INDNR Public Draw Hunts
Indiana
Well one of my first experiences since back in Indiana was registering for a pile of various public land draw hunts. When I saw there was no fee for all but the put/take pheasant I knew the odds would be slim to none and slim just left town. Drew a couple late season deer and that was it, as expected. I wish they would at least charge $5 to filter out some folks that are not serious. Well anyway, I will go check out the places I drew. And set my sights low on a late season spring turkey when that comes out. Anybody else have luck?
First time I have drawn an "APPLE" (as the state calls them) pheasant area in all of these years trying. I've heard the habitat reestablishment areas are full of birds. They might be pretty tough by my date (11/23). My area is 60acres. Looking forward to it, pheasant hunting doesn't happen very often in our state!
Good luck on the draw deer hunts Zim! Pete
Please let us know how your hunt goes. I settled for a put/take hunt about that same time, since the wife wants to try them.
I will update after. Hopefully have a few grip & grin pics of my Dad and his buddy Ron with some birds too... taking 2 of my 4 hunting mentors with me on this one!
Hunted Knobview GBA west of Boswell, IN pretty near the Illinois line today. Was a 60acre parcel planted in prairie grass and some other shorter grasses. Habitat seemed great and I had high hopes when we arrived.
In short, that did not last long. In over 5hours hunting behind a well trained german short hair we put up 3 pheasants: 2 roosters and one hen. First rooster got up early and flew off the property. Ron and I both missed the second rooster and he also then flew completely off the property.
While working along the south edge of the property, I walked up on a pile of 16 coyote lower legs stashed up under a scrub tree - no carcasses, just the lower legs. There were plenty of old deer beds but we never bumped a single deer nor did we kick up a single rabbit on the 60 acres. The property was surprisingly devoid of wildlife considering that it looked like an island oasis of habitat surrounded by cut cornfields and plowed fields.
Dad and Ron had hunted a different GBA two weeks ago with another buddy, Paul. They put up over 25 pheasants at that GBA near Morocco, IN. Since they simply assign you an area if you are drawn, I guess I just didn't get one of the better areas...
It was a great day weather-wise and at least I did get to shoot at a rooster. Not sure that it was worth the nearly 3 hour drive over to hunt that particular game bird area...
Hopefully I can find a couple new fields to hunt geese as none of my usual permission fields are in corn this year with the extremely wet spring.
Wanted to check back and give a report on my experience at this particular GBA. Good luck with the rest of your hunting season. Pete
I've got a hunt near Reynolds on Wednesday. Supposed to be pretty windy. 2 mediocre dogs that have not hunted together and both owners are young guns that will outrun this old man any day of the week. Could be interesting.
Stretch out that hammy, Mike. You can do it!
I turned out to be the hero of the house today due to bringing back two birds from my put/take pheasant hunt at Winamac F&W. Haha.....big challenge! The wife is chinese and her mom is visiting. Pheasant are a protected species in China these days and neither of them has ever had one. So it is beyond a delicacy for them. They made short work of my two birds, boiling, plucking & chopping them up fresh chinese style. I just got out of the way. They were so thrilled, I booked another reservation, the last one available anywhere near me. A Thanksgiving Day spot at Tri-County F&G. Will also take them to Amish Acres for Thanksgiving Day dinner. It's right on our route from LaPorte so it works out nice.
As for my deer season, it has been a pretty big bust. Only seen one shooter, a 140" at JP but just a little too thick branches to get an arrow through. Do got a two day archery hunt at the Dunes Dec 2/3, but I've just seen too many dinks despite hunting the best remote thick stuff I could find. I plan to take advantage of my Illinois lifetime license in future years. Two buck tags/year there for only $15 & $26. Their public isn't much better these days, so I'll devote a lot of time scouting remote public this Jan/Febr. I have three far southern IL properties targeted. Tried to pick the ones farthest from any cities.
LOL Greg, As long as there is no horse around, I should be okay.
Here Zim.. for you ..... at Kingsbury ..
http://chestertontribune.com/PoliceFireEmergency/deer_hunter_shoots_self_in_leg_a.htm
Hey Zim, the DUNES IS GUN/FIREARM ONLY !! .............. Properties where hunting is allowed by archery ONLY are Clifty Falls and Fort Harrison state parks, and Trine State Recreation Area.
Firearms allowed are the same that are allowed on State lands/F&W properties .. Slug Guns/ML's/Handguns and cowboy caliber-case length specific rifles ..
Firearm only? I can’t use my bow? I got some fine tuning to do learning about these IN special hunts. The military firearm hunts would not even display on my INDNR dashboard. Maybe because I only bought an archery permit? Don’t know. My Dunes notifications do not name any weapon type. Others do. Go figure. I don’t care much though. I expect to be doing all my future deer hunts in Illinois. Take advantage of the mass taxpayer exodus! I found quite a few public properties there with some kind of barrier to entry. Either no firearms, no nonresidents, no leaving stands up unattended, landlocked, etc. I do love Indiana for public land turkey though. Apparently not enough money in turkey for special interest group greased politicians to meddle with that. Conservative mgmt and I’ve found heavy bird populations in select places at a few properties. I am close enough to do leftover draws at all of them.
Nope, No bow in the Dunes, gun only ........ to apply for a State park reduction hunt all you need is a Indiana deer license, any type .... I quit doing the park hunts after 2013 (I killed a 160" 9 pt then), I dont like guys being packed in around me and I dont like being cut off ... I hunt to get away from humans, not to have one blasting 100 yds away from me who came in after I was already set up ..... some like 'em and I do see a need for 'em, but they aint for me ..... I used to do the bow hunts when they first started those at Clifty Falls and Fort Ben. they even did Shades with archery only the first year it was hunted, but switched Shades to firearm as not enough deer were being take there with archery gear... Shades is a beautiful park btw.... ... I killed deer at all these parks ....
3.3 miles and we kicked up only 1 cock pheasant. A bit windy.
Ended up getting one more pheasant, from Tri-County F&W Thursday. So 3/4 ain't bad. The wife and mother-in-law are very pleased. Scouted all day today at the Dunes for my Mon/Tues deer hunt. That should be a shootout. Chatted with the CO at the office and he agreed with me that the lotteries should not be free because that results in an abundance of no shows. And too many guys who really want to hunt, get left out.
