Who all killed 8 doe's this year? Did anybody even kill 4? The DNR can make the doe bag limit a hundred per county, and I'll never kill more than 3, and that, only if I dont get a buck during Modern Firearms. I've said time and again, I'd like to see a couple of extra "either sex" weeks tacked onto the front of gun season...or better still, just make deer season 90 days long/any weapon. Lets just pretend for a second that actually happened....I'd still kill no more than 3 deer, and those 3 would most likley come out of 2 countys. Still...What used to be a 30 acre HONEY HOLE in my life, is now next to worthless. Why? There was nobody up there but me and Jesus 6 years ago. Now there's an Army of "Brown and Downers" on one property line, and an idiot on the other. They came along before the new regs., and I dont hear any more, or less shooting out of them now, than I did before. I used to see deer most every day on this place, several...up in the teens sometimes. This year I seen 1....1 deer on that property all year. The thought of shooting it never occoured to me. So what's the point? No matter what the DNR, Congress, or any insurance company says....If you dont want your deer herd reduced.....Don't reduce it.....and tell a friend.!!! Since they are probably NOT EVER going to add gun days to the rut, I might even break down and buy me one of them, What is it you guys call 'em... "X-Guns"?.....but I still won't kill more than 3 deer. Cross Bows, and longer Gun seasons, arent the enemy. Too many dead deer is the enemy, and how they die is irrevelant. Remember "Let a little buck go, so he can grow"? This was not common practice when I started hunting, and a concept completly forigen to those who taught me. Hunters began to regulate themselves..... Now, we must do so again!

Here is how I regulate myself. If the weather is right I kill 2 does in early archery with XBow used to be compound so Xbow no diff. than my previous 40yrs hunting deer hunting then I buck hunt till end of Gun then a doe with MZL in gun. then back to bucks till end of mzl then another doe for 4 total or maybe 5 deer a year in at least 2 diff co.,s all on diff farms havent killed a buck in 5yrs If I kill a buck I back off on the does but I always get 4 or 5 if season length changed I would not pass in warm weather as do now

+1. Well said, Randy. Unfortunately, personal responsibility, not just in natural resource management, but in many areas of society has fell to the wayside.

Yes, one can regulate themselves....but odd's are you can regulate your neighbor....that has been and always will be the problem....some just dont know how to lay off the trigger. The high bonus tags in many counties give the illusion that there is to many deer....even if the one hunter takes 3 AL's in a 8 bonus county(or 4, etc), then his buddy takes 3 off the same land or close to it, then his girl friend takes 3, etc.....it adds up fast....considering the average birthing ratio of doe/bucks is 1:1, they just killed off 9 potential bucks, if they make it to the recruitment stage...we all know the saying, kill one doe, you've killed 3 deer...it does add up fast.....

Hunter density is an issue in a lot of areas. My two neighbors to our farm in White County have a total of five young sons starting to hunt. So, even though our place holds a lot of deer after gun season opens up, I won't take more then one doe between my wife and I off that property because those young kids are all going to want to harvest something. If my wife and I took seven or eight does and they took a doe or two apiece, our hunting would be in a horrible situation very quickly. In southern Indiana on 500 acres a total of seven does were taken, five of us, and we are having a talk about next year there only being four taken, and this place has a good number of deer. The one gentleman donated a deer this year to the donate a deer program and that will be no longer. None of us need deer to feed our families.

I started regulating myself many years ago for many reasons but mainly because I have grandson's that may want to hunt in a few years, I wanted a place where they may have a chance to see deer.
I bought 55 acres in Jefferson County in the spring of 2007, there has been 4(3 does and 1 buck) deer taken off my property in 7 seasons, the buck was taken this year. Only 4 deer in 7 seasons is by choice, oh I could have taken many deer each season off my property but I choose not to. Since 2007 I have noticed more bucks and more quality bucks when I hunt, just this season I saw 3 bucks that would have scored 140" plus.
I am very fortunate to have great neighbors (between 4 of us we have several hundred acres) and they practice the same
hunting philosophy as I.
With that being said I have noticed less doe sightings these past few seasons then when I first bought my place. Not sure what the reason for this is but it's all the more reason for me to keep my finger off the trigger. Just my 2cents on this topic.

I never take more than I need.. I try to manage wildlife without government help.

Our family would "like" 3 deer, we "need" 0 deer. We eat two deer ourselves and most of the 3rd one goes to church related fundraiser events for our church's youth group. The church gets first dibs. I can buy beef if I have too. In 2012, that is what we did. I killed a 3 legged doe and one of my daughter's killed a button. The church got what they needed (35-40 pounds as I recall), we ate the rest, and then we bought beef for a change.

I killed a big bodied buck this year. I have no desire to kill a doe just to kill a deer anymore, unless it is a gimp or some other extenuating circumstance. I was tempted to go out in our late special season this year to test out a new gun, but decided the resource could not support it. My girls get free choice to kill what they want. My youngest killed a 2 1/2 year old buck. My oldest killed a decent doe. 3 deer for us this year ... we were done.

Yes ... you can self regulate ... it isn't that difficult to do.

Sadly, I watch neighboring land slaughter everything on four legs. To the point that we don't even hunt the land that I worked so hard to buy for hunting purposes. It simply sits as a refuge for the few lucky ones that escape the neighboring lead slinging fest.

Doesn't that suck DEC? We are in the same boat on a property my dad spent 401K money on simply as a family hunting retreat. EHD and brown and down neighbors have raped the place.

Yea. When I bought the place only one guy hunted along one of my property lines. He and I met, we talked, we came to terms finally and he finally realized that shooting a deer out of my field from his side of the line would be a huge mistake. All was good for a couple seasons. Trail cams were showing outstanding bucks (killing one is another story of course), many young bucks, and a good amount of does.

About 3 years ago 3 other neighboring properties leased out all of their land. My land is in the middle of it all. None of those properties have much habitat so the deer come and go from my land to those areas. These guys shoot everything that moves. It is unfortunate, but nothing I can do about it other than go to the land owners and offer more money. I'm not about to do that. I bought my land through hard work. I have another 200 or so acres that I have been hunting for 17 years now that is free of outside pressure. My daughters and I just go deer hunt that ground for the most part anymore.

I figure things happen in cycles for a reason. These guys have killed all the deer off and simply ruined the quality of hunting for all of us. At some point the lease price won't be worth the handful of 60# deer left come deer season. They will stop paying and my hunting will hopefully return to normal in due time. But in the meantime it sure is frustrating.

Interesting feedabck guys. Been keeping an eye out for a piece of property to hunt/manage myself. Just something to call my own and know that it will always be there.

Not saying it won't happen in Indiana, but will have to be the right fit for sure. (i.e. I know of a couple large, well managed tracts where owning adjacent property would be appealing.)

Since 2.0, I have actually spent alot more time researching properties in southern Ohio. My luck though, buy in Ohio...and their regs change the following year!

Maybe I should just take the money and cash it in on some high dollar Canadian hunts? A Dall Sheep / Mountain Caribou bowhunt in the NWT sounds pretty darn good!

I would almost do Kentucky before Ohio.

Wow Dec sounds like same exact scenario almost. Dad bought this ground after years of hardworking to start his retirement. We killed 3 Indiana book bucks in short order. It didn't take long after that before we were surrounded. The hunting plummeted since.

Pav I strongly agree with you. I've considered purchasing more ground but for hunting only purposes I've pretty much determined my money/hunting experience is better justified being spent on leases/out of state hunting trips.

For the record, I'm not blaming my situation on a 1.0 vs 2.0 or any other policy. While I value providing our thoughts to the state, very few of us are qualified (IMO) to claim that we know what is best for our herd. Sadly however, I'm not sure that those in charge at the state level are qualified to even make these decisions, but that is just my opinion.

My situation regarding leasing around me, I blame more on the economy. Land owners are trying to squeeze every penny out of their property. In a way I don't blame them. Heck I do it with the farmer who cash rents from me. I want to maximize my revenue off of the tillable ground as it covers property taxes every year. These land owners did not have anyone hunting and now they can put a few extra hundred dollar bills in their pocket every year without Uncle Sam knowing about it. I cannot fault them for that, if I didn't hunt I'd do it too.

Just sucks because it was such a nice piece of land just a short time ago. Now with the "War on Does" that the state has declared, it is game on by these guys who shelled out a couple hundred bucks to shoot 'em up for a couple weeks every November.

Life moves on ... again, I believe that everything is cyclical and at some point I hope to enjoy quality hunting on the property that I bought.

Per Dec: "Life moves on ... again, I believe that everything is cyclical and at some point I hope to enjoy quality hunting on the property that I bought."

Perfect comment. The issue of cyclic can be expanded in many regards to the whole deer issue and in every aspect of it. Value, expectations, attitudes all morph over time. When guys pay out money to hunt, most want to shoot something and in many cases shoot a lot.

Kinda like building a nice sandbox for the kids. It only takes a few cats to ruin it for everybody.