BP - I'm sure you an figure it out.
Hal - I you're right there could be lots of factors as to why the Mulies are in "decline" there, if indeed they are. The fact that guys can and will shoot 5 or six or more animals a year is BS, especially under the guise of "cheap meat". I think there are very few guys who can hunt deer cheaper than buying meat. Maybe if you have land, and a hand me down gun and shoot one off of your porch or in the "back forty" sure it might be cheaper. I know by the time I pay for gas, ammo, tags and hunting "toys" it is the most expensive meat in my freezer and I suspect for
most people it is the same.
I find this thread a mix of interesting and down right sad. I never really realized the animosity there is towards bow hunters or the division between different groups of hunters, in general. It is no wonder we are "losing" to the antis, we can't even stop bickering and fighting amongst ourselves. It seems everyone is so worried about losing what they have that we can't put our differences aside and work for the good of hunting in general.
I think everyone can agree that we would like to see increased numbers of deer, quality of deer and no draws in an ideal world? To do that we would need to decrease hunting pressure and that can be done by limiting the groups that harvest the most deer. I'm assuming that is rifle hunters and outfitter allocations?
No one here can argue that rifle hunters are less efficient than bow hunters, can they? Sure we see pics of deers harvested or see "tons of bow hunters" in the field but I seriously doubt they are actually harvesting as many deer as people think. If bow hunting is so easy every weekend warrior would be buying a bow a week before the season and calling Sugar Creek to mount their monster buck the opening weekend. It just isn't happening.
I have never shot a Mulie but I would limit my season in order to insure that future generations could. I think Hal has a good point, maybe we should all have draws and get a tag for one animal, per season. you get drawn for moose that NO whities or elk for you.
I'm not sure what the answers are but I do see that it seems SRD is clueless. It must fall upon hunters to self manage what we have or we won't have anything at all.