Dear Editor:
I never read such a crock of foolishness and misinformation in my life as the piece about the United Fish and Game Clubs of Manitoulin (UFGCM) wanting to end party hunting. Have you guys done any homework about this at all? Where did you get your facts? Where have you been hunting that you find a shortage of deer?
The only shortage I ever see is a shortage of bucks. I normally (and I have kept track for many decades) see about 40 to 50 deer a year when hunting on The Manitoulin of which only one to three are bucks, which I almost inevitably shoot!
The idea that there are not enough young deer making it to maturity is poppy cock, all those young deer are the problem, ask any farmer.
If the UFGCM were really interested in improving the hunt they would get rid of the antlerless tags and let us shoot whatever we want for awhile. That is what we need to do for quality deer management. The fact is that most hunters, given the chance, would shoot a buck before a doe anyway, you don’t need to target the bucks they are already the choice game. (Not me, I’d rather eat a fat dry doe, I have enough horns sticking out of my walls).
As to Mr. Seifried’s suggestion that in the US you harvest your own deer and no one else’s, I don’t know, I found it hard to find out that kind of information in time to write this missive. However, it is interesting to note the bag limits in some of our neighbouring states; Ohio-6 (well some counties have “only” two, three or four); Michigan two, Wisconsin-two. Let me shoot six deer and I will not have to fill somebody else’s tag! As far as party hunting goes, well again I could not find out about it on line one way or the other, but it is allowed in our two neighbouring provinces. So the suggestion that Ontario is different is, well, incorrect.
I was raised on the Manitoulin, have never missed a deer season for about 55 years, and yes, I am one of those guys that fills other people’s tags. You know, there are guys in our family gang that would not come hunting at all if they had to count on filling their own tag, they trust the rest of us to help out that way. There is nothing wrong with that, it is legal and the way mankind always hunted.
If there are areas where the deer are in short supply it is probably because there are seven or eight guys crammed on one little 100 acre lot. Maybe you should make rules about that-it’s dangerous if nothing else! Give the deer a little room and they will get so thick that they move right into town, oh right, that has already happened.
Every year I drag my trailer over to my nephew’s and stay all season. I buy gas and propane, food, booze and restaurant meals. At the end of the season I come home to the North Shore. But if you limit me to one tag, I doubt that I would stay longer than the first forenoon. Probably just drive the truck over in the morning, shoot a deer and go back home by myself because a lot of my family will not be coming with me. Is this what you want? Is this what the farmers want? How about the business men, what do they think about that?
Charlie Smith,
Massey
