ugh hunting season is here again

[MarkCO]

When I was younger I went out in the summer and door-knocked. Had a bunch of people let me hunt on their land. We shot prairie Dogs and Coyotes if they wanted us to. We also volunteered to fix some fences, haul some trash and other chores. Nothing wrong with asking, and some landowners are nice enough to understand that not everyone can buy enough land to hunt on.

[MarkCO]

Colorado and up until about 10 years ago. Where I used to hunt up where you live now has McMansions on the corners and no more hunting. Out near Limon, I had access to over 300K acres, owned by a multi-millionaire with a college degree who lived in Illinois. I have had two landowners just this year offer to let me hunt on their land, but it was of course after I had interacted with them on other matters as well.

I've checked many times into buying land...sorry, if I sold everything I had and lived in a van, I could not scratch enough together for enough land to hunt all the species I currently do. Sure, maybe deer, but they are like fish in a barrel anyway. I mostly hunt public land, in the less desirable seasons to keep away from the drunks and idiots. The hunting heritage is dying, which is what I guess most Americans want anyway.

[denverco]

IMO if you own enough property that people are asking you to hunt it then you have a lot to be grateful for. How about you turn them away nicely and go enjoy your property. Right now you're not acting much better than "city folk" who whine because there is no land to hunt. You're whining essentially because you have land. Comes with the territory, literally. Get over it. I can tell you right now if I had that much property I wouldn't be crying about the burdens that come with it.

[Zombie Steve]

I did almost all of my pheasant hunting growing up in Nebraska by knocking on doors. Yeah, I'd do chores or bring them a coyote... whatever it took. That said, it's a different world these days. Heck, I used to bring a .22 rifle to school to shoot frogs at the creek after school got out. Nobody cared.

I still consider myself my brother's keeper... it's just that these days I keep him away.

[screagle2]

IMO if you own enough property that people are asking you to hunt it then you have a lot to be grateful for. How about you turn them away nicely and go enjoy your property. Right now you're not acting much better than "city folk" who whine because there is no land to hunt. You're whining essentially because you have land. Comes with the territory, literally. Get over it. I can tell you right now if I had that much property I wouldn't be crying about the burdens that come with it.

So how would you react when your property is posted with HUNTING BY PERMISSION ONLY, not NO HUNTING! but asking for respect, and peeps ignore the signs, and will not take the time to contact you? If that doesn't bother you, then let us all know if you get some property, and we will all come over, uninvited and shoot at whatever we see......

I'm fairly certain you haven't sustained significant property damage by "hunters" who seem only capable of shooting stationary objects.....windmills, machinery, etc., etc...

Whining....... No, just telling you why you are losing access to tens of thousands of acres.

Think of it what you will, but the others attitude of asking and respecting, vs, yours of disrespect points towards the future of hunting private land.

BTW, If someone politely asks, we will do our best to allow them an area. If they have an attitude, nope.
I have not been able to draw a license to hunt MY land where I supply the habitat for both deer or antelope in 5 years, under the "landowner preference system"......Must mean there are not adequate numbers for anyone to responsibly hunt? Sound reasonable

[Trout Hunter]

Funny to see the attitudes of some people.

Some times what you do to support a family doesn't allow you to purchase property, I work a job that moves me every 2 to 3 years so it pretty much eliminates the chance to even buy a home let alone acreage. I've knocked doors in other states to hunt, offered to do chores, fix fence ect and found a lot of receptive people and then some not receptive. Seems the receptive are always the ones that realize the fact that they are stewards of the land and even though they own it they owe the land the respect to take care of it in away to provide for the animals that call it home. The ones that aren't receptive tend to be the type that justify poaching game cause "I fed them on my crops all summer they are mine" kinds of owners. End of the day I used to hunt prob 40-50 days a year before I moved to CO and haven't even tried here since most of the people here have the later attitude. One of the only reason's I want to move from this state is due to how tight the laws are regarding water way access and the shitty attitude that landowners have.

[bryjcom]

I found that people are more receptive to bow hunting instead of rifle hunting. I recently increased my hunting territory by another 20+acres along the poudre river. The guy was hard of hearing and wasn't going to let me hunt until I re-explained in a louder tone, that I'm a bow hunter. He was totally cool with bow hunting.

[Lars]

I'm in Montana for a few days with work and I just knocked on a guys door this afternoon to ask if I could shoot a few prairie dogs, his response was to give me permission to hunt deer and antelope on his 50,000 acre ranch. Maybe I was In the wrong to ask because I'm a city boy now, or maybe he was still just a good ole boy that didn't mind helping a guy have somewhere to go. I guess it's not just the city folk in colorado that are one way and closed minded. It's your property, you don't have to let anyone on it but don't bitch and moan because a guy took the correct path by trying to get permission to hunt one piece of ground that didn't have umpteen million other people on it.

[YammyMonkey]

When I was growing up my dad & I were able to hunt Dove on a ranch out by the old dog track on I-70. When I got into college, the land changed hands and we weren't able to access it anymore. Now that my son is getting old enough to go out and hunt with my dad & I we're hitting the public land. It's tougher to show him how to properly behave/take care of things because it seems like a lot of people, especially non-hunters, don't treat the public lands the way they should. Picking up after yourself is an afterthought, if it's there at all.

I was just out Elk hunting with a friend of mine in 501, around Buffalo Creek and if I had brought my expedition-sized pack I probably could have filled it with trash all 3 days we were out. We picked up a bunch of trash, but there's only so much you can do. And that's just the trash. It doesn't include the graffiti on the rocks, attempts to hack down some of the few living trees in the burn area, etc. It's sad that that is what public land has come to, but with that as an example, I can understand why private landowners don't want to take the risk. I wouldn't want a bunch of drunk clowns starting a fire, littering, or otherwise abusing my land either. And while a lot of us are responsible hunters and shooters, it only takes one bad experience to ruin a landowner's perception of the group as a whole.

I think hunters are running into the same issues that mountain bikers were around the mid-90s. A few of the riders were being rude and acted like they owned the trails, so the hikers and horseback riders tried to get them banned from the trails. Since then, the mountain biking community has done a lot to try to fix that image by, among other things, getting out and working on the trails and trying to make things better for everyone. Maybe what we, as hunters, need to do is start setting the example by organizing under a non-political banner and actively promoting that we're going out and cleaning up the public lands. If we could get some press time it would definitely help the overall image and might help reverse the trend that we've been seeing in the outright closing of private land to hunters as well. Is there such an organization that we could hitch onto? Maybe something like Safari Club International or the North American Hunting Club?