Read on the WEAU website that 10 licenses were sold to "hunters" under 1 year old this season.
Unethical parents exploiting the law for a $5 tag. This was not the intent of removing the age restriction. Luckily, the youngest reported harvest was by a 4 year old.
Your right. Law is law. Regardless of the law people still break it. Alcohol is a big contributor to fatalities, does this mean we should raise the drinking age to 30. Can a 21 year old handle the responsibility? I don't know about you but I don't trust a 12 year old with a firearm. My point being JC is regardless of the law people will always abuse it. Same story different topic. Some are good and can understand the responsibility some can't.
"You forget its a mentored hunt"
That is the problem, is it really? Surely more likely on private land, but the stories I hear is there have been several reports in this neck of the woods of using kids as additional drivers on public land. Since they are a driver, might as well have a gun in their hand right? A kid is a kid, but I would trust the same kid at 12 vs. 9 with a gun by themselves a bit more. There are a lot of idiot fathers out there who think their kid can handle way more than they actually can. How many dads would actually admit their kid isn't mature enough to handle a gun? Most dads are too macho and proud to say something like that. Heck, "if Frank's dad is letting his kid hunt with our group, sure as heck my kid can."
Yes it is a mentored hunt . But why does the mentor need a weapon also ? When it was 1 for 2 hunters I had no problem with it . However we want to think there are a fair number of unethical people out there . I will even admit I have tagged a few bucks with my brothers tag when he still hunted . He was there and in the woods with a weapon, but did not have the deep drive to sit all day in rain or snow . Plus he usually only had a day or two . He did shoot at a few over the years but did not put in his shooting practice time . Only hit one and the neighbors finished it .
I could have just as easily kept his tag in my pocket and used it when I wanted .
Eliminate the group hunting and we may see a greater chance of ethics being practiced.
You forget its a mentored hunt. A 9 year old isn't allowed to carry a fire arm all on his lonesome. Some people just like to complain for the sake of complaining. Big problem now days with this country. People that love to create problems. Be part of the solution not the problem! Was there any reported incidents as a result of this? No. Lets move on from this. I took my 8yr old, Saturday morning opening day. He harvested his first buck. Yes we sat in a enclosed blind. Yes he had a firm rest. Yes the hunt was totally mentored the way it should. END OF STORY. Speed limit is 70 on the interstate but yet we still drive 75-80. C'mon Man.
I like how you ignored the first part of what I said and used 1 phrase to draw an inaccurate conclusion. You could get a job at Yahoo News writing headlines. All you really did was take what you needed to continue your complaining and didn't really counter anything I said.
I do agree though with the drives, not a fan myself. Lots of adults flinging bullets wildly that I worry about. I know one guy who has a bullet in his cabin from someone doing a drive. That stuff is a numbers game, far more adults than kids doing it so the likelihood is much higher for it being an adult."Couple kids went hunting, big whoop"
Well, if a 9 year old ends up shooting your son while conducting a deer drive, then it is a big whoop. I agree, the easiest fix is to stop deer drives, and especially for public land. The next best thing is to make party tagging illegal. It is illegal for bowhunting, so why do we allow it for rifle hunting? Yes, people will still do it, but the practice would decrease to some degree.
When I was in the military we put padlocks on wall lockers and foot lockers. The cliche was "to keep an honest man honest". It is very easy to fill a youth tag on a deer drive. I know it's illegal to fill a youth tag by someone else. It is not illegal for a youth to participate in deer drives. It is not illegal for the youth to fill other tags as well as his own. Deer drives can get chaotic sometimes. At those times many youth tags can get filled. Not once breaking the law. Who's going to contest it? No one including a game warden. When crossbows became legal look how many people went out and bought one. Why? Because it makes it much easier. The way that hunting is regulated it easy to fill tags. Now more than ever.
Rule number 4 for the mentored hunt already takes care of that in regards to kids anyways (still applies to adults/non mentor hunters). In fact the deer drive scenario was also illegal so if anyone does that it just shows they don't care about the rules and probably broke others in the past. Violators will be violators.
Rules for mentor
.1. Must have any valid, non-expired Wisconsin hunting approval, regardless of the type of game pursued by the mentee.
2. Must remain within arm's reach of mentee.
3. Must ensure compliance with all other hunting laws, including season, bag limit and weapon regulations. If also hunting and/or attempting to harvest game while mentoring, has all required hunting approvals for the applicable season (license, permit, tag, etc.).
4. A mentor may not use any deer harvest authorizations issued to the mentee.
5. Must only serve as a mentor for one mentee at a time.
There is a very simple way to fix this problem. This is also a way the argument of taking away rights don't come into play. How can we fix it? Not only will this fix the problem it makes public land hunting safer and more enjoyable. NO PARTY HUNTING. When your tag(s) are filled you're done hunting. The only hunting you do is unarmed escorting a youth hunter. You may assist in retrieval of downed game, but you may not participate in deer drives on public land. If you wish to party hunt on private land that's legal.
I still think most of those 'stories' are probably less than 1% of the deer hunters. That kind of thinking where you just assume everyone must be like that is no different than the people who think all gun owners are bad.
Most of the kids who shot deer were probably in some fancy permanent blind on private property shooting deer off a food plot or bait pile. I'm sure they had rests to hold the gun and all. I don't picture a 5 year old blasting on a drive or sitting in a small stand freezing. Maybe a couple did, but no way there were many. I'm more concerned about the guys drunk from the night before or the basket cases who lose their minds.
At the end of the day all it really turned into was more revenue for the DNR. Couple kids went hunting, big whoop. A few grandpas bought licenses for infants which was really just a donation to the DNR. That's exactly why they did this in the first place, just follow the money. Any way to sell more licenses = $$
I am embarrassed by this law. It truely shows a lack of intelligence by those who rammed it through. I am also embarrassed that I voted in some of the clowns that pushed this through. I don't understand why you can't find a leader that doesn't just bury the needle to one extreme or the other after a couple years in office? Both sides are guilty of this. What is wrong with just making a few changes and then managing to that? Why must you tip it beyond what even your base wants? I won't be voting for more of this crap. Hunting is too important too me and I have seen too much of this embarrasing crap the last couple years such as getting rid of registration stations, tagging, etc. All so POS Joel Kleefisch can violate fish and game laws a little easier.
