hunts is a good example. Some richer towns out by springfield limit it and are hard to hunt. If you get into those towns there is some good hunting.

Ive hunted zone 5,8,and 3. And the trend for me over 20 plus years has bedn very negative. Bavk when i started shotgun was one week, one buck only, and getting a doe tag was like winning the lottery. There was 3 days of muzzleloader and only a month of archery.

In a relatively short time, theyve doubled the available seasons or more, made it way easier to get a doe permit, and added an extra buck tag to the license. Probably all in all a 75 percent increase in hunting time and a 50 percent in increase in tags. Not baby steps.

Now add to that the expansion of the coyotes over 20 years. And the brown is down mentality thatsso prevalent in this state because the herd sucks. So the average hunter shoots anything they see.
What i question is did the deer herd increase that much to warrant that. Not in the areas i hunt. And ive seen first hand the results.

So i choose not to use a doe tag, i also choose not to shoot small bucks for the most part either. I generally stick to bowhunting my ct spots now anyway. I m guarenteed to see a deer every hunt. I dont shoot them all the time but at least its a nice day afield seeing them.
Click to expand...

I could be wrong - but I think that the '98' law Mittens signed drastically reduced the number of gun permit holders and similarly impacted the number of hunters. So less total hunters means more tags for the remaining hunters. Most I speak to seem to think deer are overpopulated. I didn't see many in the woods this last year - but I think that's just because I'm not very good at hunting yet...

Got a tag in zone 11.... No surprise there though...
 
Last edited:
Got my surplus zone 11 tag, but I rarely hunt off Cape. I think I'll start roaming the woods off Cape on my way into work between the 2nd week in December and the 31st. I took the first week off of shotgun deer this year.
 
45collector said:
Got my surplus zone 11 tag, but I rarely hunt off Cape. I think I'll start roaming the woods off Cape on my way into work between the 2nd week in December and the 31st. I took the first week off of shotgun deer this year.
Click to expand...

I put in for 1 Dec and 3 Dec for vactation days. Depending on how I make out on those days and any time I have in the afternoons after work I may/may not get sick on the 15th or 16th of December [smile]
 
I take the week off and even if none of my hunting buds take the entire week off as well, I'll still go out solo and walk quietly as I can in some of the (deepest the outer Cape has to offer) woods and hope to have dumb luck and sneak up on something. There are areas in Wellfleet and Truro that are fairly easy to walk quietly through and the wind is usually coming off the ocean, through the woods and right into your face. There is some really beautiful scenery out there anyhow so just getting through those scrub pine woods and out to the huge dunes is worth the time even if no deer are to be found. I love to hike with or without a long gun. Honestly once guns start thundering away all over the Cape on Dec 1st, the chances are less and less of creeping up on a deer during daylight.

I'd imagine even the gun shots of pheasant and early duck which start a few days before archery probably effects the success of the guys who bow hunt deer. I never got into bow but I'm seriously considering it for next season. It's just a whole other set of gear, tactics, and experience to get into and thus far I haven't bothered. I'm not real big on climbing trees either.

In the past seasons my buddies have gone back to work after the 2nd or 3rd day of shotgun and I'll just be wandering the Cape alone with my scoped 12g Winchester. A few times after hiking my ass off I've just said "Screw this I'm going duck hunting the last few of my days off." [wink]
 
I Love bow season and I'm glad it opens before shotgun. It leaves the woods untouched since the last season of muzzleloader, 10 months ago. I don't have to worry about a group of guys marching through the woods in orange, hooting and barking like dogs, trying to drive deer. Just me and my climber, my bow and months of shooting, preparing and scouting. I try to tag out during archery before my public land spots get ruined by guys who decide, "hey, lets go deer hunting instead of pheasant hunting today". Bow hunters are a special group, they respect each other, put in a lot of time and practice, and scout a lot, as you need to get close to the animal. Commit to taking a deer with a bow and see what I mean.
 
kjm1022 said:
I Love bow season and I'm glad it opens before shotgun. It leaves the woods untouched since the last season of muzzleloader, 10 months ago. I don't have to worry about a group of guys marching through the woods in orange, hooting and barking like dogs, trying to drive deer. Just me and my climber, my bow and months of shooting, preparing and scouting. I try to tag out during archery before my public land spots get ruined by guys who decide, "hey, lets go deer hunting instead of pheasant hunting today". Bow hunters are a special group, they respect each other, put in a lot of time and practice, and scout a lot, as you need to get close to the animal. Commit to taking a deer with a bow and see what I mean.
Click to expand...

You think the woods are untouched after the new year? LOL.
Its funny to me; the way hunters like you perceive hunters like me. You are the snob of the woods, and you have no clue how much time, effort, shooting and scouting I do to prepare for deer.
 
45collector said:
You think the woods are untouched after the new year? LOL.
Its funny to me; the way hunters like you perceive hunters like me. You are the snob of the woods, and you have no clue how much time, effort, shooting and scouting I do to prepare for deer.
Click to expand...
Some people walk the walk and some people talk the walk. I'll help a fellow hunter with some tips,etc, but some guys sound like they are bragging. It's a sign of the times.;)
 
^Yeah, cuz you know.... pheasant and deer season are open at the same time and the woods become a warzone:/
 
kjm1022 said:
I Love bow season and I'm glad it opens before shotgun. It leaves the woods untouched since the last season of muzzleloader, 10 months ago. I don't have to worry about a group of guys marching through the woods in orange, hooting and barking like dogs, trying to drive deer. Just me and my climber, my bow and months of shooting, preparing and scouting. I try to tag out during archery before my public land spots get ruined by guys who decide, "hey, lets go deer hunting instead of pheasant hunting today". Bow hunters are a special group, they respect each other, put in a lot of time and practice, and scout a lot, as you need to get close to the animal. Commit to taking a deer with a bow and see what I mean.
Click to expand...
Nominaton for the most "full of themselves " post of the year right here. Yeah bow hunters are special.........please. I know plenty fat.....lazy......full of themselves bow hunters that wander the woods every year too. Anyway......good luck this season ......but you probably don't need it......being the great white hunter and all.
 
45collector said:
You think the woods are untouched after the new year? LOL.
Its funny to me; the way hunters like you perceive hunters like me. You are the snob of the woods, and you have no clue how much time, effort, shooting and scouting I do to prepare for deer.
Click to expand...

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to 45collector again.
 
71montess said:
Some people walk the walk and some people talk the walk. I'll help a fellow hunter with some tips,etc, but some guys sound like they are bragging. It's a sign of the times.;)
Click to expand...

Bragging is one thing. Everyone likes to show off a nice kill and whatnot. It's the guys who think they own public land and look down their noses on anyone who doesn't bow hunt that are the crybabies. They are hunting over a month before the shotgun season kicks off and they have all that time to land a thwack or two before the orange army sweeps through their shooting lanes. If you can't stick one within those 35 or so days you have in the woods before Dec 1st, chances are it isn't the shotgun guys that are going to screw you out of a deer this year.

I respect the sportsmanship of bow because yeah, deer have been taken by bow for thousands of years and it requires a certain set of skills and of course a lot of patience. FWIW I don't get involved with the huge groups of guys who push deer in places like Otis or the Islands. Right on brother if that's your thing but for me it's just too many guns swinging around. It's legal to push deer in MA after all, and you can be successful with only a handful of guys even in a large area. The group of guys I go with (we've all been friends since before high school) are rarely more than 5 heads, and we have several areas across the Cape that we scout out every year before December and we make planned strategies before we walk in. Many of these places are so difficult to get to we rarely see any other hunters at all. We fall into tidal rivers and get soaked for the rest of the day, get torn to pieces by prickers, walk long distances out to big marshlands and we have a great time doing it whether we fill a tag or not. The best part of it is talking shit to each other and joking around. I enjoy hunting alone, and hunting with friends equally for different reasons.

Anyhow enough of the long-winded garbage (referring to myself that is). Everyone's got their own idea of what hunting really is, and God willing the bow guys get their deer, we shotgun and primitive guys get ours, and we can all share the woods and not get all territorial and pissy about it.
 
Last edited:
I think you misunderstood my comment or maybe I was poor in representing my thoughts? All I'm saying is, the woods are very enjoyable and quiet during bow season because fewer guys bow hunt than shotgun. I hunt shotgun and muzzleloader as well. If you hunt during shotgun season on public land, you can agree it gets down right dangerous at times. I was simply stating what I enjoy and how I go about it preseason leading up to bow. Let's move on to Cincinnati!
 
kjm1022 said:
I think you misunderstood my comment or maybe I was poor in representing my thoughts? All I'm saying is, the woods are very enjoyable and quiet during bow season because fewer guys bow hunt than shotgun. I hunt shotgun and muzzleloader as well. If you hunt during shotgun season on public land, you can agree it gets down right dangerous at times. I was simply stating what I enjoy and how I go about it preseason leading up to bow. Let's move on to Cincinnati!
Click to expand...
Don't know how this can be misundersood

"I don't have to worry about a group of guys marching through the woods in orange, hooting and barking like dogs, trying to drive deer"

Or this
"I try to tag out during archery before my public land spots get ruined by guys who decide, "hey, lets go deer hunting instead of pheasant hunting today"

But hey.....whatever makes you feel better......on to cincinnati.
 
whacko said:
Don't know how this can be misundersood

"I don't have to worry about a group of guys marching through the woods in orange, hooting and barking like dogs, trying to drive deer"

Or this
"I try to tag out during archery before my public land spots get ruined by guys who decide, "hey, lets go deer hunting instead of pheasant hunting today"

But hey.....whatever makes you feel better......on to cincinnati.
Click to expand...

I don't really need to "feel better", but if I hurt your sensitive feelings, too friggin" bad. Maybe you're one of the retards in orange and feel offended, again..I don't care. You have your opinion about me based off my post and I have my opinion about you, you're a douche!
 
I picked up my surplus zone 10 this AM but that is not of much interest. I'll hang out and see how this derailment goes though [popcorn]
 
kjm1022 said:
I don't really need to "feel better", but if I hurt your sensitive feelings, too friggin" bad. Maybe you're one of the retards in orange and feel offended, again..I don't care. You have your opinion about me based off my post and I have my opinion about you, you're a douche!
Click to expand...

But......but......I thought this was your opinion:

"I was simply stating what I enjoy and how I go about it preseason leading up to bow"

which is it?

Trust me my feelings are far from sensitive......just trying to figure out where you are coming from cuz you have contradicted your own statements 2 times now. So.......are the shotgun guys in orange retards or are we not retards? Do we just walk around the woods like barking dogs or do we not? These were your statements.......cut and pasted from your post.........

If those are your feelings don't hide it and try to recant like you did in post #137. Just come out and say it. I think we'd all have more respect at that point.
 
Last edited:
kjm1022 said:
I Love bow season and I'm glad it opens before shotgun. It leaves the woods untouched since the last season of muzzleloader, 10 months ago. I don't have to worry about a group of guys marching through the woods in orange, hooting and barking like dogs, trying to drive deer. Just me and my climber, my bow and months of shooting, preparing and scouting. I try to tag out during archery before my public land spots get ruined by guys who decide, "hey, lets go deer hunting instead of pheasant hunting today". Bow hunters are a special group, they respect each other, put in a lot of time and practice, and scout a lot, as you need to get close to the animal. Commit to taking a deer with a bow and see what I mean.
Click to expand...

Buy your own land and hunt it. I'll save you from what my thoughts are on that group you think is so special.
 
bdb said:
I picked up my surplus zone 10 this AM but that is not of much interest. I'll hang out and see how this derailment goes though [popcorn]
Click to expand...

He already asked me to delete his account saying we are to sensitive. You can cut the irony with a knife, you know after you shoot it with an arrow, track it for 500+ yards until it dies.
 
LOL well anyhow, I wish I could, just once, get a damn doe tag for zone 12 because I see plenty of doe all the time during shotgun/ ML on the Cape. Last year, on the last day I had off for shotgun, my buddies called it a day early so I trekked out to one of my favorite spots on the outer Cape. I was standing on this same cliff (the highest point on the entire national seashore) and there, suddenly popping out from behind the grass, stood a FAT doe less than 50 yards from me, just staring. [crying]

C'mon mannnn!!!!!

2-12-11 001.jpg
 

Similar threads

Some bear scouting today
Replies
5
Views
121
LakeTrout
L
Kokanee day
Replies
7
Views
337
sig shooter
sig shooter
Modern gun season opens today in Kentucky.
Replies
10
Views
537
Dennis in MA
Dennis in MA
Opening day of Archery Deer
Replies
15
Views
616
GM-GUY
GM-GUY
Antlerless deer tag in MA, apply before July 16
2
Replies
31
Views
886
DJBrad
DJBrad
Back
Top Bottom