LOL... nice response.

Go back to your petting zoo and watch your livestock grown until they get big enough to shoot.

Here's one problem with HF places IMO....there is a local HF ranch that offers whitetail hunts. The acreage is a little over 3,000 acres, much larger than the "pen" type places, right? They boast a 95% success rate and take an averge of 60 bucks per year. I'm not sure whether they breed or buy/sell deer or not, which I also don't like, but 60 bucks taken annually on 3000 acres? It just ain't natural. And that combined with the advertised 95% success rate resembles shooting and not hunting.....but that's me.

I've been to several large and reputable HF ranches, one of which I could have taken something but declined. Quite frankly I was shocked at how easy it was to locate the game just riding through the ranch with a guide.

You guys shouldnt be insulting hunters that are hunting LEGALLY!!! Canned hunts are a different story.

By the way my lease is LOW FENCE

Hunting with corn or any type attractant, from an enclosed blind, or anything other than a spear is NOT HUNTING...

Are you reading what this guy is saying? Do you really think hunting 3,000-10,000 acres HF is in the same ballpark as a canned hunt? Have you ever spent much time on a place that big? I hunt close to 11,000 LF, and we do helicopter surveys every year, and most years we kill deer that the helicopter guys didn't get pics of. We kill deer that we never get trail cam pics of. We also get helicopter and trail cam pics of deer we never see. Hunting pressure and food sources have way more to do with how easy a deer is to kill than a fence.

When does it not become canned, 100 acres, 200, 1500, 15,000. Does the animal have to be born on the property, 1 year, 2nd generation deer. What is the difference really. And deer are my only gripe. If you are shooting an elk in Central Texas you know exactly what you are doing. People seem to want to justify deer.

A canned hunt has nothing to do with acreage. A HF doesn't make it a tame herd.

RockinU lookup canned hunt on wikipedia does not have to be tame. Simpily in an enclosed area to increase the likelyhood of success. Dictionary def is that is is raised on a game ranch until big enough to harvest. Highfence increases likelyhood of harvest, it is an enclosed area, its highfenced to allow these animals to reach a certain size. The more I think about it I think it is canned, some cans are just bigger than others.

A canned hunt is pick him out of a catalog, and go shoot him. A turn-out hunt, things of that magnitude. HF may increase the opportunity of killing a big mature deer because it may increase a deer's likelihood of reaching a mature age. It may increase the number of deer that reach a mature age to be killed. So I guess it does increase the likelihood of success by some definitions, but a wild deer on a HF place can and will still go nocturnal and take other measures to avoid hunters. A tame deer in a can environment will not. Big difference...

Not to the definition I read. What about an elk in central Texas, what about a black buck, or an Axis. Is this ok. Why do deer get separate treatment. You are holding the deer captive. You are trying to justify a position by saying its still not easy. I get that but it is not the same. You now they are there, they are not going anywhere. And just saying its legal, its my right does not make it ethical. Just because the herd is healthy does not make it ethical. Ethics are for each person to set for themselves and this does not meet my standard.

Couldn't have said it any better myself Tye.....I agree 100%

First of all, so what the definition you read...have you seen some of the junk on wikipedia? Elk in central Texas? Never hunted them, I want to hunt Elk where they are from, part of the experience. Other exotics, never been a fan myself, but for those that are...they know if they do it right or not, don't know much about the whole deal, but it's still apples and oranges, I'm talking about white-tails in their natural habitat. I hunt LF, and I know some of the deer that are there. I killed a 163" eight point that I have been passing on for 2 years...knew he was there, knew he wasn't going anywhere. Everyone that uses trail cams have an idea of what is there. Most mature bucks don't go anywhere anyway, they have an established territory, and there they stay. They have chased radio collared bucks long distances from their home range, and they always come back...just where is it that you think these deer want to go? On a big place the only deer that have to adjust their home ranges are the ones on the edges of the perimeter, and you logically probably loose half of them when the fence goes up, so it's a wash. You make it sound like people are hemming the deer up in the corner of the fence and shooting them...it's fine if it's not your deal, it's not mine either, it's also for neither of us to condemn the practice...as long as it's wild deer that is.

Wild being the key word.

I agree with that completely

You dont get it. If a man buys a ranch for 3 millon bucks spends 200000 on fence and another 400000 or what ever I dont care if he pens the deer he bought in a 1 acre plot and throws handgrandes in there a squeegys them into a hog trough. Its not one bit of your damm business. And for the post of driving throw a place that the game was everywhere. Maybe this guy hasnt been to a low fence place in many parts of tx that hasnt been properly managed. Theres ranchs that are like driveing threw africa. And there low fence.

Just admit it now dem or lib. If it looks like a duck Quacks like a duck its a duck.

Lifelong conservative. Since when have being conservative and having an opinion about what is sporting and not been mutualy exclusive.

What a guy spends does not make it right or wrong. If a place is mismanaged or not is not the point either. That is ends justify means. You are shooting captive animals. What is to get?

Not sure why anyone cares if someone else wants to hunt a high fence over low fence?? It IS up to the hunter and I don't care what others want to do. We are all hunters, but some got the cash and need to kill something big every year.

Most of us are hunters to spend quality time outdoors w/ family and friends and away from this city crap. A little wildgame on the table is another reward I really enjoy. If I'd add up all of the money I spend gearing up, ammo, gas, food, lodging, processing and the lease I got some pretty damn expensive 1lb vacuum sealed meat in the freezer. I would consider it GOLD if it weren't edible.

Can't we all just get along?

Take a gander in "The Journal of the Texas Throphy Hunters" magazine. Dr. Kroll wrote an article in this month about hunting being a sport or a recreation.

HF supporters will never get it, because they never learned how to actually go out and work for the game they wanted to kill. Stalking, Tracking, Studying Land Topography, Walking property for miles and miles during the off season, etc. The only thing they know is pouring more money into their hunting, then BAM the next thing they are on a HF hunting club where livestock is being raised to justify getting the big rack they want.

Yes you got the lib part part, it is actually Libertarian

Learning the land and and your quary are great things. I just think that your missing my point to respect the rights of others. I myself have spent a lifetime afield, doing many of the things youve mentioned. But not everyone has the time to do that. I have been fortunate to have 20 acre tanks to fish in but rarely do I love the challenge of finding fish in bigger impoundments. I myself cant go on hard physicaly demanding hunts any longer. But still find away to hunt deer. My point is theres hunters in other states that think the way you do about HF if you hunt feeders. I have known men that wont hunt in the snow and dont think much of hunters that take a trophy in it.All I ask is that as hunters we respect that right. Some would say its not a right its a privelage same as driveing. I think IMO its a god givin right over the dominon of wildlife. I will end it at that . GOOD HUNTING HF OR LF have a MERRY CHRISTMAS.

Like it takes a rocket scientist to figure out the habits of a whitetail deer, where the travel routes are, where the bedding areas are,where the feeding areas are etc. With the use of a night camera or walking the area, you can figure that out really quick.

Is hunting with an outfitter in New Mexico for an Elk on public land not hunting if you didn't do all the research or scouting? What about a Stone Sheep hunt in British Columbia with horses when you don't know how to saddle a horse or pack a sheep out? What about fishing offshore when you don't own a boat or know how to find the fish? Would anything caught or killed make it less of an experience? I wouldn't think so. You simply enjoy the time you spent doing it. It might cost the same as spending 4 days in Cancun, but you are hunting and not spending time on the beach sipping a margarita.

I support their right to hunt HF. I hunt LF, and it is doubtful many spend much more time scouting the off-season than I do, or walk too many more miles. I cover lots of miles during the season too...I just choose not to be narrow-minded, judgmental, and condescending.

Hunting a high fence is like hunting a zoo. C'mon guys. Lose the feeders and high fences and be a sport, just to see if you can do it. Ol' Bucky sez you can't and ain't got the huevos, stamina, and stalking experience, to do it.

I've done all of that, probably longer than you have. Hunting means as much to me as anyone.

What you don't seem to grasp is that every ranch that has a HF is not a game preserve, or a zoo, or whatever you want to call it. Many HF ranches have a lower deer/acre density than surrounding properties.

For about 20 years,I hunted a family place of about 500 acres in the Hill Country. I shot 4 does every year and never saw a buck over 1.5 years old. The neighbors on all sides shot anything with horns. The place was crawling with malnurished does and young bucks. And the flora suffered because of it.

Many HF's are put up to control this type of problem. A HF is a tool, it is not evil. It does not define canned hunts, nor does lack of a HF guarantee fair chase.

Most of us here can agree that canned hunts stink. What I don't understand is why some of you seem to think that a HF is the ONLY factor which determines whether a hunt is "good enough", or "tough enough" to be a "real hunt". I have been on LF ranches where you could ride around in a pickup and mature 10 point bucks would lay under a mesquite tree 15 feet off the road and watch you drive by. But I guess I could have stuck my rifle out the window and shot one, and I would be a mighty "real hunter" 'cause I got him on a LF ranch.