Nope. Those sort of things just seem “game hoggish” to me. Keep in mind I have formed that opinion having never participated. Just seems wrong to award prizes based on the weight or number of dead game animals.
I get it. I just started and it seems to be good fun with groups of people from 8-80 years in age.
We used to have a contest for the team (2 man) that killed the most groundhogs. It kinda took the fun out of it as other people wouldn’t want to take you to their spots and you didn’t want to take them to yours. The reason for the trip was to hunt with your friends and do some drinking. You only got to hunt with your team mate and missed out on an opportunity to hunt with your other friends. We stopped doing it after a couple seasons. We had some great times hunting up in Potter county Pennsylvania for a whole week in the summer. Ain’t many groundhogs up there anymore. It was not uncommon to shoot 30 in a day, now you’re lucky to get ten between the entire camp.
Lol. When I look at what I post on Facebook, it appears we do kill and catch a lot of stuff. Maybe even more than we should. But in reality, for the amount of time in the woods and the amount of properties we hunt, we really do not do much damage to any population. The line exception being when Jamie and the pups come to town. For whatever reason, by the time he makes it down each season, I’ve developed a healthy dislike of squirrels. Groundhogs, although rodents, have a soft spot in my heart. Makes no logical sense, I know. I shot a bunch of them when I was a kid but seeing them all but disappear from the local landscape gave me a sense of empathy for them. I suppose if they ever come back to the point of being a genuine nuisance I could find some enjoyment sitting alongside a half grown bean field again.
Lol. When I look at what I post on Facebook, it appears we do kill and catch a lot of stuff. Maybe even more than we should. But in reality, for the amount of time in the woods and the amount of properties we hunt, we really do not do much damage to any population. The line exception being when Jamie and the pups come to town. For whatever reason, by the time he makes it down each season, I’ve developed a healthy dislike of squirrels. Groundhogs, although rodents, have a soft spot in my heart. Makes no logical sense, I know. I shot a bunch of them when I was a kid but seeing them all but disappear from the local landscape gave me a sense of empathy for them. I suppose if they ever come back to the point of being a genuine nuisance I could find some enjoyment sitting alongside a half grown bean field again.
That's the viewpoint of my inlaws with their beef farm. Between breaking equipment in the fields and the damage to the buildings they want them taken care of. About 15 years ago there were a bunch on the farm and I did my best with a .243 to thin them out and I would get 20-30 a year. Then the coyote population boomed and the groundhogs all but disappeared for a few years. We actually had a trailcam photo of a coyote with a groundhog in its mouth. In the last few years the groundhogs have been making a comeback. I got 10 or so last year, most around a few of the buildings. There are a few fields with some known holes that I'm gonna sit with my son this spring/early summer and hopefully get him on a couple.The farmers in Pennsylvania loved when we would ask permission to hunt their fields....since the mid 80’s I’ve only been turned down once. The dairy industry is big up there and the last thing a farmer wanted was for one of his milk cows to step in a chuck hole and break a leg, or do damage to a tractor by running over a larger hole that was covered by tall grass. They’d smile when we told them we would remove every dead chuck from the field, as we know they don’t want the carcass to end up in the hay bales for the cows to chew on....it was a win-win for everyone except the woodchucks.
Doesn’t take a whole lot too make it look like a whole lot.....Bunny tracks everywhere!
