I don't quite understand the rationale of moving 1st firearms season from Fri-Sun to Sat-Mon. The way I see it you'd have more hunters in the woods on opening day, hunting unpressured deer, which should lead to higher success rates and more deer being killed. If we're trying to stabilize or grow the population why kill more deer?
Well - at least they are asking for some opinions which to me means the voices have been heard. Now whether anything happens or not we'll see. Not sure how the survey questions matter much if deer numbers are what they are focusing on - get good data for each county, and set tag limits/goals for each county. I know archery is not county specific, but gun season can do all the "control" we need, plus when checking in bow kills you give county which allows them to get the data they need. The ? about OTC tags, I could care less - but again, if you set a limit for a county for # of tags - why not make access to tags convenient for people that do have the deer or trying to thin herd on their property. I know if it's mail/online only it will limit some of those last second tags/kills...but again, if you want to limit kills, just limit the tags to begin with. The Fri/Mon Gun season ?...still not sure how that fixes anything, you can make gun season 30 days if you want - still need to have limits on tags/harvest. I personally don't like losing the Friday of gun season as that has become family tradition for us. Gun season is Friday only for my family each year as Sat & Sun is always jam packed with basketball games, events, church, etc. It wouldn't be the same to have a Monday off work for our hunt after everyone else has been out hunting all weekend - again, this is just me...but I love what the Friday opening day excitement does in small towns across IL, kids getting out of school, etc. I won't cry if they change it, would just like my kids to keep the Fri opener. I have an accounting degree - so I like numbers behind all decisions - I just hope they start to manage with some real numbers and goals. As long as I can bowhunt each year and shoot at least 1 doe and 1 buck I'll be happy...MY BIGGEST COMPLAINT AS A BOWHUNTER IS THAT I FEEL LIKE I HAVE TO WEAR ORANGE NEARLY EVERY DANG WEEKEND ANYMORE! HARD TO BE A NINJA WITH BLAZE ORANGE ON!
After reading my own reply...I just realized what the state is trying to do: Still sell as many tags as possible (Revenue) but limit the success rate as much as possible to keep harvest down. Not sure why I didn't see that the first time!
I think I had read earlier in Jan that the reason for the switch to sat-mon was so more people especially kids could take part in opening day because alot of people can't or don't want to take off work or school but not sure how much truth there is to that. As I have grown older and placed more importance on bowhunting I really don't care to much about when they move the gun season. The issue I see is more people will be in the woods on opening day which might increase the harvest numbers because usually by the second and third day the deer are on alert more.
As long as they don't drastically lower the number of out of state licenses available. I'll be happy.
I'm thinking the otc sales being stopped is maybe their solution to people saying to many tags are being sold. If they make it where you can only get them through mail/online maybe people won't take the time to do it. Honesly I don't see any of these three options chamging much. The biggest thing people are complaining about is tag sales so they throw in some proposed changes to hope and appease those comolaints. The change in the Friday to Monday does nothing, The same people that took off work or whatever on Friday will take off Monday. I'm not so sure the allure of being out opening day is what makes people take off on Friday its more that its only a three day seaon and they want to get out as much as possible. A big majority of the gun hunters would rather get all three days during the first season anyway because most years its better time to be in the woods then the second seaon.
