Are you old enough to remember?

in the 1980s you needed to apply for doe tags. were we hunted in black river falls we would get a doe tag every other year most of the time. I was a kid and would have to pass on so many does every year it was ridiculous. Sometimes several dozen just on opening weekend .. Now you might see 1 opening weekend, if your lucky.  But you could have a pocket full of doe tags ... 

Hogmam 

That's exactly what I would have done  

Gone hunting that is

That was 1976.

I remember getting kicked off the JV basketball team by my coach because I went deer hunting instead of practice during the Thanksgiving break.

My first fall to carry a gun was 1981.  Who remembers dad taking you out of school Friday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday & Friday we had off of school for the Holiday!!  Friday was the travel / sight in the slug-gun day, drop-off cheese, crackers & sausage to the area farmers that let you on their land to hunt, and then talk smart & figure out which farm was the "go-to" spot in the morning.  We could only hunt the first 3-days in Lafayette County(slug gun) and then that county closed for the year, so we'd roadtrip north to Iowa County daily to finish the 9-day season. Dad had the following week off to process the deer we were lucky enough to harvest.  Not so sure he was happy to go back to work or not, :)   !!!  Most of it seems like yesterday......what a blast

As a teenager and old enough to hunt on my own I was allowed to carry the party tag. My father and two of my mother’s cousins and I pooled our 4 licenses to get a party tag for a few years. One of those years I was sitting in a brush pile at the edge of a corn field where it met a marsh and a doe walked up to me and stood there at 15’ away. I brought up my 20 gauge Remington Wingmaster pump and took aim with the iron sights on the slug barrel. When I had the deer in the sights I took off the safety and pulled the trigger. There laid my first deer. Now what to do, I ran to my grandparents house and fortunately my mother’s two cousins who were in on the party tag were there to go out hunting. They didn’t believe me that I had shot a deer until they followed me out to the corn field and there it laid. They promptly showed me how to field dress a deer and then dragged it to the house. 

I started hunting in 1963, no one my age will ever forget that Friday before opening day in American history. Would see lots of does hardly a buck. Then the "party permit" came along along I want to say 1965, my girl friend now wife worked for the Conservation Dept. which is now the DNR. Tons of applications came in, and the office gals would dump them down on floor and hand select the apps., truly amazing how I got one every year. Who will ever forget "earn a buck" !! Another off the wall DNR idea, seemed like the only time I saw a nice buck in those's days  was before I shot a doe, being old school I didn't like shooting does anyway. Think this was about the time they ended metal tags, correct me if I'm wrong. Shortly after this they told us they wanted all the does shot, and we had tags coming out of you know where !! From 90's until now I have a draw full of unused tags. One deer a year is plenty if, I'll never buy an extra tag, right now I get 6 tags a year, 3 bow, 3 gun, in southern farm zone which I never use because my grandsons do most the shooting. I'll given up telling the DNR what a bunch of idiots they are, think they know it !! Doing away with back tags wonderful, now you can't ID a violator even if you wanted to turn them in. No tags at all now, all electronic just great, what do us old dummies do that don't have smart phones, a violators dream.  But even with all this as the Yooper's say, its the greatest time of year.

When EAB was enacted, I was heavy into bowhunting on the quest to make the P&Y book which means passing up every buck I saw.  But not to be caught off guard, the little fawn I arrowed could be picked up by the hind legs like a rabbit.

A CHRONOLOGY OF WISCONSIN DEER HUNTING: FROM CLOSED SEASONS TO RECORD HARVESTS 

I seem to recall bear hunting during the gun deer season, I think.

https://dnr.wi.gov/topic/hunt/documents/deer4page.pdf

The last couple years of EAB coincided with me getting into bow hunting. First time up in my new climber. Nice frosty morning, clear skies. From off to my left I heard a bunch of crashing so I stood up and got my bow ready. Out trots a beautiful tall, wide 8 pointer who just stood there at 30 yards perfectly broadside completely oblivious to my presence. And all I could do was watch. 

I went on earn a buck twice same thing bucks one time standing on the ground by a huge pine i yurn around a big 10 pointer 5 feet away and walks on great.

Here is my Earn a Buck experience.  Opening morning and I hear a deer coming toward me.  I stand,raise my rifle and wait for the deer to appear. It was a nice  7 pointer but since I hadn't shot a doe yet, I had to let it walk by.   Never saw a doe that season so empty freezer again.  Thanks Madison.for nothing.

metal deer tags

Anyone remember the hunter choice permits?  1 deer and could shoot a doe but that was your one for the year.  Now my son and I do gun and archery and without buying anything extra they give us 18 permits…complete joke…we only take 2 a year and that is more than enough to fill our freezer and we give some away to family, I can’t imagine what it would be like to have 18 deer in the freezer chest

I remember my first year of hunting you could still wear a red and black wool coat lol. I had orange but my old man had a red coat.

Recall the "party permit" system. One member was the designated shooter for 4 party members. Each permit was by drawing. 
Then in the 80's there were so many deer that you could see 25 walk past you during bow season in one morning or evening hunt. By the middle 90's the deer had been thinned out pretty well. Public lands were void of deer and they couldn't thin them out enough on private lands. Then, they forced everyone to "earn a buck" by tagging a doe first. This forced the private landowners to finally thin the does out (a little bit anyway).