I see where our local state park will be closed a few days this season in an effort to try and reduce the deer population. They seem to have no problem finding folks willing to try and fill the freezer, there's always more participants than there are slots available. Meat hunting appears to be alive and well down here, as I don't imagine there are too many trophies in that herd.
Tony:
State Park hunts are popular for a couple of reasons.
1) They allow you to take 3 more deer, so yes, the freezer benefits. 2) They also allow you to have one buck as one of those 3 deer, and because the areas are typically not hunted (only 4 days of the year) there are larger bucks in the parks. 3) The Park hunts are free. There is no license to purchase, no fees generated by the hunters for the Parks.
The hunts are done on the Monday and Tuesday after the firearm opener, and the Monday and Tuesday after the firearm season closes. You have to have your Hunters Safety Certificate, and the hunts are done on a lottery basis only. Hunting hours are different than the regular hunting season - 1/2 hr after sunrise to 1/2 hr before sunset. The parks are broken up into zones, and you are tolk where you should hunt. They regulate that by having specific parking areas, but once out of the vehicle they don't check to see if the hunters are in the correct zone.
At Potato Creek State Park by me, the first year the rangers cut off and kept all the antlers to prevent guys from strictly going in to trophy hunt. There is an orientation meeting that you have to attend a week or so before the hunt, and you are told to shoot the first 3 deer that you see, but only one can be a buck. If people are caught passing up a buck when they haven't shot one, then the park will go back to confiscating all antlers. There are a number of large bucks shot every year in a park during the hunts because they are a safe zone for them during the regular hunting season.
But, by no means is it shooting fish in a barrel. The hunting is just as hard as it is out of the park. Not only do you have to out think the deer, because of the hunter density, you have to out think the other hunters. I've been there during the hunts, and set up in a great funnel area, only to have a hunter set up 150 yds away further up the funnel and intercept the deer that were coming my way before they got to me.
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