Why can't they just look at states that have had tagging for decades and gotten the bugs worked out and just copy cat them. The DNRs that are on top of their actual kills require a tag fixed to the animal before moving.This writing it down and printing a new license sounds like something my inlaws would come up with.

I just want to know which jabroni saw a decade-long decline in hunter participation and thought game check was a great idea.

The only people I know that don't comply are people trying to kill more than 3 bucks. I own two separate land tracks and one has fewer deer because of harvesting of too many does. This will be a great management tool if people will use it. I have another track where all owners but one have managed deer for over ten years. Went 8 years and killed very few deer. Last two years we have been killing nice bucks. Florida guys next to us kill well over 3 bucks per person a year. Land owners have complained and game warden visits them on a regular basis.
Sorry for long rant but bottom line- Personally I like it. Takes a couple of seconds. I'm afraid if people don't report they will start restricting doe harvest across the board. This would help one track of my property but would harm the property that is managed. Just my opinion!

Why are more bucks being slaughtered now? For decades a person could kill one buck a day all season long and there were still bucks left for the next season. If you look at this site very much I believe you will find Mr. Itchyfinger to be very few and far between, but everybody knows somebody that heard a friend talk about a relative that overheard a conversation at Wednesday night church service that their cousin talked to the wife of an old schoolmate that has a father-in-law that has a son that hunts that heard in school that his friends uncle killed four bucks and was going to make sure the rest of the State didn't have any bucks left. This opinion is old.

Manage your property, let others manage theirs. If you don't like the way they manage theirs get control of it and manage that land the way you want. Or, cast large generalizations/assumptions around and beg the State to do it the easiest way for you.

I vote we do away with GC, bag limits, and seasons on all game. Everybody can manage there property the way they want. For deer turkey bear hogs whatever. Everybody could hunt how they want when they want. I am sure the hunting would be better and a lot more enjoyable.

More data can't hurt. It amazes me grown men who love a resource so much they post on a website about it can complain about the intense difficulty of a less than 1 minute reporting process so the resource can be more effectively managed. Some folks seem to be able to simultaneously believe the state isn't effectively managing the deer population and also they shouldn't be bothered with providing simple harvest information so the population can be managed. Those two ideas held together ought to make your head hurt.

I only took one statistics course in college but I'm sure over time they can get a very accurate idea of not only how many deer are killed but how many hunters are using the system.

Off the top of my head at a freshman level understanding I'd gather gamecheck numbers, find out what percentage of persons wardens contacted with dead deer had reported those deer, plug that in and then check the numbers with processor numbers. If wardens come into contact with as many people as I'd assume over time you'd come up with a statistically significant sample and be able to estimate game check compliance pretty accurately. You're gonna miss the guy who shoots a deer, drags it back to his back porch processes it and eats it, but you always were anyway.

No system would be perfect, but over time you could fine tune it and probably get a pretty good idea. In a few years you'd have enough trends to tell you something. Throw in some population surveys around the state and you'd be cooking with gas.

I report every deer I kill and I wish everyone else would too, in the same way I'd wish they didn't spotlight deer.

Read up on the tragedy of the commons. Remember there was a time finding a deer track in the county I grew up in was newspaper level news. Remember that unregulated hunting devastated the population of not only deer but most every game species in North America. We wouldn't need a NWTF or Ducks Unlimited or RMEF or game laws or seasons if we could be trusted to manage independently. We wouldn't have had to import deer from all over the country creating 6 different rut times.

Also, all you spot checkers would need to use statewide processor numbers. I have never used a processor in the county I hunt and currently don't use one at all, but when I do it's neither where I hunt or where I live.

Laughable! Never have I said that bag limits and seasons should not be in place, but apparently not being in the the "more regulations, laws, rules the are the better" camp I am somehow a kill everything in sight kind of "hunter. Interesting giant leap. Since apparently it has been missed. I believe the approach from the State should be as minimal as possible as far as regulations, laws and rules go. Leave the land management up to the land owners/controllers to institute (putting corn out during hunting season is not land management, or deer management in my opinion) more restrictive management as they see fit on their property. Yes, I know radical anarchist thoughts.

The State can get as valuable information from a voluntary reporting system as a FORCED UNDER PENALTY OF LAW reporting system. Yes, I know hard to understand that concept but just hang in there.

The State should spend it's time educating the public about the benefits of land and game management on diverse tracks of land from those areas of ag fields to dense pine plantations to river bottom hardwoods to large blocks of hilly hardwoods, to the sandy soils of the coastal plains. Education is ABSOLUTELY THE BEST WAY to assist the landowners/controllers and public, which would increase the reporting in a voluntary reporting system. But I understand if one wants to grovel at the States feet to solve the problem for them. I don't care to do that, but to each their own I guess.

This is gonna be long. Those who say the ones not reporting are the one wanting to kill more than 3 bucks is true but is far from the sole reason. I've never said I was for or against the 10 day extension in the north or GC. What I am and was against was the data used for the 10 day extension. They happened the same year. Why not implement GC, gather data, and then use it for or against the 10 extension. GC, if done correctly, should be at least considered in the decisions. Either the 10 extension was so important it couldn't wait on GC or GC really isn't that important in decesion making.
Then there is the leader you publically belittles landowners, military, special needs people, and senior citizens by essentially saying they are no better than a capable welfare recipient. True leaders can get the people to follow and the people will like it and then their are the ones that naturally just have a way of turning people off. He was the wrong guy to be pushing GC.
Next, is the goal. What is our goal and the plan to get there? Older deer? Bigger deer? More balanced herd? Not just "a healthier nerd?" That meaning could vary. Spell it out for the people.

So, we have a leader that targets certain groups that's going to piss most people whether you are a military supporter or a special needs supporter. He delivers a program for better data at the same time delivers a season extension contradicting the need for data. Everything done without a goal relayed to the hunters.

As I said, I'm not pro or anti GC. But from many conversations GC non compliance goes much deeper than just wanting to kill more than 3 bucks.

Is

What I stated is as minimal as possible which is what you stated you are for. So you do want some rules as long as you agree with them. I think I am finally starting to understand. Except you are for restricting the way someone hunts on there property if they want to do it over corn or there bait of choice if they want to. Which is no diffrent than the food plot I am sitting on now it is just bait to draw in deer to kill. Maybe they have no where to plant a field or the equipment to plant it with but since you don't like it it should be illegal So as long as the rules and regulations fit your way of thinking they are good, Well sir I would say that makes you a hypocrite.

Probably the same one that allowed the liberal doe harvest that had driven the deer population so low in areas of the State that many hunters have just given up and the ones that are still at it in those areas have a hard time getting their kids or any new hunter interested in a sport when they hardly ever see their prey much less actually kill one....

You almost had me onboard with the ability to manage my own bear population lol

We have an older gentlemen that hunts next to us I really like the guy he's a hoot.... and he's killed 4-5 so far. He was telling me he heard he was supposed to call some number and report it.

Smiling... I told him just whip out his little smart phone and go the the app and report it.

He looked at me like like WTH you talkin bout? What's an App?

I just laughed.

Can't have rules if there is no way to enforce them. Meaning we don't have enough Game Wardens with a local presence. This guy is honest if he thought for a minute it was really going to be an issue I guarantee he'd figure it out and call it in. I looked up the number and gave it to him.

For one, a tagging system would be more expensive. The states that use tags also have higher taxes and licenses. I don't think the people of AL are willing to pay more for anything.

I think the dcnr needs the support of a majority of the hunters to get any new system to work. Hunters in high regulation states have been conditioned over the decades to expect more regulations, and they are willing to comply and in many cases even seem to like it. It's going to take time to change the mindset of AL hunters. Even then, I don't think anyone reading this will live long enough to see hunters in AL start thinking the same as hunters in a state like MN.

If government forces more regulations on hunters, and hunters don't want them, then the only reason they will comply is if they perceive that there is a reasonable chance they will get caught and fined. AL doesn't have the resources to make hunters believe they might get caught. Many of them didn't want GC. Hence, they ignore it. The people I know of who haven't reported their deer were not trying to kill more than the limit. They just didn't want to go to the trouble of reporting and didn't think it was important.

My take of GC is that our director probably knows a lot about managing wildlife, but knows very little about managing people. His public statements lead me to believe that he thinks hunters should comply simply because "I said so." I think he overestimated his power, and a lot of hunters are just ignoring him.

In hunting other states, with all different sorts of laws and systems, I reached the conclusion that it isn't the state that determines how much game will be taken. It's always the landowner or leaseholder that decides that. In some places they are really careful to do that within their system. In other places, not so much. AL seems to fall into the second group.

This is what I was afraid GC would do to AL. The hunter survey has been trashed enough that it won't be very reliable even if they continue it. And GC is gonna be wildly inaccurate for a long time. Probably for the rest of my life, our dcnr will have to manage our game without having any idea what is going on with game populations.

As you stated in the high lighted paragraph having an elitist attitude will never work with us common folk's that deer hunt our small tracts of land, in clubs or management areas. What gets our attention is a common sense approach that produces real results. Anybody with any hunting knowledge knows that what works in one area of the state doesn't in all of the state. Like extending the season to the tenth of February in North Alabama. That's what just doesn't make any sense at all and game check working at 30 % even shows that.

GC seems to be generational and hunter desires. Those for it,seem to come from the younger generation fixated with stats ,data,technology or for managing for better bucks. Those against seem to be from the older generation that are not that interested in the above. Then you have the 10 to 20 percent who want to kill as many bucks as they want to, bait,night hunt etc, that were doing outlaw stuff before the 3 buck limit and GC and will do it after any other rules are came up with to include tags

Honestly I do not believe Sykes has an elitest attitude rather just that of a wildlife biologist that was used to being hired by a landowner to manage the wildlife and if you wanted to hunt or lease said property you were going to do what he said to do. I think as time goes by he will learn the difference but it is good to have someone that actually has made his living prior to this job managing wildlife I think...

What criteria did you use to make the statement "It's obviously not happening." ? The following are not my words, but sum it up pretty nicely I think. "“Obviously” is a purely destructive word. It’s commonly used when a new concept or idea is being built of pre-existing notions.

I thought you might like that part of the plan.

I remember when there were no deer in Barbour County or turkeys in Dale County because of years of no regulation. Also, I remembered for years seeing deer and not being allowed to hunt them until the numbers were adequate. I remember a couple of weeks for doe season and now very liberal hunting regulations compared to other states.
First- I own land and they are not my animals- They belong to the State. My grandfather thought if they were on his property he could do what he wanted. That is how we eliminated these animals in most counties. Now we have screwed up ruts from deer from multiple states introduced in the 60's and 70's.
Regulation has a lot to do with insurance companies. We went to two does a day because of Alfa and deer collisions. Keep an eye on deer accident incidents from insurance companies. More liberal hunting season if Insurance companies have high collision-deer claims. More regulation on deer limits if insurance claims go down.
I agree that it does not make sense to extend the season without GC data in place ahead of time. My guess this was a compromise since hunters and insurance companies were both in favor.
Everyone hates change but I think GC is a good middle ground.