Where have all the hunters gone?

[Doe Master]

I am not an expert but it could be a few things.
With broken families is it just a matter of not being able to take all the kids .When you have them on your weekend . Know a person with this dilemma .
Hard to pry some of these people from electronic devices .
We as a society have became a INSTANT gratification society . Ask a young person to play a video game that takes a couple of hours of sitting quiet and does not net a result until you play that game for a month or two .
Finally not everyone has someone to actually take the time to take them out . If everyone just took one person hunting that would double the numbers .

[vixenmaster]

Sad but true & its happening all over North America. Like y'all i believe its many factors not just a couple. Yes lots of the younger ppl don't hunt & more are in the cities & bigger towns than the rural areas. A third of USA's population 71 million are now Baby-Boomers & its the grandchildren not learning to hunt & fish.

[OneShot]

In canada -"MY" opinion for the loss of interest in hunting and fishing, is the government suppressing all programs and education of our youth.

They are not allowed to say the word hunt or gun without raising a flag or be branded corupt.

When I attended an all male school , seems like a century ago ; we all had to take shooting classes in the school basement.

It was equiped with a full rifle range; never seemed to have enough guns to go around.

Heck we were encouraged to bring our own guns to school to be sure we'd get practice in.

We all had to participate in the cadet program, mandatory- no excuse~

Now mention anything not polictically correct like gun God - any religion or political views and you are suspended!

Makes ya "Proud to canadian don't it" ?

Besides groceries come from the stores all wrapped in selifane don't they?

Don't be trying to harvest your own food - just not allowed too!

oneshot.......

[kurisu]

I read an article in the paper a day of so ago on the figures regarding hunting license sales. Here in the state of Taxachusetts they are down 50% which was the highest in this country. Not really sure of the time frame but what a striking statistic.

What do I care. My own kids don't hunt and I will be dead before any real changes affect me. Has it become so politically correct not to hunt? Is it video games? Is it schools teaching blatently against it? Is is loss of places to hunt? What the heck has happened?

It's not just the tradition aspect. It's millions if not billions in lost revenue for so many cool projects starting with land aquisition. Here in Mass the state doesn't even still run a game farm for pheasants. As a result they pay over $6.00 per bird for the FEW they release.

Very good point about not enough placed to hunt. This holds true in most populated areas near metropolitan cities. Unless you know a private landowner you're stuck. Even then, many landowners are reluctant to let hunters hunt, even my own aunt and uncle shut me out, they own 100 acres of beautiful farm land with 50 acres of bush!

Is the overall decline just as bad north of the border as it is here in the states I applaud the states that now allow full crossbow use and I hope it has added a couple of percentage points of new or returning hunters I just don't want them in my woods.

[Helmut]

In my opinion here in Ontario the number are not really down. I believe more folks are just not buying the permits and hunting anyway.
I spend a lot of time up in the Ottawa Valley area and see it first hand. Hunters taking 4+ deer with one or no tags.
Any area that claims permit numbers are down really should take a good look at the animal populations at the same time, I would bet it is down too

[OkXbowHunter]

I have no idea whether or not our hunting license sales here in Oklahoma are down or not. What I do know is that I'm seeing fewer and fewer hunters in some areas.

There's popular boat ramp that is used by duck hunters I go by sometimes on my way to deer hunt. I've noticed this year that the parking lot is nearly empty, and on some days it's totally empty, of duck hunters.

Just before Archery season, I visited a WMA that I haven't hunted in over 10 years. Usually at that time the grass in the parking lots would have been beaten bare due to everyone parking in them. When I arrived, the dirt roads into the area had grass growing in them and the parking lots looked like mowed lawns with very little to no sign of traffic.

For whatever reason, it appears to me that hunter numbers are down and down big time. That's why it's so important to get as many hunters afield as possible and crossbows help with that!

[hiking]

I don't know how many states have them, but the youth hunt days in new jersey really help a lot. we have youth hunts for deer,turkey pheasant. they are at prime times and have been very productive for the youn hunters.

[DanO]

This purely anecdotal but I think the number of hunters is up in Ontario. I'm seeing more and more hunters as I attempt to hunt. Now that could be because the opportunities to hunt are declining as land gets posted.

IF our numbers are down in Canada it would be because of the gun registry system. It takes alot of courses and paper pushing to hunt in this country.

Dan O.

[Mr. Dynamite]

This purely anecdotal but I think the number of hunters is up in Ontario.

I think this is true too. I was talking to the guy who does the hunters safety course in London towards the end of summer and he was telling me that he was booked out to Feb. I told him I could not believe there were that many people starting into hunting, but he assured me there are. I told him they are going to have quite a time finding permission on land around here. Most permission is already had by guys who want to be the only one hunting the land, even if they have multiple farms that they never go too!

I also think this is true from my own experience and how this past season went. Let me explain... I got my license right at the end of November in 05 when I was 17. I had permission on a 10 acre farm for the few weeks left in the season, and though I scouted it once I never made it out there with my bow. Waste of buying tags, but I have no one in my family who currently hunts, and I was eager to give it a try. I had already been watching, studying and chasing deer for a number of years and thought it would be fun to branch out into hunting. I spent the last number of years in the states at college, and this has basically my first season of hunting. I managed to get permission on 2 smaller pieces of land, and the one got shot to shreds during ML season by the other guys who hunt it, but on the other piece I was the only hunter. Even though it is small it is a slice of a bigger woods that no one can hunt, so I thought I would have a better chance on this land. Well, come beginning of Dec. I went out there one evening to dump some corn, and before I did I looked up, and there sky lined in a tree is a tree stand. And I thought I was the only one who had permission. Make a long story short, a couple of guys right around my age, who had just taken the safety course and just gotten their tags had also just gotten permission on this chunk of land, and were just as earnest as I was to get a deer there. Problem was they had more time to spend there than me, and were are all rather new at actually trying to shoot a deer. Deer had the last laugh this season.

So I too think hunter numbers are up in Ontario, but all these new guys need land and someone to show them how too do it.

[smarr20]

I hunt and live in Ohio and lost my hunting spot due to leasing out land for hunting.I don't have hundreds of dollars to hunt for deer or pay $500 to hunt turkey.This new way of hunting is becoming a rich man's sport you have to pay big bucks to hunt bucks. The public hunting grounds are getting smaller and it's dangerous to hunt 20 yards from a person and the deer run to the land we can't afford to hunt. it's getting harder for a family to put food on the table due to this way of hunting.

[Limbs and Sticks]

I hunt and live in Ohio and lost my hunting spot due to leasing out land for hunting.I don't have hundreds of dollars to hunt for deer or pay $500 to hunt turkey.This new way of hunting is becoming a rich man's sport you have to pay big bucks to hunt bucks. The public hunting grounds are getting smaller and it's dangerous to hunt 20 yards from a person and the deer run to the land we can't afford to hunt. it's getting harder for a family to put food on the table due to this way of hunting.

You said a mouth full, around here one has to join a hunt club, or own land, or be friends with someone who does. It's about $$$$$ today, 80% of the hunters are middle class folks and the people with out jobs can't buy a permit to hunt, I know I bought two for other people, the ones that do hunt are limited because of the price of ammo or working more hrs. to make ends meet, it's becoming a rich mans game with no end in sight.

Wes