Riding around during hunting season, etiquette question

Jerrybo66 wrote:
I don't hunt anymore but have done so for about 40 years. Whether you or anyone want to believe it, hunter's revenue pay for the environment and propagation of wildlife the rest of the folks enjoy. They apply for expensive permits and take time off from their jobs to enjoy their sport. For all this expense they only would like two weeks to experience the wild of the hunt without civilization harassing them. Most can only afford to take off a couple days. Pretty expensive.. They are taxpayers as you are. All they want for their investment is two weeks. Respect their sport. Don't be selfish, you have the other 50 weeks to enjoy the outdoors. If you ride in high traffic areas, I see no problem..... IMO..

Hi, while I have a lot of respect for what you are saying, remember the roads and trails you are on are also paid with OHV funds.

Up North even just around the home the whole town curtails our activities in the woods hiking, 4-wheel, horseback riding etc. during hunting season. It's such a short time and really not worth putting the family in harms way and/or interfering with the folks who participate in the sport of hunting.

One more post deleted.

Can we keep it civil and keep this open?

gandude wrote:
We will respect their right to hunt and stay on main roads, and defer our need to discover backwoods riding up there for another time.

Thanks for the input all.

Good Move

My thoughts, as a hunter and a rider.
Public road, obviously ok, as anyone can drive on them.
Private land (if owned by you or your friend) ok assuming the owner hasn't granted permission for hunters to be in the same area.
Public land, best to stay away until after the season.

Regardless, I would add some bright clothing to your normal protective equipment if you ride during hunting season.

We will respect their right to hunt and stay on main roads, and defer our need to discover backwoods riding up there for another time.

Thanks for the input all.

If the road is a maintained public road to a housing area, even unpaved, I don’t think that would bother anyone. The game is already used to the traffic and any serious hunter will be further back in. Forest roads and primitive roads are another story, there it would disturb the game and be considered rude behavior.

Believe it or not, I was once sitting on a ridge watching a saddle when I heard a four track coming up the ravine. I glassed him and couldn’t believe what I saw. The fellow was driving with one hand and holding what appeared to be a martini glass in the other. He wasn’t hunting since I saw no rifle, but I always wondered what he thought he was doing. Besides, he had to have spilled more than he drank.:)Of course that spooked any deer that may have been there and I had to move on.

Dog Folks wrote:
I'd wait. Grew up in dairy country of the northeast.

It was not uncommon for farmers to paint "COW", in florescent paint on the sides of their cows during deer season.

We were hunters and did not hunt during the weekends because of the "cowboys" out there.

Yup this was very true in the Wisconsin area I used to live in.

I had to put up all the horses during hunting season. AND yes there were always a couple of cowboys every season. I had one shooting at the end of my pasture every year with a "rifle". :R

I finally put an end to him when I invited DNR over to set up a sting to at least remove rifle guy from the equation.


......although I still had to put a red vest on my concrete deer out in the garden every hunting season. :W

I do plenty of riding here in PA during hunting season. A post above says give them 2 weeks but it's not even close to 2 weeks. You have archery deer, small game, Turkey, another small game, riffle, muzzle loader, another archery season, bear season etc etc. Basically the entire fall and winter is some sort of hunting season and there is even a spring season. I also dont feel bad for hunters at all. The laws here in PA are sooooo far in their favor and sooooo far against ATV's. We have to pay registration for our ATV's and get very little state provided area to ride yet there are game lands everywhere, all off limits to us. I hunted for years and my take on it is the hunters have plenty of land, I have very select land so ride on!