Annual debate

[Davemuzz]

Yeah.....I know where that is. My daughter lives in Regent Square. Crazy young kids love the city....where taxes are higher!!!

Go figure!!

Dave

 

[Twowithone]

I know quite a few people from Regent Square. As a matter of fact that's where I bought my first muzzleloader there was a shop there yrs ago. Now its a hot dog and beer joint. The people that ran the bp shop knew their stuff also.

 

[Bitterroot Sherpa]

I know no one here cares but I personally have no issue with inlines. As far as I'm concerned they are just muzzleloaders. The only supposed advantage to them is more reliable ignition. However according to most muzzleloaders, sidelocks rarely if ever misfire. Where's the advantage? Isn't one. I suppose they are easier to scope. I am ok with not allowing scopes. I am not ok with not allowing one type of muzzleloader over another. This is just just a tactic of non hunters to divide us. Anyways that's just my 2 cents. I suppose that a muzzleloading rifle designed to accept smokeless powder would not be ok too. I think we could have a more grey approach to this than just black or white. Bottom line is that an open sight inline firing BP or sub (regardless of primer size or type) has no better chance of hitting a target than a sidelock. Both are accurate, reliable & powerful & have similar sighting equipment.

 

[Bitterroot Sherpa]

I suppose I should mention that I prefer traditional. I've used both & have both but I do prefer traditional.

 

[Spikebuck]

I know no one here cares but I personally have no issue with inlines. As far as I'm concerned they are just muzzleloaders. The only supposed advantage to them is more reliable ignition. However according to most muzzleloaders, sidelocks rarely if ever misfire. Where's the advantage? Isn't one. I suppose they are easier to scope. I am ok with not allowing scopes. I am not ok with not allowing one type of muzzleloader over another. This is just just a tactic of non hunters to divide us. Anyways that's just my 2 cents. I suppose that a muzzleloading rifle designed to accept smokeless powder would not be ok too. I think we could have a more grey approach to this than just black or white. Bottom line is that an open sight inline firing BP or sub (regardless of primer size or type) has no better chance of hitting a target than a sidelock. Both are accurate, reliable & powerful & have similar sighting equipment.

In general, I can agree with your basic point. I don't have a big hangup with "older" non-scoped inlines either. If I look back at the one and only inline I ever bought...the one I started out with 15 years ago and used my first two years...there is really no advantage. The problem comes with the continuing development of them such that they are turning into single shot high-powered rifles.

If one has a sealed breech, one doesn't need to practice skills to keep moisture out. How about electronic ignition? No cap or pan powder to get wet, no direct hole into the powder. Smokeless powder? Higher velocities for longer, flatter shooting with modern bullets in plastic sabots. So I think one needs to look at the whole package and not just the fact that the load is stuffed down the barrel.

All of the above makes for the argument that they are already modern rifles, so why not allow full scopes? Why not allow modern rifles? Over time, what was once a hard-fought battle to get a separate season for primitive arms that require more skills to ensure they do shoot every time and that have more limitations requiring a level of dedication not required with the most modern front-stuffers becomes a virtual extension of modern rifle seasons.

 

[FishDFly]

"In a land painted by our Maker's hand, teeming with wildlife, where but here can a man know such freedom" Primal Dreams

He can not know freedom, when his desires are limited by law makers.

 

[XXX]

Nice response Spike.

 

[XXX]

I know no one here cares but I personally have no issue with inlines. As far as I'm concerned they are just muzzleloaders. ..... I am not ok with not allowing one type of muzzleloader over another. This is just just a tactic of non hunters to divide us.......

I do not want you to take this response as something that is directed at you personally Bitterroot, but I have seen the emergence of this idea in the last couple of years that anyone advocating for anything less than full liberalization of all manner of hunting methods in all seasons is somehow an anti hunter or the witless tool of anti hunters. As a thoughtful, dedicated,and ethical hunter, I resent this unfair implication. I can assure you that few if any anti hunters know anything at all about muzzleloaders and guns of any kind and are likely to be completely unaware of the technical differences we are discussing or that the division could somehow be exploited against us.
When any public discussion of this subject among hunters reaches this point, it seems inevitable that those advocating on the side of more liberalization (more modern, less regulated technique, etc), suggest that those who are against liberalization are motivated solely out of selfishness, that we are "elitists" with an interest in excluding regulatory liberals so we can enjoy the resource at their exclusion. I would like to offer that perhaps it is the modernists in this case who are being selfish. They seem to care nothing at all about anything related to the subject other than that they get to participate and with the most modern weapon possible. Their arguments never deviate from their personal desire to participate with currently excluded modern equipment and show no concern at all for the opinions of the traditionalist participants who will be negatively impacted, the image of the sport in the eye of the general public, or the impact on the game resource itself. If the cardinal crime for us hunters faced with this imminent peril from the Anti's is to create division among fellow hunters, then ask yourself who it is that attacks the Penn Flintlock season each year and those who would keep it as it is. The modernists obviously feel that their personal convenience and participation far outweighs any concern for unity among hunters. If they did care about unity, we would not be having this discussion.

 

[FishDFly]

As well put as I have seen.

The fat lady has sung, excuse me sir for the gender reference, but it's time to let the subject go away.

This subject is like wrestling with a pig in the mud, after awhile, a person realizes, the pig is having the most fun and winning.

This is like Ford and Chevy, no clear advantage to anyone, only winners are those who can type the loudest.

 

[Carl Fowler III]

Glad you stuck to your guns (flintlock)....sounds like a site I would have been kicked off as well...I have watched as the special interest groups (crossbows) have made inroads into archery season here in PA...now the PA game commission is looking at to many deer are being taken and they may have to reduce the season back to the 4 weeks it originally was prior to an awful lot of work to get those extra 2 weeks by traditional archers! Don't eliminate or reduce the use of these X bows...just screw everyone right!

This is why we should never give an inch to these special interest groups (in-lines) or we may lose everything we have worked for...This has nothing to do with someone being sold an in-line accidentally (are you serious) but the in-line industry wanting more and longer seasons so they can sell more guns...period! If it looks, smells, and taste like a duck...it's a duck! :slap:

 

[Snakebite]

My own opinion is that those who do shoot inlines or use compound/crossbows are 1)not interested in tradition or 2)just fooling themselves and 3)just want to extend their own hunting. If I remember right, you can shoot from 3 to 5 deer in Texas depending on the county your are in. When I was a kid and my uncle (who was a rich doctor) always had a lease that family could hunt on, if you didn't kill your limit (if that's what you wanted to do) during the regular hunting season, there was something wrong. (No bow or ML seasons back then). I will say that my druthers are that a primitive season should be a primitive season, but that's up to the politicians. I sure don't blame the companies who give the market what it wants.

To me, shooting a muzzleloader is more than just shooting a muzzleloader. But I am kind of a sucker for tradition and history.

I haven't hunted for several years. Where there is public land, there are too many idiots out there shooting away. I won't pay the money for a lease, the last time I checked they were anywhere from $2500 to $10K to hunt. And that is for 1 gun (person). That's some pretty expensive venison. I'll leave that to the rich doctors and lawyers from Dallas, Austin, and San Antonio. Don't get me wrong, I'm not against hunting at all, I think it's the best way to maintain game populations. And I have gone hunting when invited on someones ranch or farm. But bottom line is don't blame someone else for taking advantage of what is legal.

 

[FishDFly]

This is why we should never give an inch to these special interest groups (in-lines) or we may lose everything we have worked for”¦”


Each group is a special interest group, traditional or inline, which are you defining as special interest, traditional or inline, LAMPS permitted, Youth weekend, MDA, etc”¦.. Everyone is a special interest group, in Texas.


“When I was a kid and my uncle (who was a rich doctor) always had a lease that family could hunt on, if you didn't kill your limit (if that's what you wanted to do) during the regular hunting season, there was something wrong. (No bow or ML seasons back then). I will say that my druthers are that a primitive season should be a primitive season, but that's up to the politicians”


In all honesty if you cannot harvest your limit in Texas with a traditional M/L in 8 weeks on private land, you do not need more weeks, you need to learn how to hunt.

"' I'll leave that to the rich doctors and lawyers from Dallas, Austin, and San Antonio.", those who make money have more money to spend, how many chemical plant workers attended the Super Bowl this year?

 

[Carl Fowler III]

You are absolutely right about the politicians influencing the game departments in their respective states, ignoring the game biologist recommendations and listening to special interest groups...but let us not forget how and who influence's these politicians...the company's who pay the lobbyists to bribe and influence these political decisions!

Remember it's those who stand by and do nothing who usually cry the loudest when something that was handed to them is lost! Those individuals who got these special seasons put into place worked long and hard to get their game departments to listen and enact these seasons...so when some Johnny come lately wants to horn in on our season and not want to use the traditional weaponry just to up their odds...too BAD....they are just being lazy and want a piece of the pie that I paid for and baked! :nono:

 

[Spikebuck]

last time I checked they were anywhere from $2500 to $10K to hunt. And that is for 1 gun (person). That's some pretty expensive venison.

ff but as long as you mentioned it...

You're correct that paying a lease makes for expensive venison.

Two years ago I went into a lease and I'm no rich doctor or lawyer. But I probably spend less on a year of turkey, deer, and squirrel hunting and trout fishing than a lot of blue-collar guys spend in a year in the bar or others spend on their annual vacation. It's a matter of priority.

It's not just the meat, it's the opportunity to have fantastic hunting and fishing in absolute peace and quiet.

One afternoon during rut I had 17 different bucks come through and none were yearlings. In three hours I saw and heard every kind of buck "aggression" and vocalization (except an all-out fight). I had already filled my buck tag and could have shot many does that afternoon but just passed them to watch the show. I walked out at dark and if I'd have died right then and there I had already been to heaven.

While that kind of afternoon was exceptional for buck activity, in two years I've only had one sit that I did not see at least one deer and usually I'll see from 10 to 30 per sit. The squirrel and turkey hunting are unbelievable.

What kind of price can one put on that? :v

 

[satx78247]

AGREED 100% = The older that I get the more often that the modern rifles get left in the safe & my XB or ML is taken out to the brush country.

To the "traditionalists" in TX,: There an awful LOT of hogs, WT, small game, predators & exotics all over the state & there's plenty for every TRUE hunter.

Note: To the XB & vertical archers out there, IF you need a LEASE with a HUGE variety of game that can be hunted 24/365, our club has TWO huge ranches leased. = I can get anyone (decent) invited to join & the cost is ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS A YEAR. - FACT.

yours, satx

 

[hpdrifter]

Just think how our forefathers would feel about our Constitution and laws today and any verbage they used being misconstrued.

I'm a proponent of laws written having "intent" attached to them. The "intent" being a determining factor on any changes.

 

[zimmerstutzen]

Just as an update about PA. The flintlock season for the coming year has been cut to about half, but the early inline antlerless season has been left a full week.

 

[satx78247]

EXACTLY.
(ImVho, we are losing parts of our LIBERTY every moment.)

yours, satx

 

[plain old dave]

I would like to see a primitive equipment season (sidelocks or hammered traditional inlines [Mowrey?] and patched round balls only) here in TN, but don't see where it could be put. Maybe opening weekend of ML season as primitive equipment only?

I share most of the concerns with inlines; the tech has advanced to the point they shoot as far and accurate as a CF cartridge rifle, only loading from the front.

 

[leslie]

Where I live most of the land is owned by timber companys and is mostly locked to vehicular access.Some of the companies are using a permit system for access,with a fee of course.There is a huge uproar from the hunters because the land has been taxed at a lower rate since it was classified as recreational use.I sympathize with the owners when you look at the mess and damage done to the property.I am talking serious dollars here eg a log deck cut up for firewood and mountains of old refrigerators other household appliances and bedding to say nothing about cans and garbage.The other factor is the dependence of the game dept on various license and other fees for their existence.It doesn't take much to sway their thinking if increased fees are on the horizon.Traditional muzzleloaders don't add up to much when it comes to license fees.The decrease in license fees due to access restrictions from all hunters adds to the pressure.Some one commented about game depts ignoring their game management people,my question is when was the last time science or good sense influenced hunting rules?