I hunt where they have a minimum 4 pt side to be legal (SE Minnesota) but have not seen much improvement other than many basket deer. I am against antler point restrictions figuring a deer is a trophy to different people for different reasons and why should we legally change that.
That said, wondering if there is a better way. Alternating years-one year-4pt minimum, next year, smaller only, that way these basket deer survive to get big.
Thoughts?
I'm all for making WI a 1 buck state. Choose your size, if your happy with the first deer with a rack, shoot it.
The issues is WI has a lot of hunters, but a lot of pretenders. WI stands to lose a lot of revenue by doing that because a lot of people won't buy a gun tag or vice versa. " i can't shoot two spike bucks this year, that's BS!"
WI manages licenses remember...not the deer herd
WI should also make shining deer illegal like some other states.
What Tim said x2. I guess for a lot of these people the thrill has just gone out of the hunt when you are seeing 15-20 deer per day and just decide which one to shoot at some point. Maybe there aren't many of us left who get to hunt only a few days each year, or see a deer so rarely they cherish each opportunity, and would never pass up a shot at a deer, unless it is a fawn. Plain and simple, I have been a deer hunter for over 40 years now, have never missed a season, killed over 30 deer, but if an antler point restriction ever happens - I'll be done.
If you really want to see hunter numbers plummet, add point restrictions. What ever happened to 'simplifying things'?
Why has deer hunting become a trophy hunt, instead of putting meat in the freezer or letting one decide what's a trophy and what isn't? I don't get the obsession with the score of a rack.
I always look at deer hunting being a way to control the population and have some tasty dinners.
Tim
I like the idea of the first buck being current standards and the second buck being 4 points on one side. The reason I like it is because its a middle ground solution. Try to go one way or the other and you're probably going to lose. Sounds good on a site like this but probably not going to fly with the masses. Remember a few years back they were going to do a doe only hunt in some counties and hunters started closing their lands so the DNR backed off. That kind of crap will happen if you rile people up too much. You have to remember that not everyone cares about a buck's antlers as much as you may do. I know that is a freaky thing to think about for some people but its true.
If you're worried that too many 1.5 bucks are being killed you should be on board with a bait ban. 2016 Price county buck harvest up over 40% Oneida county buck harvest essentially flat. Neighboring counties, essentially identical habitats, but with one difference. As a result Oneida county has more 2.5 bucks on the landscape right now than if baiting had been allowed. That is a fact. The 1.5 bucks that you feel that need protection are most vulnerable to baiting.
