Road hunting??

[horst]

In the "stirring the pot post I thought a good question was asked by one of the mebers.He simply asked for a definition of road hunting, I made a post in there but changed it so as not to hijack the post or cause an argument.

Im also confused as to what exactly constitutes road hunting.I will often times drive around, glass different properties I have permission for and large chunks of public land looking for deer that are either bedded or feeding.If I see one Im interested in thats in a good spot I will attempt one of two things, to stalk the animal where its at, or to make an educated guesse as to where the animals going and try to get ahead of it for a shot.9 out of 10 times it results in failure anyway.Ive never screwed up anyone elses hunt using this tactic, if theres a car there I wont even slow down to look the place over.

Last night for example I took my sister in law out to try and fill her ML tag.Its been warm here and after shotgun season the deer seemingly vanished.About 45 minutes before dark I saw 7 does coming out of a slough hole heading west in one section.I decided they would try to get into a foodplot left by the state about 1/2 mile away.We drove around the section and made a 1/2 mile walk through the snow to intercept them.They beat us there and we had to sneak in the last 200 yrds without them seeing us.It resulted in her getting a shot at about 50 yrds which she missed on a deer standing still broadside{the cap didnt go off the first time and kinda rattled her }.Since I was in the car when I seen them and used the car to get ahead of them is this roadhunting despite the fact the actual shot took place 1/2 mile from the car and we had to sneak up on deer that were already there and feeding when we got there?

Not loking for an argument, no need to bash anyone else, just wondered since its so ill defined what is considered road hunting by everyone?

[Gator]

Re: Road hunting??

My definition of road hunting: Shooting from a road or right of way, or even from a vehicle.

What you did I would NOT consider road hunting

[horst]

Re: Road hunting??

Just an added thought I might have left out.I believe they changed the law here a few years ago, You used to be able to shoot legaly as long as you were in the ditch, I think now it states you must be on the opposite side of the fence.

The earlier law allowed people to sit in a public right of way and shoot across the fence into private property legally, once an animals down you can retrieve it here as long as your unarmed without permission.The revised law done away with that loophole.It doesnt apply to waterfowl/upland game hunting though, you can still sit in the ditch on the edge of the boudary and shoot geese as they come out, or hunt pheasants in the ditch as theyre considered public property.

[M00N]

Re: Road hunting??

Road hunting to me is several things. For me it'd be one of the following:

• [*]Shooting from or on a vehicle whether it be moving or parked.

[*]Using a vehicle to spook or herd animals for drive hunting.

[*]Shooting from a close distance of one's vehicle or a legal driving road.

[*]Using an articifical light from a vehicle (headlights, spotlight, flashlights, etc.) in the dark to pick your stand based on amount of deer eyes spotted.

[*]Carrying a loaded weapon in your vehicle while driving around with intent to hunt.

[*]Using calls from a moving or parked vehicle to lure animals out for hunting purposes.

There are probably more than that, that I am forgetting. Those are just the common ones I've heard of hunters doing that violated a law in this state while doing so, or ones I've witnessed hunters do infront of me, that made me wish a warden was around. The only exception I could see for road hunting would be handicapped individuals with a permit to hunt from their vehicle on a road.

One thing, that in my opinion, I wouldn't consider road hunting is scouting the land from the vehicle to determine a good hunting spot, looking for signs of deer movement from the vehicle, or looking legally (without aid of light, nightvision, or using the scope on your firearm) for bedded deer for park and stalk hunting. As long as you do everything legally I do not see anything wrong with this, like you said it takes real skill to accomplish it because a car is noisy and most deer move after hearing a car pass by in the hunting season. By legally I mean not attempting to load your gun until you're a legal distance off the road and from your car, not discharging your gun until you're in a legal hunting area, not disturbing other hunters in the area while attempting to harvest the deer, parking in a designated parking pull-off and not trying to make your own in order to rush out and shoot at the deer quick or worse yet parking in the middle of the road or leaving the car running, and definately not pushing the deer into a legal hunting area if it is bedded in an illegal hunting area.

[Guest indianahunter1]

Re: Road hunting??

i agree with you. i am disabled and i have a vehicle access permit to hunt deer but i would rather hunt from a stand.

[rad_112176]

Re: Road hunting??

My opinion is that you can do whatever is legal in your state. I don't think it is right to shoot from a vehicle except for disabled hunters, but some states have laws that let people do it. You can see how much more respect a hunter has for a deer that he has hiked in a mile to set a stand and shoot than one does that shoots from the road. I would disagree with MOON on the part of using a artificial light to scout deer, but then again i grew up in Michigan where it is legal to spotlight deer except during gun season. We seen alot of bucks that we didn't know we had on our property and yes we did adjust some of our stand locations due to where we seen deer coming out in the evening. Not really any different than watching a feild right at dusk to see where the come out from and making a game plan from there. Usually when you spot light they are already in the feild to begin with. It is against the law to do this with any weapon in the vehicle. My opinion of Road Hunting is someone that hunts from his/her vehicle and shoots at deer that are crossing the road or standing close to the road on private property. This is a stupid thing to do cause most of the time they are shooting at something that is on private property to begin with and if it is not then they know the deer is going to run onto private property. Driving around to you see deer and then trying to pull a sneak up on one is alot different than this. Just my 2 cents.

[snapper]

Re: Road hunting??

[ QUOTE ]

I would disagree with MOON on the part of using a artificial light to scout deer, but then again i grew up in Michigan where it is legal to spotlight deer except during gun season.

[/ QUOTE ]

Its alos legal here in PA as well.

Road Hunting: It is unlawful to 1) hunt from a vehicle; 2) shoot at wildlife on a public road or right-of-way open to public travel; 3) shoot across a road unless the line of fire is high enough to preclude any danger to road users; and 4) alight from a vehicle and shoot at any wildlife until the shooter is at least 25 yards from the traeled portion of the roadway. NOTE: These provisions do not prevent an individual, who may not qualify for a Disabled Person's Permit, but who has health concerns or problems to sit in or near a legally "parked" vehicle and watch for game. Of course, loaded firearms may never be placed in, or against the vehicle at any time.

Copied that straight out of the PA hunting digest!

[wtnhunt]

Re: Road hunting??

Well Chris, in my opinion road hunting as I would define it, is those who drive along and see deer and shoot from either in their vehicle or from the roadway near their vehicle without putting forth any effort other than seeing deer from the road which anyone with good eyes can do. Whether it be a public road or a private road on a large property, I don't think it is really hunting when you drive around and then shoot from a vehicle or right beside it. Here it is still illegal to hunt from vehicles that can be licensed to use on highways, pretty sure that does not stop some though, and am pretty certain there are those out there who poach deer this way off of both private land and public land from roadways.

In watching some shows, watching guys out west driving roads or senderos glassing from trucks and the mules and other utv type vehicles with the shooting chair and rests mounted above the cab, I don't think highly of that type of thing, just does not seem to me to be that sporting to drive around find a deer, then shoot it from a utv or close by a truck. I think that in my mind could also be considered to be a form of road hunting. I would not necessarily say that it is unethical though as I really have no first hand experience with that type of thing and there may be more challenges to it than I realize, although it seems anyone with good glass and a a somewhat trained eye who can place a shot at fair distances could easily engage in this type of thing without any other knowledge or skills.

On the other hand some of those types of shows the guys do have to work and will spot deer a long ways off and then leave the vehicle and work their way to the deer. That seems more challenging to me and I don't see a thing wrong with it. From reading your posts, seems you have on several occasions worked hard for several deer doing whatever it takes to get close enough. I would not consider what you do from your posts to be road hunting unless I have overlooked something along the way.

I said it before either in the deer dogging post or maybe I the stirring the pot post and will say it again, lumping a group of hunters together by the way they chose to hunt is a mistake. There are unethical shooters and those poachers and thieves who are not hunters at all in every group out there.

[M00N]

Re: Road hunting??

[ QUOTE ]

Spotlighting Wildlife: It is unlawful to 1) spotlight wildlife while

in possession of a firearm, bow and arrow, or other device capable

of killing wildlife; 2) spotlight wildlife during the regularly scheduled

statewide antlered and antlerless deer seasons (Nov. 27-Dec.

9), including those days separating the seasons and now including

the late firearms deer seasons in WMUs 2B, 5C & 5D; and

3) cast an artificial light upon any building, farm animal or photoelectric

cell. Recreational spotlighting is lawful between sunrise

and 11 p.m., except as previously noted. Spotlighting includes

handheld lights, accessory spotlights on vehicles and vehicle headlights

when intentionally used to locate wildlife. A person hunting

raccoons, skunks, opossums, foxes and coyotes on foot may use a

handheld light. It is not lawful to have a light affixed to a firearm.

[/ QUOTE ]

Not legal to spotlight wildlife during the deer season in this state with or without a weapon and illegal all other times with a weapon present despite an open hunting season, with the exception of raccoon, skunk, opossum, fox, and coyote hunting and only on foot, not vehicle, can you do this in those exception hunting seasons. That is copied from the General Hunting Regulations in the 2006-2007 Hunting & Trapping Digest. This is why I included the part about spotlighting from the vehicle because it wouldn't be road hunting unless you had your weapon with you.

[PAstringking]

Re: Road hunting??

my camp sits on a dirt road and this is our major travel route through our property. cars do drive it all the time but we must walk down it to get to certain areas of our property without spooking all the game.

i have never shot a deer from the road but i will tell you that when i slowly walk to my stand for the afternoon hunt i am fully loaded.

dont know if it is really legal but its seems to be accepted in my area.

[Guest Xen]

Re: Road hunting??

I think a lot of the definition to road hunting has to do with what is or is not a "road"... from a dirt road that is mostly rocks to a 6 lane paved highway - there are a lot in between. also, the vehicle... atv crawling along at 5 mph to the trucks running 60-80 mph. and then lastly, where the shot comes from... directly from the vehicle itself or 50 yards away from the vehicle.

some states have actual restrictions to how far from a paved road you have to be to legally shoot.

some people refer to road hunting as a guy using his atv to go from where he was hunting to back to his camp, even if along a dirt trail up in the mountains

[Guest waynemclain]

Re: Road hunting??

well said xen

[johnf]

Re: Road hunting??

In Arkansas it is illigal to hunt within 100 feet of any publically maitained right of way.

Deffintion of hunting is having a loaded gun or knocked arrow. You can have a loaded rifle in your car, but the second you take it out or shoulder it, you are hunting by state regs.

[Randy]

Re: Road hunting??

Do you ever want to answer a post and just can't figure out how to put your thoughts into words??

[arrow32]

Re: Road hunting??

There last year here in West Virginia they changed the law from you have to be like 100 feet from the road or somthing to you can shoot from the road. You have to be 25 yards from you car tho i think.

What i think roadhunting is...Shooting deer from car window stepping outside the truck and shooting from resting on the truck or anything you dont have to put any effort forth.

What you done i dont see as a roadhunt.

[horst]

Re: Road hunting??

Ok good discussion so far.Let me run another scenario past you guys that happened to me two years ago.

I had my 10 yr old nephew in the truck with me, he had missed a shot at a doe earlier and scared the deer out of the field we were hunting in.We were headed back to town, if memory serves me there was about 20 minutes of legal shooting time left.Going past a chunk of public ground I seen a really nice 10 point buck standing in the switchgrass about 30 yrds from the parking lot.I slowed down and pulled in expecting the deer to run, he apparently thought he was hid because he didnt move.I had my nephew load his shotgun, then told him to step out of the truck, the deer still didnt move.I told him to chamber a shell and sneak around to my side of the truck which he did, the deer still didnt move.To make a long story short I overlooked the fact he was a foot shorter then me and I was still sitting in the cab of the truck, he couldnt see the deer through the thick switchgrass once he stepped out so the shot never happened.The deer was actually still standing there watching us when we drove back out and if he had tried to ove closer it would have never worked.

But had he got the shot he would have literally had to have leaned against the truck and used the bumper for a rest to take the shot.We were off the road, in public ground, and he was out of the truck, ethical shot or not?The deer had every oppurtunity to escape and had the shooter been an adult it could have easily been a dead deer.Honestly Ive killed deer walking in or out of the parking lots before, some reason they like to hang around them here But Ive never had to sneak out of the truck to do it.Again not trying to start anything and dont want to see anyone bashing anyone else, I just find the answers to these questions interesting, guesse Im easily amused

[Randy]

Re: Road hunting??

That's kind of what I was trying to say earlier. If you would have walked up to that deer it would have ran away more than likely, Right? So my opinion on road hunting would be using a vehicle to get within shooting distance of an animal. Does that make sense? Spot and stalking where it is common practice is alright but most animals are not afraid of vehicles which make it easier to get close to game using them.

[johnf]

Re: Road hunting??

I would have to say that it depends on what your state laws say Horst. In Arkansas that would have been illigal as soon as the loaded gun came out of the truck.

In most cases, anything illigal is unethical by defalt.

[elkoholic]

Re: Road hunting??

Since I started this mess with the first post, I guess I should throw out my opinion here. When someone is crawling down the road at 5 mph or less, with the intention being, to see and shoot said deer from the confines of their vehicle....that is road hunting. That is a very common occurrence in these parts and definitely illegal. The exception would be if that person is disabled. The driving around trying to spot game at a distance and then stalking within range is also a common occurrence in wide open country and while it allows one to cover a lot more ground, it also puts one's stalking skills to the test. Personally, I feel that if one has the physical ability, "hunting" from a vehicle is pretty lame and even if legal it is pretty hard to call it hunting. Here in the "wild" west you would think it would be overrun with "mountain" men who know how to hunt, get their game out of the woods and butcher it themselves, but this is not the case. If the road hunters would stick to the roads that would be bad enough, but they tend to drive off road (illegally) often cutting the locks on forest service gates and making unauthorized trails/roads across the land. One good point of all this is that if you get far enough off the roads you can have some excellent hunting with little or no competition. I also think that driving around and glassing is fine and sometimes serendipity reigns and an easy kill results, but there is no fair chase in shooting an animal from your vehicle or one in which the vehicle is used as a major player in the hunting scheme. There is nothing wrong with driving to where the hunt begins, but it should not begin easing the safety off.

[wtnhunt]

Re: Road hunting??

Your second scenario there Chris I would think would be illegal here. I would also consider that to be road hunting, not because of the legality issue, but because little to no effort was made to get close to the deer, the deer was right there. In my opinion walking down any road versus driving on a road, even on old dirt roads and such can and will in most cases make a difference in how the deer respond. Had you and your nephew been walking the road for a good ways, I might have a little different perspective. Finding a deer from your vehicle from the road, then getting out and taking a shot with little or no effort to close in on the deer in my opinion is just not hunting as I know it.

[horst]

Re: Road hunting??

[ QUOTE ]

I would have to say that it depends on what your state laws say Horst. In Arkansas that would have been illigal as soon as the loaded gun came out of the truck.

In most cases, anything illigal is unethical by defalt.

[/ QUOTE ]

Actually John you just said something I never gave much thought to.I have always loaded my gun before I get out of the truck, I have no idea if its legal or not here.I might have to check into that.I know its illegal to drive around with a loaded gun but never gave much thought to it applying to a parked vehichle

[horst]

Re: Road hunting??

[ QUOTE ]

Your second scenario there Chris I would think would be illegal here. I would also consider that to be road hunting, not because of the legality issue, but because little to no effort was made to get close to the deer, the deer was right there. In my opinion walking down any road versus driving on a road, even on old dirt roads and such can and will in most cases make a difference in how the deer respond. Had you and your nephew been walking the road for a good ways, I might have a little different perspective. Finding a deer from your vehicle from the road, then getting out and taking a shot with little or no effort to close in on the deer in my opinion is just not hunting as I know it.

[/ QUOTE ]

So if you parked your truck and got out to walk in to your stand and a large buck stood up 30 yrds away and just stood thereyou wouldnt shoot it because you were to close to your truck?Or was it the fact that I seen the deer before I parked?Not arguing, just a little confused by your response there William.I havent had my coffee yet

[snapper]

Re: Road hunting??

[ QUOTE ]

This is why I included the part about spotlighting from the vehicle because it wouldn't be road hunting unless you had your weapon with you.

[/ QUOTE ]

I gottcha now....sorry!

[wtnhunt]

Re: Road hunting??

[ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]

Your second scenario there Chris I would think would be illegal here. I would also consider that to be road hunting, not because of the legality issue, but because little to no effort was made to get close to the deer, the deer was right there. In my opinion walking down any road versus driving on a road, even on old dirt roads and such can and will in most cases make a difference in how the deer respond. Had you and your nephew been walking the road for a good ways, I might have a little different perspective. Finding a deer from your vehicle from the road, then getting out and taking a shot with little or no effort to close in on the deer in my opinion is just not hunting as I know it.

[/ QUOTE ]

So if you parked your truck and got out to walk in to your stand and a large buck stood up 30 yrds away and just stood thereyou wouldnt shoot it because you were to close to your truck?Or was it the fact that I seen the deer before I parked?Not arguing, just a little confused by your response there William.I havent had my coffee yet

[/ QUOTE ]

OK Chris, think that is a little different in a way, and guess unless I was able to encounter that first hand which will never happen where I hunt can honestly not say for sure what I would do and would really depend on how the law reads. I think if you see a deer from a vehicle and are looking or have intents to find deer rather than actually hunt the deer that is just not the same. Walking down a field road or a access road to get to your stand and having a buck show up is just not quite the same as driving around and looking for them and finding them and capitalizing on the opportunities from a vehicle you might not otherwise have. You said the boy was up against the truck. Just don't think the way I personally view hunting that I would agree that is what he was doing.

Sounds like your situation was more of a deal where you were attempting to take advantage of a situation. That is a dilemma I have asked here before a few years back. Maybe you remember me asking the question in a thread, would you shoot a deer out your back sliding door? While I don't think shooting a deer out my back door is hunting, I might do it if the deer was one that I wanted, but I don't think if I killed a monster, I would appreciate it quite the same as if I had set out in a stand where I worked to know what the deer were doing and gotten the same deer. Realistically I have had many opportunities during the rut to shoot deer with the rifle or ml from the house, but have always picked up the camera instead . Of course had the big ten I needed a few steps with the bow on showed up in the backyard during any of the gun seasons, he would have hit the ground no question about it, and he would have been hung on the wall just the same as I had killed him from the stand. It could be easy to confuse opportunities with hunting and I am not opposed to anyone taking advantage of opportunities so long as it is legal where they are.

Guess so long as it is legal and you feel ok about that is all that really matters.

btw, if ever I do manage to shoot a monster from the house, I will be the first to admit that I was shooting and not hunting .

[doughboy1956]

Re: Road hunting??

To me road hunting is driving around until they see a deer and then get out and shoot at it. Not aloud to shoot from a public road down here but some idiots do. I don't want to get sarted on the Natives down here because i would still be writing until 2008. I seen 4 or 5 in back of pick ups, in vans with both side doors open, on top of the roofs of vans with homemade stands and all driving with their guns loaded. jacking at night etc;etc; and its legal for them according to the Supreme court decisions over the last 12 years or more.