mauser06 wrote:The first season I hunted Michigan, my trip was a few days before the rifle opener...I carried my bow scouting.
I bumped into a number of locals. I had no idea what to expect so I was making conversation and asking.
"Oh man it'll be crazy...if you aren't hours early you aren't gunna be able to park...sounds like a war zone...looks like a pumpkin patch...I don't even hunt because there's bullets whizzing all around..."
I was beside myself. It actually sounded worse than what I grew up knowing in Pennsylvania when hunter #s where at an all time high and here reduction efforts just started...
Opening day I was hours early. Not a truck in sight. I hiked about a mile in which put me in a funnel in the center of this block.
No joke...after an hour of silence I panicked...I thought for SURE I read the regulations wrong thinking absolutely no way is this an opening day. It was. I don't think I heard double digits of shots all day. I didn't see a hunter. I didn't see pressured deer.
I've learned that local Intel can be good....but also might not be what it sounds.
I'm certain there are areas of crazy pressure. I believed the locals because i was on some of the only public in the area....but it wasn't the case by a long shot. 2nd opener up there was more of the same.
Yaaaa. Growing up in pa I’ve bow hunted Michigan public twice. Pressure? Was nothing compared to what I know from archery and rifle in pa. Have a buddy who still lives in south west Michigan. I hunted in the sw and Central Part of the state with him and shot a nice buck each time. I invited him down to pa. He won’t come back haha. We hunted near state college in the big woods and northeastern part of the state.
Guess I’m used to it and know how to avoid people and over looked spot. He complained and moan and cried. Said it was insane compared to southern Michigan. I never had a problem getting on big deer once ya put the work in, but I put the work in. Most guys just like to complain when a mature deer doesn’t come down a beatin trail, 15 yards, broadside and it’s not alert....
I’m over all the talk of this state is better, this state sucks, this state has small deer. Just take your bows out in the woods and make something happen. Everything is perspective and each experience is what ya make it.