Hunting Sportsmanship

[Don P]

Same down here, in Jefferson and Pisgah forests I've heard stories. There are local reports of a black panther around Doughton st park but they never seem to get a confirmed sighting.
There are none in the Black Hills either but one ran down the main drag in Hill City right past the restaurant window.

Growing up we were told there were no  confirmed moccasins  around but I sure came across a few unconfirmed ones. Was told they were water snakes, but I saw the tushes on one (yes you can make headway in mid-air)

One note on hunter safety,  I was out one day cutting in a brown shirt and it dawned on me season had begun. Hunting or not some orange is good.

[Ron Wenrich]

We've been having big cat sightings here in PA.  But, there has been no confirmations.

We even had one close to my area, which is more farmland than mountains.  They had the prints and visuals, but, still say there are none.  How far will a big cat range?

As for bobcats, they finally believe their population is big enough to warrant a season.  It takes a special permit.  Hunters think differently.  So, they buy the permits and don't hunt, keeping the permits from others.  

[Texas Ranger]

Texas officials remain mum on big cats here.  But those of us who spend time in the woods are aware of an endemic population of cougar, large population of bob cat, and occaisional sighting of what used to be called the southern Lynxx, a few remote sightings of civet cats (rarer, I last saw one 25 years ago), and down around the Big Bend Country a few rare reports of jaguar, or jaquarundi.

But, I have seen three cougars in east Texas, 2 from my hunting activities, and one I will tell the story on.  My wife of 30 some odd years has always said that as a forester, I will make up an answer when I need to, i.e., scientific names of trees and plants.  So she also took a rather dim view of my sightings of cougars.  Until one day we were driving from our town to one in the next county, some 30 miles.  About mid way my wife says, "What's that", as a large cat clears the road way in 2 -3 bounds.  It was a cougar, tail and all.  About a week later I ran into the Extension Agent for that county (we call them country agents) and told him the story.  He grinned and allowed as how he had been called out to a rural subdivision to find out what was killing a ladies chickens, and found pug marks some 5 inches across, and yep, it was our cougar.  

Most hunters are not hunters and don't see the natural world when they are in it.  A cat could pass withing a few yards and they would never know it was there.  An example.  We were marking a tract of timber for a client and had sat down to take a breath and drink a little water, this was a managed stand and the beauty berry and yaupon was only a couple of feet high from burning.  We are setting there and I catch movement out of the corner of my eye.  I hush my crew, and we freeze.  Here comes some dude in full camo, face painted, bow with arrow nocked, "sneaking" throught the woods (Oh, bow season in Texas is an early season).  He walks not 5 feet from us, us in woods gear looking at him, he never sees us.

I have had hunters leave stands when they hear "strange" noises that they cannot identify.  Wierd stuff, we hunt pipelines down here a lot, and occaisionally a pipeline will burp, gurgle and sing.  Or a cat crying at sun down, or a coyote cutting loose over the next hill.  Most humans are not aware that 99.99% of the time, we are the baddest they are gonna meet in the woods.

My old army unit had a saying, "Fear not the night, fear what hunts the night".  Probably a carry over from an old Dracula movie, but it says what most would not understand.  The night/woods holds no danger other than man himself.

[Tom]

.....except for maybe a high root and a deep hole.

Good story,  I've seen folks walk in the woods with blinders on also.  The scary thing to me is "what they see".  I quit hunting in Management areas years ago because a lot of these fellows were taking "wiggle" shots and mistaking people for hogs and cows for deer.

[Tom]

This is actually Charlies post.  He asked me to put it on this thread.

http://www.forestryforum.com/images/YaBBImages/userpics/cougar01-47k.jpg

[Ron Scott]

Is This Hunting?? One of several elevated stands on an area with seperate channel CB radio communications between them. Note the "bait station" below with a "roof" overhead to prevent the deer from "seeing up" and detecting the "shooter".

[Corley5]

If you hunt for the sport of it I would say it isn't very sporting.  If you hunt only because you like to eat venison it looks like a very efficient way to go about it

[Kevin]

If it makes for a one shot humane kill I don`t have a problem with it considering there are too many deer and disease will wipe out far more than hunters will take in a season if they aren`t harvested.
I`d rather see a deer killed there and put to good use rather than see it wedged into a windshield.

[J Beyer]

I get to go hunting on 30-40 private acres this year .  Besides myself, there might be one or two others on the same plot of land   .  I'm just going to get the lawn chair out and sit there as long as I can stand it if it is really cold out.  The place is right on the Fox River with plenty of food nearby.  Hunting should be good  considering the land has not been hunted on for several years.

JB