Everything thats wrong with hi-tech gear in primative seasons

[dk17hmr]

In most states this goes through the State Legislator. Find a State Rep and a State Senator that is willing to sponsor a bill for you. The problem is you never have a set time when the bill goes to the floor. If you want to testify you may only have an couple of hours’ notice that it is coming to the floor.

I have done this 7 or 8 times. I was successful three times and my bills became law. DNR and G&F make recommendations not law. For a season to become law it has to be approved by the State Legislator.

I am in touch with my local Rep about this as well. I still write a letter to the G&F as well.....maybe someone with a little more voice in G&F would read it and agree as well. I lack the time to devote much more than emails and letters.

[C. Latch]

Yep, you're off base.

I enjoy shooting blackpowder arms. I enjoy hunting with whatever weapon is legal at the moment. If you don't like the rules, get rich, buy an enclosure, put your own deer in it, and kill them with sticks and rocks.

<--proud and unashamed shooter of blackpowder until deer season, at which point the smokeless savage rolls out with sabots and drops deer at 200 yards.

You have to understand this: states manage deer herds in order to entertain the citizenry. And to better manage them, they give us extra seasons that allow them to sell extra licenses and guns and ammo and, frankly, they see blackpowder seasons as a sales-tax dream, because the average citizen is too lazy to clean the thing correctly, forcing him to buy a new rifle every few years.

States love tax dollars.

[Fishman]

If you hunt only with a sharpened stick that is a primitive weapon, except to the guy hunting with an unsharpened stick.

How do you do that purple color?

Who needs a 30 round magazine?
Semiautomatics aren't sporting arms.
The 2nd amendment is outdated and scares me.

When will people learn that worrying about what other people do is pointless and frankly just a waste of time? Making judgements about other people's choice of hunting guns!!??? Seriously!?

[Duckiller]

If you really want to change the rules got to your state legislature of Fish and Game commision. Who ever makes the rules. Michigan recently allowed crossbows during archery season because us old people can't pull bows anymore. Real reason may have to do with commerce. Manufactures want to sell things they make, stores want to sell things they have ordered. Real question is do we need special hunts? LOet everyone use whatever they want and don't worry about what the next guy is using.

[Screwbolts]

Conversations like this thread only tend to divide us. We all need to stick together or we will surely hang along.

We all have different dreams and goals, so why does it matter to some what we each as individuals choose to hunt with.

What ever handicap you choose to limit yourself with is fine, I do not need others to approve of my choice of devise to harvest deer.

Nor do I pass judgment on others choices.

Ken

[btroj]

The State is only concerned with herd management, not the "quality" of the experience. They also look at things like selling more permits with a more open definition of primitive weapons.

[TXGunNut]

If I want to hunt with a frontstuffer it will be a .54 Hawken using PRB and loose powder. I had to put an aperture sight on it to get any degree of accuracy so that would probably disturb the purists but so be it. I have no interest in the inlines but I know they're lots of fun and may get a few more folks interested in the BP game; but then again, maybe not.
We need more hunters and if the rifle that gets them into the game and into the field is one I personally dislike I'm OK with that, it would be a boring world if we all had the same likes and dislikes.

[fouronesix]

Am I off base?

Nope- couldn't agree more!

[JSnover]

If smokeless powder and cartridge ammunition had never been developed, the muzzleloader we shoot today would be far more advanced than those in use more than a century ago.
They'd have stainless barrels, synthetic stocks, high-dollar scopes, etc. It's just evolution. The technology would have matured, it just wouldn't have to compete with "modern" firearms.
I think it is laughable to hunt a primitive season with a Buck Rogers charcoal burner, but if you're legal and ethical I won't squawk about it.

[NVScouter]

The quality of the hunt is improved during primitive seasons. They also allow unique areas to be hunted that aren't open to hi power rifles in many states.

If the range is shorter, the stalk is harder, more time spent per harvested animal. Couple this with weeding out the folks to lazy to do this it becomes one heck of an experience.

If it's all about getting meat use a centerfire and doe tags.

[Elkins45]

We don't have a primitive weapon season here in KY; we have a muzzle loading rifle season. I hunt with a muzzle loading rifle. Of course, when I load it from the muzzle I pour in a charge of smokeless powder and seat a saboted boolet (home poured modified HP) on top of it. I love my Savage 10ML-II because I don't have to clean it. In fact, I leave it loaded from season to season and the last charge I load in the fall is the first sighting shot the next fall.

If KY tells me I need to shoot a patched ball with black powder then that's what I will do. The ML season here results in what is barely a blip in the statistics compared to the modern firearms season. I think topics like this don't do the community any favors because there's no good than can come from an us vs them mentality.

Again: in the case of where I live there is no such thing as a primitive weapon season. There's a ML season and the distinction matters.

[M-Tecs]

I think topics like this don't do the community any favors because there's no good than can come from an us vs them mentality.

I could not agree more!!! What I don’t understand is the mentally that feels they must force their views on anyone that chooses to legally hunt differently than them. Some in this post claim that if you don’t subscribe to their version of hunting you are sickening, lazy and not experiencing a quality fair chase hunt.

I personally don’t care for hunting over waterholes or bait but where it is legal it is not my place to tell fellow hunters they are lesser hunters for legal hunting methods that I don’t choose to do myself.

My most enjoyable hunts have been with disabled vets and terminal ill when I didn’t carry a firearm or hunt. My least enjoy hunt was setting over a water hole with a smoothbore flint trade gun. A friend is into the French-Canadian Voyageur scene. He hunts black bear with spear and everything else with a smoothbore flint trade gun. He talked me into trade gun only antelope hunt over a water hole. He enjoyed the hunt. I did not but it’s not my place to tell him what he enjoys or doesn’t enjoy. I simply will not do it again.

[dragon813gt]

Some in this post claim that if you don’t subscribe to their version of hunting you are sickening, lazy and not experiencing a quality fair chase hunt.

And this sums up why we have the 2nd Amendment issues we do. The hunting/shooting community really isn't a community. It's a bunch of small clicks that only care about their interests. I guess you could call them special interest groups. You have the shotgunners that will throw everyone under the bus to keep their shotguns. You have the shooters that will throw all hunters under the bus as long as they can keep their guns and vice versa. I find it all sickening. I don't understand how people can't support all form of hunting/shooting regardless if they participate in it or not. This is just common sense to me. And if they all supported the NRA, doesn't matter if you agree w/ them 100%, that 100 pound gorilla would be unstoppable. But people would rather whine and complain while their rights are slowly being taken away.
/rant

[Rangefinder]

Yup, it's a little frustrating when the 'skill' portion of anything gets constantly replaced by another gadget. I use to shoot archery leagues once upon a time. It got more frustration by the event when more and more would show up with something that looked like it was out of a sci-fi movie with stabilizers hanging every which way, bubble levels on their sights, etc. When that made it's way into the outdoor 3D shoots, I complained, then said "screw 'em". I shoot instinctive with a 60'lb recurve in my back yard and can hit the kill zone on a deer at will from as far as my back yard will allow--not quite 60 yards. The techno-gear heads wouldn't stand a chance if they had to do that with my bow, and I take my own simple pleasure in that. Starting to view the inline "muzzle-loader" crown the same way. Hand 'em a flinty with a RB and powder horn and they'll either be trimming trees or plowing dirt with it. Technology has it's trade-offs, and developing genuine skill does too. I'll take my chances with skill.

[Boogieman]

When the flint in my gun gets dull I can knap it, try that on your electric fired inline when the battery goes dead.

[Nicholas]

Our ML season in Missouri evolved to an alternate weapons hunt. Somebody has already taken a deer with an atlatl dart as in speared it during this season. All sorts of tools are permitted except centerfire rifles. I used a Contender pistol in 30-30 during the last season; in another season, I had success with a big revolver. I think of it as a bonus season that is the result of excellent management of the deer herd. It also helps put my supply of red meat in the freezer. And I like it that I get to try out various handguns for hunting. I could give a hoot about what other hunters use during the season as long as they follow the rules. We should be glad for the extra opportunity to enjoy time in the field.

[rexherring]

To each his own. I loved going out with my rifle, black powder, patched ball, and a cap that I hoped went off. (or didn't fall off when I wasn't looking) But either way, single shot with open sights still takes more skill than rapid fire. I always kept shots within the same distances as with my Blackhawk .45. More hunting and many times more hunting.

[Doubless]

I find this thread rather interesting. Some see inlines as modern, when the inline action was actually developed back in the middle of the 19th century.

I shoot White muzzleloaders, and absolutely love them. I have been fortunate enough to hunt Idaho several times, twice with Whites. And yes, they are inlines... stainless barrels and actions, synthetic stock, etc. But they are equipped with a Lyman peep, and I shoot loose powder behind conicals I pour myself. Accurate as heck!

There is a dentist in CO that posts fairly often on a site called Monster Muleys. He too shoots a White, and two years ago his elk was shot the first time at a lazered distance of 287 yards. His rifle uses a Lyman peep, just like mine. The point is, learn to shoot the rifle and then take it to the woods.

I am fortunate: in Texas where I live, there is a stable population of somewhere around four million whitetails, so harvest methods and limits are pretty lenient. The last whitetail I shot was taken with a White, but this one was scoped. Was it any less of a thrill? Not to me. Did it make for a more humane kill and quicker dispatch? Absolutely.

I see it this way: use what you will, so long as it is within the confines of the law, and don't turn up your nose at me because my choice is different from yours.

[Elkins45]

When the flint in my gun gets dull I can knap it, try that on your electric fired inline when the battery goes dead.

I don't have an electric fired inline and I'm not sure of your point. Can you start your truck with a hand crank?

Not referring to you specifically, but I do wonder just how sincere the primitive advocates really are. Do they drive an automobile to their hunting grounds? Do they use a battery powered flashlight? Wear synthetic fabrics in the field or use scent killing products? How about tree stands made in a Chinese factory somewhere? Do they cast the balls for their rifle over a wood fire and weave the cloth for patches on a hand powered loom? Etc...

I'm guessing that a whole bunch of the folks criticizing people with different ideas of what gun to hunt with probably aren't really all that primitive. Surely I'm not the only person who sees the irony of advocating for primitive stuff on a discussion forum running over a computer network?

[Elkins45]

The techno-gear heads wouldn't stand a chance if they had to do that with my bow, and I take my own simple pleasure in that. Starting to view the inline "muzzle-loader" crown the same way. Hand 'em a flinty with a RB and powder horn and they'll either be trimming trees or plowing dirt with it. Technology has it's trade-offs, and developing genuine skill does too. I'll take my chances with skill.

I think we are having two different conversations here. Nobody is stopping you from using whatever equipment you like and developing whatever level of skill you desire. The gear choices of others don't lessen your proficiency, but so long as people follow the rules then blame the rules and not the people.

I applaud anyone who develops a skill, but some skills are more valuable than others. I once earned my living shooting pictures with manual focus cameras and then developing and printing black and white film. I was very skilled at it, but now guess what? All those skills I learned mean less than jack now. The world moved on and it left me behind. I can choose to hate Photoshop and digital cameras, but my resentment of them doesn't make them go away. There's no primitive photo season.