Read on the WEAU website that 10 licenses were sold to "hunters" under 1 year old this season.
Unethical parents exploiting the law for a $5 tag. This was not the intent of removing the age restriction. Luckily, the youngest reported harvest was by a 4 year old.
Wow, cannot believe so many people support unsupervised toddlers carrying high powered rifles in the name of "FREEDOM." If you are so tied up on the word "freedom," then you should NEVER speak against baiting deer, liberalizing game possession limits, ridding size limits for fish, opening longer seasons, adding more weapon types for deer, ridding minimum cartridge sizes for large game, and the myriad of other current rules or proposed rules. You should never entertain the thought of newer rule ideas like limiting buck tags to one per hunter/year or implementing antler restrictions. You should never approve of increasing size limits for musky size potential. All of these are restricting your freedoms, and pretty much pigeonholes you into a corner. Why should the government restrict you, right? We are all big boys and girls and can manage safety and game populations ourselves without the help of government.
Lets do away with all fish and game laws and see where we end up. Freedom only goes so far. I am as conservative as anyone, but we absolutely need rules and regulations in place to protect people and to ensure fish and game populations are manageable.
Were your "freedoms" that hampered for having your 8 year old kid wait until they were 12 to hunt? Were your "freedoms" that much at risk for requiring a "mentor" to be unarmed while teaching a kid to hunt? Come on.
"Bottom line is we got some freedom back."
What freedom did you get back? In your lifetime, the minimum age for hunting was 12. This is new.
"I like less laws and more freedom so I get to make choices and not be told what to do. "
Most sane people agree. However, most sane people agree that there has to be some minimal laws or safety becomes an issue. Putting a 10 year old behind the wheel of a car - that is freedom. However, most sane people think it is a stupid idea. Should parents just decide when their kid is old enough to drive a car? Should parents let their 12 year old drive to the bar and drink whiskey? Sorry, but there has to be some common sense....and there has to be some law.
Now, sitting in a blind with a kid and truly mentoring....very safe practice. As soon as they allowed the mentor to carry a gun, this flies in the face of "mentoring" while hunting. For crews who primarily hunt by making deer drives, is the dad going to actually mentor the kid and walk next to the kid and within arm's reach? I think you know the answer. That kid will be fanned out to make the drive more effective. I have a problem with that, and most sane people would also.
"Similarly, I agree with that being wrong JC. What I disagree with though is how its sort of cherry picked. Adults poach deer every year, should we just ban deer hunting then?"
Cherry picked? Banning deer hunting because adults poach? That is cherry picking. I am not asking for a ban on hunting, I am pointing out that giving guns to toddlers and having idiot parents not follow the rules is a problem with deer drives. I didn't have a problem with the mentored hunting rule and one gun total. This just opened up a can of worms.
"Some young punk and his mentor violated, so all kids are young punks and all mentors break the rules? You can't use blanket statements like that. "
Um, I didn't. I stated clearly that it is the minority of parents doing this. Now you are elaborating for drama.
"You 'know a guy' so it must be like that everywhere. Come on now... That's like saying I heard a guy poached a deer so everyone is poaching deer. I think we can agree that saying that sounds dumb, but its really not any different."
I know of several crews that did this in 2017 from discussions with others. Obviously, this is the minority of hunters. However, why do we need younger and younger kids in the woods? Sorry to tell you, having a kid being able to hunt at 8 years old instead of 12 years old will not result in future expansion of hunters. Yep, we got more youth hunting with ridding the minimum age limit restriction, but that is the result of just a higher population of potential license purchasers.
Bottom line is we got some freedom back. I like less laws and more freedom so I get to make choices and not be told what to do. The dumb will weed themselves out. If you don't feel safe, stay home. There are places I don't go because it could be dangerous and I'm not asking for more laws so I could go there. I just go somewhere else.
Wanna reduce deer drives, make the buck tag public or private. You choose a private land buck tag you are not eligible to choose public land bonus tags upon buying your license or purchase public doe tags until after the first round of tag sales. Then end party hunting on public land tags.
Similarly, I agree with that being wrong JC. What I disagree with though is how its sort of cherry picked. Adults poach deer every year, should we just ban deer hunting then? Some young punk and his mentor violated, so all kids are young punks and all mentors break the rules? You can't use blanket statements like that.
You 'know a guy' so it must be like that everywhere. Come on now... That's like saying I heard a guy poached a deer so everyone is poaching deer. I think we can agree that saying that sounds dumb, but its really not any different.
That was easy. In the end it's about getting youths involved in the sport to ensure the future of the sport. The minute we forget about this anti gunners will strip all our rights. You can't control everyone to follow the rules.
I do agree in some aspects with you JC. I'm just trying to stick up for the ones that do it right.
"A mentor must be with in arms length of the child. So if you see otherwise JC on all your deer drives then the law is being broken. Call the DNR and report it. End of story."
End of story? That easy huh? I know a gentleman that saw this first hand. Not only did he run across a kid during a deer drive that was obviously not even 10 years old, he had his brother walking with him that was no more than 7 years old. Not an adult within 200 yards. The 10 year old had a gun, the 7 year old didn't. Maybe the 7 year old was mentoring the 10 year old....
He ran into these two in the woods about 1/2 mile in. He immediately went back to his vehicle (and after the 10 year old punk told him to mind his own business after being asked where his dad was) drove to the road they were headed to, and the crew was already gone.
Got an idea, maybe he should have snapped a picture of their back tags, that would have done it. Or, he could have called DNR without cell phone reception, and they would have been able to send one of their 2 wardens covering the entire county that day to nab them. They could have been there in 10 minutes and been waiting for them.
You are right, that is easy, and definitely the end of the story. Thanks for the tip.
I'm also very conservative, but I think by that I mean if there is a law I expect it to be followed. Exceptions being speed limits LOL, if you follow that you are the slow guy.
I'm fine with kids hunting from stands or blinds. Not a huge fan of drives in general but I think it would be hard to stop them. You can't really make it illegal to shoot at a deer if you jump it while walking to your stand. You can't tell people they can't walk in the woods. You'd be affecting guys who 'still' hunt. I guess I don't see how you would ban it. Heck I could put on an orange vest and walk through some thick stuff with a shotgun and be 'grouse' hunting. Just seems like a sketchy thing to fully prove, even if we think its obvious. I used to know someone who walked through city land acting like they lost their dog to chase deer over the line to a hunt-able area.
The whole 'wait until it happens' argument is sketchy. We've already seen adults lose their minds and shoot people during deer season. Do we say wait for the next guy, maybe no one should hunt then? Just takes a land or spot dispute and a few hot heads. Adults have flung bullets on drives and caused issues. A lot more adults do those who hardly hunt and get overly excited about a deer. Now we are trying to pigeon hole a handful of kids whose parents are violating the mentor rules and assuming that this small percentage will equal or surpass the number of adults flinging bullets wildly? Still a numbers thing in my head and I'm not seeing it. I get the initial reaction, but if we are going to use the words common sense, I'm using my common sense to think about the overall numbers and drawing conclusions.
I have to agree with you JC. Unfortunately some of these laws are put in place to protect people. I too am extremely conservative. But somewhere along the lines common sense needs to be brought to the surface. There are a lot of people in the world that have no clue that they need to be governed because they don’t have the sense God gave them. Let the bashing begin!
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