Road hunters

I guess it’s if you want to be a hunter or just a shooter. I will never understand how anyone would risk fines and reputation to alight from a vehicle to shoot a deer or elk etc ! I’m reading on another thread how hunting wife gets into shape by caring her pack ( training with her pack to get into pack shape ) and I wonder what a road hunter does to get into road shape ? Maybe coffee cup curls …..
 
MTGomer said:
I didn’t realize how serious the law in Arizona was on this until I looked into it. Listen to Aaron Snyder‘s podcast with the owner of big Chino outfitters about their antelope bust.
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I took the time to listen. Seems like they're splitting hairs
 
Tradewind said:
I took the time to listen. Seems like they're splitting hairs
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Yeah, it seems like it could go either way for a guy depending on warden discretion.

I’ll be the first to admit, I’ve glassed up deer that were nothing but spots on the horizon 5 miles away. Walked back to the truck and drove a few miles closer, then hiked in. Hard to imagine that being illegal but it sounds like if you take the law literally it may be.
 
MTGomer said:
Yeah, it seems like it could go either way for a guy depending on warden discretion.

I’ll be the first to admit, I’ve glassed up deer that were nothing but spots on the horizon 5 miles away. Walked back to the truck and drove a few miles closer, then hiked in. Hard to imagine that being illegal but it sounds like if you take the law literally it may be.
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absurd to a point. Presumably that could apply once I leave the house , no matter how far away
as long as I have intent to harvest an animal
 
MTGomer said:
Yeah, it seems like it could go either way for a guy depending on warden discretion.

I’ll be the first to admit, I’ve glassed up deer that were nothing but spots on the horizon 5 miles away. Walked back to the truck and drove a few miles closer, then hiked in. Hard to imagine that being illegal but it sounds like if you take the law literally it may be.
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It is not illegal to drive to where the deer are in Az.
Just illegal to shoot them from the road or across the road. 💥
 
I grew up initially hunting from the roads until I was around 18 years old. My dad had polio and walked on the side of his feet so he was mobility impared. The main times I hunted away from the roads growing up was when I was with my uncles and cousins. Once I got away from the roads my success rates went way up. I got my first elk when I had my dad drop me off in an area and I walked the woods. However that one died on the road so it was convenient. People had to help me load it and a gentlemen was nice enough to give me a ride to get it back to camp I had that one hanging by time my dad and uncles showed up at camp. My dad never told me I could not buy a hunting license since. Up until I turned 14 and could get my own license I rode with my dad who typically drove to the rendevous point while my uncles and cousins walked the fingers and ridges on deer drives.

Road hunting is not necessarily an ethics issues as there are some people who don't have the mobility to get out like the rest of us do. I do have problems with people shooting from or across roads though. I see a lot of that.
 
I float to where the game is...in my mind. Guess I have always been a road hunter. That's how I've gotten to trailheads & such,90% of the time.
The atv thing has gotten out of hand in places. It was bad enough with more 4x4 trucks just going where they please.AZ & UT were bad before,now NM is. Just about every truck has a atv or is towing a hotrod dune buggy.

But since I drive to explore & collect firewood(with permits) and now am 66, I am a road hunter I guess.
I don't go into those basins where a road has appeared or the gate cut. I go on FS roads to where wood is on the ground already and park(within 300' or the rule for area) and Rio & I watch the sh!t show fly by.

I usually see the best game when I am taking a break or loading wood with Rio. The big buck who gets up and moves from his spot near me or the elk feeding past us into a different draw from where the noise machines went.
And of course the OHV's stop or come over and ask....seen any? In a unit I have only dreamed of drawing.
My finger points to where their buddies drove to.

Then there is the guy alone in his truck or car who stops.Has his pack/camp in the back. "howdy,I'm new to NM & elk hunting and I drew this tag"...I will show him a decent camp place on the map to camp just off the road and point to the canyon the elk herd just went up and everyone drives by,next to the road.
Last year I went back the next day to finish loading in the spot I was and the guy has a rack and game bags filled in his truck and thanks me. Offers me some of his meat. Thanks,but I have a freezer full.

The year before it was a real old couple with an RV and she had a buck tag. I told them to camp there across the road from me. "There is a big buck on the other side of the quarry there". All the gear heads wizzing past. "Seriously"?, he asks. I say just walk 200 yards and wait. Quietly.
The next day she is all smiles. That is a bigger buck than I have taken in NM they are working on.
I helped them get it back to their camp across the road. We share some coffee and they tell me they blew it last night and thought he had headed for the hills. But there he was this morning heading back to his bed. Huge 4x4. They never went farther than a quarter mile from camp.

Ask me,if you have no OHV. If you do,I can point....
 
I find "road hunters" way less bothersome than people that Park next to me and walk in on my tracks and stand on a ridge top in their orange and spook whatever game is in the area. I have seen 5 trucks parked in a parking zone "Hunting" up on the same flock of antelope In the center of sagebrush flats thinking there the ones that will get the running shots at the goats, WHAT?

We do and can hunt, with the proper permission needed for the lands we are hunting, in the boat on public waters. Not just waterfowl, big game, predators, birds, whatever. There the same as a road but fewer people doing it...
Can't shoot from the boat if it's under power. but stopped it's good.
 
Mlgrace said:
I live in eastern Arizona in the middle of some very fine elk hunting. Pressure is very high. Locals cannot seem to draw tags. I spend a lot of time out in elk country, several days per week, and have found that road hunters have taken over the hunts. Literally one vehicle or side by side after another. We are crisscrossed with old logging trails and despite them being closed these guys are up and down ever road and trail. To me this is ethically wrong. It is illegal and from my perspective paints us all with the same negative color scheme. I have become quite discouraged by it. I know that enforcement is underfunded but something needs to be done. Are y’all experiencing this same thing and do you say something to these guys? They flag me down all the time asking if I have seen anything. I just always tell them to hike up higher and watch over the lower areas. If they sit all day they will certainly see elk. They are everywhere. This seems epidemic. Are hunting ethics failing?
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I see the same thing in SW Montana. If there wasn't a road or trail up every ridge it might be different. Those gawdam SxS buggies are EVERYWHERE! If the guys just drove them somewhere and got out and hunted for the day it might not be so bad. But they get in those things and just keep driving all day long, day after day. And there's hundreds of them. Road closures mean nothing. Everyone has a video camera on their phone. Use it when you see guys breaking the law on closed roads. I'll be more than happy to fly back as a witness for a court appearance to get a conviction. I'm fed up with this shit.
 
come on man they are just driving the road to hang about 20 cameras the day before the season, its like your scouting the night before the hunt watching a nice herd on water from afar and two dudes walk in bust the elk off so they can hang their camera. The world has changed alot.
 
88man said:
come on man they are just driving the road to hang about 20 cameras the day before the season, its like your scouting the night before the hunt watching a nice herd on water from afar and two dudes walk in bust the elk off so they can hang their camera. The world has changed alot.
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NO CAMERAS!! 💥
 
I wonder if a Marmot population has appeared near me. They do a number on things. Rats,there's lots of rats in NM,that's it.
The problem is these clowns never leave their vehicles anymore.
 
Mlgrace said:
I live in eastern Arizona in the middle of some very fine elk hunting. Pressure is very high. Locals cannot seem to draw tags. I spend a lot of time out in elk country, several days per week, and have found that road hunters have taken over the hunts. Literally one vehicle or side by side after another. We are crisscrossed with old logging trails and despite them being closed these guys are up and down ever road and trail. To me this is ethically wrong. It is illegal and from my perspective paints us all with the same negative color scheme. I have become quite discouraged by it. I know that enforcement is underfunded but something needs to be done. Are y’all experiencing this same thing and do you say something to these guys? They flag me down all the time asking if I have seen anything. I just always tell them to hike up higher and watch over the lower areas. If they sit all day they will certainly see elk. They are everywhere. This seems epidemic. Are hunting ethics failing?
Click to expand...
I’m guessing you’re on the Apache Sitgreaves forest. They have no rules against driving cross country at any time and they even rescinded the closed roads law. So there are technically no closed roads on the a-s and people can drive anywhere. The terrain in az lends it self to being able to have roads everywhere
 
I drew a special permit for elk here in WA a few years back. There were illegal camps, illegal use of atvs and deer hunters. I scouted the area well, knew where the bedding and feeding was happening and was able to kill my bull in some rugged ground 75 yards from a main road. This bull was not visible from the road due to the terrain and could move between bedding and feeding without exposing himself.

Point is, the elk were still there and huntable. Go get em’. We can’t control other hunters, and probably should want to.

Best,

Al
 
Blackcats06 said:
I’m guessing you’re on the Apache Sitgreaves forest. They have no rules against driving cross country at any time and they even rescinded the closed roads law. So there are technically no closed roads on the a-s and people can drive anywhere. The terrain in az lends it self to being able to have roads everywhere
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I am. It is like a freeway out there. It is wearing me pretty thin.
 
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