Not A Fan Of The Early Antlerless Firearm Season

I love to bow hunt but the early antlerless firearm season I have a problem with.

There are a lot of deer in Michigan and there are a lot of different seasons to hunt them. There is the liberty hunt, and early and late antlerless firearm season, archery, firearm and muzzleloader seasons for deer.

That is a lot of options but there is one season I don't agree with and that is the early antlerless deer season. I know that it's a season that is on private land only, it still has an affect on archery season.

I get the liberty hunt that also includes disabled veterans. These are great for introducing young kids to hunting plus gives a chance for some disabled vets to get out in the woods. This is a good thing, although I wish they were archery or crossbow only.

I like to hunt with my bow, but every little disturbance in the woods can really alter how your season goes. I have hunted for many years and learned a lot and thanks to some guys I met years ago in Indiana, they taught me a lot about harvesting really big bucks.

Yes I have shot my fair share of little ones back in the day but I was teaching myself how to deer hunt so it was learn as you go.

Things like the wind, moon position, temperature, the rut, food sources, bedding, thickets, how often people enter the woods I hunt or woods nearby and a ton of other factors.

Some people may argue this point but shooting guns near your hunting areas, I believe, affects the hunting of the big bucks. Now anybody can shoot a big buck and not even know how they did, it just walked by and they shot. But for those of us who actually hunt one deer specifically, there is a lot of factors in getting the big boy.

Where I live, a bunch of Amish have moved into the area after I purchased the home. From hunting by them in Indiana, I have a lot of experience hunting near them and since they are just hunting to eat and not manage the herd of deer in their area, they take a lot of small young deer, button bucks and they do a whole hell of a lot of shooting.

Between the liberty hunt and the early antlerless season, the Amish have shot up the woods all near my area. They only shot two deer, but from the shooting they did, it did some damage to my area and my trail cameras prove it. I was getting some deer photos during the day of a few decent bucks and one in particular that I have my sites on.

Well now after all their shooting, the buck has become nocturnal just before archery season started. I have seen this type of thing happen time and time again. Everything anyone does in the woods matters. Why? Because you are in the deer's house when you are in the woods. If someone shoots up your living room...wouldn't you notice?

In my opinion, the only reason we have these antlerless deer season is for the state of Michigan to get a little revenue and auto insurance companies lobbying the state to lower the numbers so they don't have to pay out to fix vehicles who hit deer.

You could solve the same problem by offering more doe tags in the normal archery and firearm season and this won't be popular, but I also believe the state should only allow one buck per all your tags per season. That could help balance the herd.

I have hunted in Michigan for many years and back in the early days before a youth hunt and early antlerless firearm season that really changed what was so special about archery season. In the early days, archery hunters were the first ones in the woods and we had the woods to ourselves uninterrupted but not anymore.

So come on Department of Natural Resources, how about doing what's right for youth hunters, disabled veterans and archery hunters and quite things down before archery season starts October 1st. You can achieve all your goals another way.