Should deer drives (gun hunters) be a legal hunting method?

I love deer drives.

 

I don't like participating in deer drives. And likely won't again anytime soon. I would love for them to be illegal for selfish reasons. Having said all that, I think they should be legal taking a logical approach to the debate instead of putting emotion into it.

The biggest thing about deer drives I hate is the running shots like TY said. We preach in bowhunting so much about taking good shots and shot placement. But many many many deer drivers just shoot Hail Mary shots without giving it thought. See brown, and shoot no matter how far or how fast the deer is running. That in my mind is disrespectful to the animal just to blast away. The guys that drive deer and take good shots I have no problem with even though I won't participate. JMHO.

 

compared to dog hunting, I love human drives

I loathe dog hunting

 

This.

Why are people so concerned with how people hunt or what they do on their own land or land they have permission to be on. Now if they're doing it on neither of those two examples then it may be a problem.

 

Hate it. In SW MN I would venture to say that 90% of slug hunters push everything they can get permission for. Everything that moves ends up getting shot. It is not safe what so ever in my area and that is my biggest concern with it. Like mentioned, everything they are shooting at is running and guess how many of those shots are "ethical"?

I get the "if you're on private land" debate but they don't realize there are guys sitting on their own private land next door sitting. Dangerous as it gets.

 

Hell, if it was up to me I would outlaw gun season all together.
Honestly, its a slippery slope when we start telling people how they can hunt. While I don't like it, wont do it and wish it was illegal, who am I to say what you can do. Maybe you don't like something that I do hunting, I don't want you telling me what I can or cant do. We start with deer drives and then what do we outlaw? Food plots....deer stands...compound bows.

 

This.

Explains it perfectly for myself.

 

Overall, I'm not "Concerned about it". The OP asked for people to give their opinions and that's what are being given. We aren't making law..just giving our personal opinions. There are a lot of things that are illegal on private property, why is any of it anyone's concern?

 

Exactly...as I stated I would vote no if given option but until illegal I will stand with rather than against those that do. I do have recommendations for those doing them...like no running shots but it's legal so we stand together.

 

I have deer hunted Wisconsin and they do drives. I am just not into gun hunting. I am not good at it at all. They do drives up there, several people from other hunting camps band together to organize a large group of drivers. It is cooperation unseen in bow hunting people. It has been legal and a tradition since hunting licenses have been sold, if you have an issue with it you have issues

 

We are only talking deer hunting with dogs right?

 

Flat out wrong. Some have justified issues with it, some of which have been stated. Again let me stress this is a thread of personal opinions on it. They are derived for the most part all from personal experiences in our repsective hunting regions. To claim if you take issue with it than you have issues is just flat out wrong bud. Would I vote no against it, sure and I have valid reasoning for my area....but also as stated until illegal I stand with them...

...being against something personally doesn't mean there is something wrong with you.

 

We ban all kinds of things related to private land hunting so I feel that argument is invalid. We can't bait, hunt at night, shoot deer year round with guns, etc etc so we limit people's hunting capabilities on private land all the time.

 

Yeah, because having deer feeders out, and having a trail cam every step of the way from their beds, to wherever else they go is way more "hunting" than deer drives.

To the op. Deer drives when done with people who know each other, and hunt with each other are fine. My family has done them in the past, and we all knew where to and where not to shoot. There was no safety issue. In fact, drives are legal, yet barely anyone gets hurt or killed. More people probably get hurt or killed bowhunting than gun. The pressure on the deer is a crock. I HIGHLY doubt fawn survival rates are at all dependent on deer drives.

To add to this, gun season is 9 days long in Wisconsin. There are a lot of times I never see a deer during gun season when sitting because deer aren't moving much during daylight in late November/early December. If you outlawed drives, harvest would go way down, as would license sales. No one is going to buy a license with no deer sightings.

 

Respectfully i have to disagree with you 100%. I have grown up hunting with dogs. Been in multiple hunt clubs and hunted at clubs through VA. Not ONCE have i ever seen anybody drop dogs on lands not belinging to that club. Standers will border property lines and deer and dogs both try to be turned back into the hunt. Dogs will cross lines and with the new tracking systems they are usually obtained quickly. But it is those land owners with the same thought process as you that make it difficult to do thing quickly becuase they would rather arugue and call game wardens when dog owners are calling the dogs in or as soon as the dogs cross lines when it is legal to gi get them without any firearms as ling as you do not refuse to state your purpose and identify yourself and do not drive on that land.

I will not argue that there are some lazy, dishonest, sorry dog hunters that do nothing but cause trouble. We have had issues with bordering clubs and they give all of us a bad name. But to say all are one in the same is rediculous.


I know that is your opinion and i respect that and doubt i will change it but most clubs are very respectful with land owners and few issues arise when doing the rigt thing.


If i was to say using a traditional bow should be illegal becuase some people who use them just wound deer that wouldnt be fair to those who practice and perfect the skill of using such a weapon to take a deer, a way inw hich i respect greatly. Or wouldbit be the same to say i dont think xbows and compounds should be legal becuase of the technological advantage over tradiyional bows. Or what open the black power guns that are capable of shooting 250 yards? Some people use these weapons and wound deer and buy it at Bass Pro and hunt the next day after just shooting it once. And not to mention these people tresspass too.


I am for dogs and man drives, howbsome would do it with rifles is beyond me cause making a shot would be difficult. But if they can make the shot great. Doesnt mean it should be illegal. Using dogs to hunt big blocks of lands is very beneficial to farmers be uase that is less deer eating their money.

 

I understand that, but I also understand the even illegally driving deer does not hold the same value as if someone was killing people or cooking meth or probably 100 other things that can be done on one's land. But the big thing I don't agree with on anything is to change laws to make something illegal just because you can get enough people that disagree with it. The amount of personal freedoms that get taking away because there's someone that doesn't agree with it is already getting pretty high in this country. And when you have people saying that the only reason they don't like it is because they think anyone that does is lazy or not really hunting or any other excuse that makes people on here feel like a "real" man has run its course, in my opinion.

I agree though the original question was asking for opinions and that's fine but the reasons above were only reason for my initial comment. Had nothing to do with thinking somebody can do as they pleases on their property, legal or illegal. Which is why I only said how someone hunts, not how they do anything else. If it'd legal to drive deer have at it.

 

Nice jab...but ill conceived and off base. I have feeders out on managed property and none on my private land though I do supplement mineral. Let me define some things for you in defense of your off base comment.

My managed land is roughly 2700 acres, of that about 750 is crop land, the remaining balance is a mix of brush, overgrown pastures, CRP in native grass. In that management land, we have 7 feeders total, only 5 of which are out. There are only four hunters on the property and three of those are rare events. The feeders are to supplement feed the deer to contribute to keeping deer on property and to boost herd health, they are not hunted on or even nearby. Only reason feeders are out now at all is because they are new and wanted to get deer familiar with them before winter, otherwise they will not even be out during hunting seasons. Cameras are used for management, I run 17 cameras on the total acreage of ~3000 acres (*edit). That's a hell of a long way from having cameras every step of the way. They are for inventory purposes for management, not to pattern deer. You can't very well manage deer if you don't keep track of what you have or have a way of monitoring any gains. As far as food plots, I don't hunt over the food plots, most of the plots are in the middle of our sanctuaries, the remainder is on field edges where there is crop or crop residue and cover crops for winter for soil health and also deer herd health.

Comparing our feeders, plots and camera based management to making deer drives to kill deer just because you do it and are okay with it , would be pretty remarkably ignorant. The fact that I've not put a bruiser on the ground yet this year is proof that what we do is not diminishing any challenge to hunting here, we just have more and better deer than most places. Partially because we don't do stupid crap like deer drives.

 

Why is it illegal to kill deer out of season on private land....the point I was making had nothing to do with the more severe and extreme things that are illegal.

 

No, but I think it could be restricted a little. Examples would be that you could only have 10 people in a party or that you could only drive the last 5 days of a season. Again, these are just examples but something along those lines.

Growing up in PA, I've seen a lot more "sloppy" drives than well put together drives. Wounded deer, trespassing, and awareness are some big issues. When I say awareness, it's when hunters are shooting with no thought of what might be at the other side of the field or the other side of the property line. It can become scary when you're out in your stand when a bullet smacks a tree close to you. I think awareness is an issue in hunting as a whole but it really shows it's head during deer drives.

 

A legal method of hunting that a party does on public land, or private land without trespassing, if you are that concerned what a group legally does it indicates elitism and that you think every deer in the woods is yours