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Burn Zone posted:Great intro post OP. I identify with this part. My father is a life-long hunter, and I hunted with him until I lost interest around 15-16 years old. I'm getting back into it now, and I'm excited. Applied for a few local quota hunts on federal land as those hunts occur before regular season opens. I'm going to ask around and see if I can find out what the etiquette is, but I'm assuming I can hike pretty far out and be good for the most part. One of the areas allows for overnight camping, so I'm considering going out the day before and setting up camp. I need to get a good pack and a new tent. I've been eyeing KUIU's stuff, but I feel like there might be better options out there. If the fit works for you, I think any of these brands have really good options. For years I used an old Sitka outfit and it was really well made and nicely featured, but as it got worn out I've moved to a mix of Kuiu for early season hot weather stuff and First-Lite for later season. The fit, features and fabric of the Kuiu warm weather gear really suits me in Northern Virginia when it's in the 70s in November, but the First-Lite Catalyst worked great for when it finally gets colder. My old Sitka stuff was kinda in-between in weight/temp, but it was an old style and they revised the fabric at some point and I haven't used their newer stuff. I still use an old Cabelas suit for stand hunting when I don't have to hike - super warm but incredibly heavy and bulky. Heh. I went with a huge Kifaru pack last year too since I like to do a 3-5 day camp while hunting the WMAs, but that's not really anything most people need in the east at all. For more than a decade I liked my Osprey Trailblazer 26L pack to carry all my little stuff and it worked great for day hunting in drag-out territory.
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Jul 28, 2020 00:31
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| # ¿ Apr 25, 2024 07:02 |
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Hell, in Virginia (and probably lots of other states) if you're a resident landowner you can hunt your own property without any safety training or license at all.
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Sep 19, 2020 21:24
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Outrail posted:Guessing the laws (or at least common sense) around guns and bikes are the same as guns and vehicles in most places? Gotta be careful in Virginia because counties here have all kinds of different laws related to hunting/firearms. Some say "It is unlawful to hunt from the road with firearms." Okay, easy enough; in these counties you can carry a loaded firearm in your car or bike, just no hunting and it has to be in the open unless you have a concealed carry permit. Of course it's illegal to hunt from a road statewide anyway... Other counties expand that to within 100 yards of a road, pretty simple. A few change the wording to, "It is unlawful to transport, possess or carry a loaded rifle in any vehicle while on the road from October 1 through February 15," or "..during deer season" etc. A bike is a vehicle when operated on the road, so no loaded guns allowed in these counties, though exceptions are carved out for concealed carry. Finally, there are 10 counties that say, "It is unlawful to possess a loaded firearm on the road except when permission to hunt is obtained from landowners on each side." There you can't even walk in the road with a loaded gun, again exceptions for CCW. Generally in Virginia you aren't allowed to take vehicles offroad to hunt on public land. Not sure how they would interpret bikes since they are only vehicles on roads! Probably not going to test that, though. Hunting in Virginia means knowing exactly what county you're in at all times! I do wish the OnX app had county boarders.
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Nov 4, 2020 12:34
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tesilential posted:Anyone been out? I got a little buck with a crossbow from a treestand on my brother's small farm in northern Maryland a couple weeks ago.  Just picked up the meat from his freezer yesterday.  Hoping to get another in the rifle season there the week after Thanksgiving, but I'm also going to try to do some public land stuff in Virginia if I have time.
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Nov 21, 2020 23:52
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tesilential posted:I just bought a tikka t3x superlite stainless in strada camo and 6.5CM as my first deer rifle. Thanks for the recommendations in the gun newbie thread. Wanted black stainless but they didn’t have any so gently caress it, what’s another Hundo? I haven't been watching lately, but you used to be able to get the Vortex Viper HS 2.5-10x44 on sale for really great prices, and if you can I'd recommend it. I paid $250 two years ago, and it may not get that cheap anymore, but it's worth looking around for sure.
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Jul 16, 2021 20:20
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Outrail posted:Is eastern states hunting really as bad as hunters spaced 200m apart while deer pinball between them? It sounds hectic. In the Virginia wildlife management areas near DC, while not literally every few hundred yards, yes it is incredibly terrible early in the rifle season. Archery and muzzleloader are less bad, but still not great. Later in the season the crowding gets much better, but obviously the hunting can be pretty crap. Even October early bear has gotten popular and where I once was the only person deep into the woods up near the peak of the eastern face of the Blue Ridge mountains, the last couple years there are 7 or 8 other hunters within a half-mile of me. Two years ago heading into one of my late season deer spots where the brush is blindingly thick and you need a 4x4 to access I passed 3 pickups heading out just as I was hoping to head in. That was a real bummer because I kinda count on being the only guy willing to sleep in a tent in late December around here. On the other hand, if you know someone who has property in one of the exurban counties close to the city, you will see dozens of deer in a season and are allowed to harvest from September 4th through March 27th (using various methods at various times) and can bag over 6 deer without doing too much special license stuff.
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Aug 12, 2021 19:19
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HamAdams posted:bumping The Hunting Thread because hunting season is here. Anybody have any cool hunts coming up? I have a new baby so I’m planning on taking the year off for the most part, save for a couple weekends in NY’s gun season, so I need to live vicariously through other goons I'm heading up to do black bear in Vermont in a couple weeks. Kinda the middle of the early bear season, but it's mostly intended as a scouting trip since this is my first year going up there for it. Gonna be interesting!
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Sep 17, 2022 21:57
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| # ¿ Apr 25, 2024 07:02 |
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HamAdams posted:That sounds interesting, what are the regs like in VT? IIRC here in NY, you can’t bait or use dogs, and the numbers around me locally are low enough that it’s not really worth going out specifically for bears. No baiting and I'm not using dogs or anything. I'm gonna drive into the Green Mountain National Forest and try to hike to some remote areas that have good tree species for bear to feed on and hope I can catch one coming or going. Vermont has a really dense black bear population, so it's a better shot that down here in Virginia. The main challenge is I'm going solo, so processing and hauling a harvest will be hard as hell.
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Sep 18, 2022 01:59
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